crop circle question

[TheDiddleyMan]

Hey! Does anybody know about this kind of evidence that the paranormal is occurring in crop circles - namely magnetic energy type stuff?


scientific evidence (http://www.cccrn.ca/thephenomenon.html#scientificevidence)

Thanks

Kevin

[Corona688]

Crop circles aren't anything supernatural. They're not even mysterious anymore, in fact, they're a business (http://www.circlemakers.org/)...

[iridium]

They faked and amazingly easy to make, the one who started it of in the UK admitted it and took a newspaper reporter with them one night and made a really intrictae one in front of him, next day UFO theories and all sorts flying about. Same everywhere else I'd guess

[TheDiddleyMan]

I do appreciate the replies very much, but they did not address my question - perhaps I should have formulated it more clearly. I know that crop circles can be duplicated and I know about the hoax stuff (obviously you guys may not have known that - so thanks for the links) but I have never heard anything like what was found on the above stuff - that crop circles have different kind of anamolies associated with them, like magnetic energy or whatever......

Thanks again,

Kevin

[McGargoyle]

And you believe this because a website states it?
Because it cites a "Research" Institute founded to find evidence of the paranormal by a guy who believes in the supernatural origins of crop circles?
The "peer-reviewed" "scientific" journals they have published their papers in are published by organisations such as the Society of Scientific Exploration, whose mission statement begins with:
The primary goal of the international Society for Scientific Exploration (SSE) is to provide a professional forum for presentations, criticism, and debate concerning topics which are for various reasons ignored or studied inadequately within mainstream science. A secondary goal is to promote improved understanding of those factors that unnecessarily limit the scope of scientific inquiry, such as sociological constraints, restrictive world views, hidden theoretical assumptions, and the temptation to convert prevailing theory into prevailing dogma.
Which could have been copied verbatim from a creatonist "research" institute.
The whole thing sounds and smells fishy, even if it is about plants.

[TheDiddleyMan]

Originally posted by McGargoyle
And you believe this because a website states it?
Because it cites a "Research" Institute founded to find evidence of the paranormal by a guy who believes in the supernatural origins of crop circles?
The "peer-reviewed" "scientific" journals they have published their papers in are published by organisations such as the Society of Scientific Exploration, whose mission statement begins with:

Which could have been copied verbatim from a creatonist "research" institute.
The whole thing sounds and smells fishy, even if it is about plants.

lol, no I don't believe simply because it says it on the site. I don't consider myself a believer in the paranormal. Neither do I believe what I read on skeptical sites simply because it is on a skeptical site. However, upon reading what that site says and having never heard such arguments for paranormal activity, I thought I would inquire a bit. But apparently that makes me gullible or stupid or something....so maybe I'll just read Skeptical Inquiry magazine or the stuff on CSICOP and not bother reading anything else, as that might actually make me want to investigate things for myself :rolleyes:


Kevin

[McGargoyle]

Originally posted by TheDiddleyMan
However, upon reading what that site says and having never heard such arguments for paranormal activity...
Then, I guess, you haven't heard about many alleged paranormal phenomena, because these arguments are pretty standard.
I thought I would inquire a bit.
Good! Checking the credentials of the cited institute, would have been a good start, in fact, that's all I did; it set off an all-out bullshit-alert.
But apparently that makes me gullible or stupid or something.
Not at all.
...so maybe I'll just read Skeptical Inquiry magazine or the stuff on CSICOP and not bother reading anything else, as that might actually make me want to investigate things for myself :rolleyes:
No, I should think that reading Skeptical Inquirer would make someone want to investigate things for oneself. Read it, learn the methods, find out what clues usually point to a claim being bullshit.
Then read about "scientific evidence" for paranormal claims, and apply said methods.

[TheDiddleyMan]

YOU:Then, I guess, you haven't heard about many alleged paranormal phenomena, because these arguments are pretty standard.


ME: Well, then perhaps linking me to or elaborating upon a standard reply would help answer my question?

Look, In all my admittedly rather minimal examination of crop circles (namely Carl Sagan's book "Demon Haunted World" - only a few paragraphs IIRC and looking at the crop circle makers site) I have yet to see these arguments presented or rebutted. I was under the impression that the argument for the paranormalness of crop circles was from the design characterists -e.g. too complicated to be human, and the fact that they were done in a very small amount of time. To be honest, this is the first time I have ever read an argument for crop circles directly from a proponent - before this, I have just read the rebuttals and never gone to the source. Well, I read the source, found something new and I was looking for some rebuttal material, and I thought that perhaps here people would know where to look, as opposed to me doing a bunch of internet searches (at which I have never had great results). In fact, a quick search by me revealed (nameles at CSICOPs crop circle area) no rebuttals to arguments of this type. Hence my asking the question here.

YOU: Good! Checking the credentials of the cited institute, would have been a good start, in fact, that's all I did; it set off an all-out bullshit-alert.

ME: Look, to be frank, my bullshit alert went off too. I really don't believe that there is any paranormal activity involved here. But credentials or lack of them don't prove that an argument is false - I am interested in seeing my query addressed directly rather somebody saying "Well, he looks like a fruit-cake." Could well be true, but many fruit cakes have made sound arguments before and many smart men have been duped. So, really, I am back at the same spot where I started (though I do appreciate your taking the time to discuss things.)

I think I will email CSICOP directly.

Kevin

[anthrosciguy]

The problem is that this tactic is often seen in pseudoscience and fringe stuff (as others have stated already). So they throw out this stuff and say "what explains this" or "why don't scientists have an explanation for this". The first question you have to ask is "is what they're saying real or accurate?" before you even get into possible explanations. I've seen this again and again in my critiques of the "aquatic ape" theory, where they continually ask why scientists don't have explanations for similarities in features -- but when you look at the supposed similarities they're bogus. So of course there's no explanation for how they came about -- they didn't come about, they aren't real. Then you see a few things that are real and they have extremely prosaic explanations, and of course you see other things that contradict the pseudo's thesis and of course they are ignored by those pseudos. And that's par for the course.

I went through a couple of long threads on another forum (The Hall of Maat) a few months back on crop circles and found loads of nonsense being spouted by proponents (and lots of evasion). I was also suprised to find just how big a business crop circles are -- some tour companies are making hundreds of thousands of dollars every year from crop circles, and they pay the farmers. It's overall a multi-million dollar business.

Here's a few figures I picked up at that time from tour companies' web sites:

******
"We get special permission from the farmers so you can personally walk through their fields and step into the Crop Circles to experience the thrilling vortex of energy that created them."

Think the farmers are letting them do this for free?

"Enter and research crop formations with Lucy Pringle, noted British researcher, author and crop circle lecturer"

Think Lucy is donating 10 days of her time? You get to walk through the fields here too -- think the farmers are letting them do this for free?
8 people on tour times $2,195 each equals $17,560 per tour.

"Chet & Kallista Snow also lead a 10-person group, 7-night tour to Wiltshire, England, each July"
also
"We know where the best ones are and can take you inside the circles"

Again, think the farmers are letting them do this for free?
This quote is from a £1550/person tour (£175 single supplement):
"we visit the crop circle sites with three avid researchers - John Michell, George Wingfield and Jurgen Kronig having gained prior permission from the farmer."

Again farmers and researchers doing this for free -- ya think?

For $2093 per person:
"We will enter select formations that have formed in the fields that summer"

Farmers -- free? etc. they also say that "we can only bring 24 people on each tour"
$2093 times 24 people times 2 tours in 2004 equals $100,464.
*******

So if you were a farmer and could work all year to make X-dollars, or work one night and make the same (or even let someone else do the work), would you be tempted? I would, although I'd hope my basic decency would prevent me from duping gullible people that way (I guess that's also why I'm not a rich televangelist). There are also lots of hoaxers, and even incidents where "researchers" (the "respected crop circle researchers") have declared circles to be genuine and unfakeable when the circles in question where made by humans in front of television cameras. So anything you see done by a crop circle "researcher" should be held suspect until they start doing a decent job of it -- at which point I'm afraid their "evidence" will evaporate.

BTW, here's a joke I wrote about aliens and crop circles at that time; I like it and hope you do too:

A spaceship is hovering over a Canadian field; inside an argument starts.

"Oohtak you imbecile, can't you navigate? We're at some out of the way planet again."

"Hey, I'll have you know my navigation skills are pretty damned good.�

"Well, maybe if they were better than 'pretty damned good' we could make a warp jump and end up at home for once instead of places like this. What are we going to do while our engines recharge?"

"We could make a crop circle."

"Oohtak, you devil, you mean you're one of those behind all those crop circles? They've got people guessing all over the galaxy."

"One of many, Elrood. What do you say, you up for making one?"

"Sure, how do we do it? Plasma vortex backdraft from our environmental pod generators?"

"Nothing like that."

"How then?"

"Well, first we need a length of rope and a board..."

[McGargoyle]

Originally posted by TheDiddleyMan
So, really, I am back at the same spot where I started (though I do appreciate your taking the time to discuss things.)

I think I will email CSICOP directly.
That would be probably be best. I'm not really qualified to refute specific arguments, all I'm able to do is recognize the standard pattern when there is attempted bullshitting afoot.
I apologize for being so sarcastic.

[Corona688]

Originally posted by anthrosciguy
BTW, here's a joke I wrote about aliens and crop circles at that time; I like it and hope you do too: LOL. Can I quote that? :D

[anthrosciguy]

Originally posted by Corona688
LOL. Can I quote that? :D

Sure. Throw in a credit if you can - glad you liked it.

BTW, the "pretty darned good" bit was a reference to a crop circle researcher who claimed that a Canadian circle was genuine because its orientation was "almost exactly on an east/west axis and the accuracy is “pretty damned good.� It struck me that the accuracy would have be better than "pretty damned good" to be an indication of "genuineness", as if an earth person hoaxer couldn't make a "pretty damn" accurate circle. Here's the relevant part of the news story on that circle:

Some of the people who visited the farm suggested that the crop formations are the work of hoaxers with boards tied to their feet.
Experts disagree
Matt Rock, of the Canadian Crop Circle Research Network (CCCRN), said he’s been to five real crop circle formations and added the Hensall formation is genuine. “It’s real. I don’t think it’s a hoax.�
Rock said the circles have been positioned almost exactly on an east/west axis and the accuracy is “pretty damned good.�

[Deadbeat]

A big part of the problem with finding specific rebuttals to sites like that are that the claims themselves are so vague and poorly documented as to make a direct rebuttal impossible.

For instance, take this snippet:
In some cases, otherwise normal seed pods are found to be empty (no seed development at all). These effects are not reproduceable by conventional hoaxing methods (ie. boards, rope, feet, etc.), and have been found in simple circles as well as some of the much more complex patterns. Test circles made by researchers for comparison purposes and known man-made formations do not show these kinds of pronounced changes.

Before anyone could possibly begin to refute this, they'd need much more information.

a) How many of the crop circles studies showed this kind of abnormality? What percentage of the total number of circles studied displayed similar anomalies?

b) What were the environmental conditions on the night the circles appeared? How long were the circles in the field before they were studied? Did they duplicate these conditions exactly when they made their test circles? Just how tight were their controls?

c) Have the seed pods been studied by botanists and determined to be specifically different, or do they just look cool?

And that's just off the top of my head. I also know from experience that you can study the wheat in one field, hop over a fence to another and find all kinds of things changed. Even within a single field (which can be several acres), you can find different species, strange mutations, and tiny insect infestations that only affect a couple hundred stalks out of hundreds of thousands.

Basically, they make a lot of claims, but they don't offer any specific proof as to why their claims are true. And it's hard to refute the claim without being able to dispute the specific evidence.

But here are some easy ones.
Infra-red photography has also shown increased heat signatures in the region of flattened crop in some formations.

Flattened wheat produces and stores heat more efficiently than standing grain.

Other types of [Balls of Light] are those found often in photographs taken in or near formations, either film or digital although primarily with digital cameras, mostly at night although sometimes in daytime photos as well.

Digital cameras are notoriously bad for producing hot spots and strange lighting effects, especially when the settings aren't perfect. Even regular film can produce the effects in non-circle environments simply by using the wrong shutter speed. The problem with this piece of evidence is that they are conveniently ignoring the same thing when it occurs in normal settings, with no paranormal overtones.

In 1998, several formations in England were found to contain dead flies adhered to the plant stalks, which were dehydrated as if they had been 'baked', consistent with the involvement of some form of microwave-type energy. Smaller insects inside the seed pods were also dead. Flies and other insects outside of the formations were normal.

Insects crushed and then left to bake in the sun for a day or two. I'd be surprised if they weren't there.

My favorite question to ask "circle researchers" is to ask how they identify a "genuine" crop circle from a hoaxed one if they haven't been told yet.

[TheDiddleyMan]

Deadbeat, that is some good stuff you got going. Thank you very much - that is exactly what I was looking for :) Same goes to you anthrosciguy.

And no need to apologize McGargoyle....I appreciate you taking the time to respond.

Just thought I'd say that :)

Actually, this whole thing got started because some people from cccrn are giving a lecture at my library. don't think I'll go though....except maybe to add a bit of critiquing to the whole process :)


Kevin

[Mike Rosoft]

Hey! Does anybody know about this kind of evidence that the paranormal is occurring in crop circles - namely magnetic energy type stuff?

The best thing about these anomalies is that they appear even in the demonstrably fake circles. There is a Czech circlemaking group (http://circlemakers.astronomy.cz/), and they list what sort of claims the ufologists have made about circles made by them:

- Strange lights appear at the circle.
- Animals (dogs) avoid the area.
- A trans-dimensional energy substance has been found there (whatever it is).
- If the circle were made by humans, they would have to use antigravity. (Even though there was a tractor track leading right into the circle!)


Mike Rosoft

[Marduk]

There was a show on Discover where they got 4 MIT grad students to make a crop circle, they had to meet 4 conditions:
Do it at night, I think they were given 5 hours
Make a simple design
Duplicate the anomalies found at ‘real’ circles; an even distribution of iron particles 1 micron or less around the circle and a ‘bursting’ of the crops at the point where they bend over but don’t break

They even got graded by their advisors, the one gave an A- the other was a bit of a prick and only gave them a C. They built an iron filing spraying flame thrower thing that didn’t work right so they had to resort to a Fe spraying bomb, they also built some microwave dispersing contraption to get the bursting effect on the crops. They succeeded with just minutes left so the one advisor gave them a good grade A-, the more fussy Prof. complained that the Fe particles and ‘bursting’ were not done evenly and in correct proportions so he gave the lower grade, a C I think. It was an interesting show.
Though it’s almost certain that the complex circles are done by hoaxers, the simple circles have been around since the 17th cent. Then called ‘Pixy Circles’, the best explanation so far seems to do with the vast amounts of underground water in parts of England & some elctro-magnetic phenomena.