Crop Circles

[naomi24]

Following wendilla's question about the latest ufo sightings, many new and intricate crop circles have appeared recently. Is there a connection, and if not, how can we explain them?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/how aboutthat/2144652/Most-complex-crop-circle-eve r-discovered-in-British-fields.html

http://www.lucypringle.co.uk/photos/2008/jun.s html

[squarebear]

Crops circles were exposed some years ago as an elaborate hoax.

[naomi24]

Do you have any idea how they're created, in the dark and in such a short space of time? It seems they appear overnight.

[claymore]

Like Mulder said..." I want to believe". How elaborate can it get before it starts to look like there just might be more to these things than meets the eye?

[squarebear]

Yes, it was a group of guys who flattened down the straw with planks. Once, they had been exposed, the crop circles stopped.

[WaldoMcFroog]

To be honest, the pi one is a piece of the proverbial to explain.

You can work out the mechanics of it in advance very easily.

All you need is the person in the centre holding the string to have a protractor and Bob's yer oncle!

[andrea81]

They are a work of art, really cleverly done! But I don't believe by any UFO!

If you think of how complex man made buildings and structures are, we can surely believe that man can make these things too!

Beautiful though!

[naomi24]

It's easy enough to work out the mechanics, but it's the time factor that puzzles me. They're so intricate and so precise, and often cover quite a large area, so I really can't see how they're done with a plank of wood, a bit of string, and a protractor, in the dark and in such a short space of time - and if the area was illuminated, surely by now someone would have spotted at least one of them being created.

Having said that, I knew a roguish farmer who thought he'd make a few bob by creating a very simple crop circle and charging people to see it, but he did it over the course of a day or two in daylight - and it was very, very simple indeed - and not terribly precise. Nothing like these things. Incidentally, his little scheme hit the rocks when he called a TV station and his girlfriend took fright and put a stop to it!

[chakka35]

naomi, I am puzzled by your puzzlement. Whoever made these designs would have required the necessary amount of time. And since they undoubtedly exist, that time must have been found somehow.
One needs to know, in each individual case, how much time was available and then experiment to find a method by which the design could have been finished in that time.

[squarebear]

It wasn't just one bloke. There were dozens of these guys at each circle. It was all over the news a few years ago.

[aka pixi]

werent the guys who admitted to making the crop circles challenged to make one overnight and couldnt do it? Im sure I read that somewhere.

I have also read that crop circles often appear in fields with rape in them and the formations dont break the plant stem, yet apparently if rape is bent at more than 45 degrees it snaps. In man made circles in rape fields the stems do break.

[pug100]

There's a good article here if you're interested

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crop_circle

[naomi24]

Hello Chakka, old bean. I'm puzzled by your lack of puzzlement. These things have appeared overnight in June, so we know how much time was available to produce them. Since they are complete, that amount of time was clearly sufficient to finish the job The questions that remain are 'how were they completed within a few hours' - and 'who dunnit'? Curiouser and curiouser.

[squarebear]

From the wiki article:

"....Many circles are known to be man-made, such as those created by Doug Bower, Dave Chorley, and John Lundberg, and a 2000 study into circle hoaxing concluded that 80 percent of UK circles were definitely man-made...."

[naomi24]

Thanks for the link, pug. I'll read it in depth later, but it's interesting to note that a study found 80% of those in England to be man-made. Wonder what conclusions it drew on the other 20%?

[squarebear]

80% DEFINITELY man made so 20% PROBABLY man made.

As crop circles stopped appearing after these guys came forward I would assume that 100% are man made.

[aka pixi]

I think some crop circles are man made, Ive seen lots of photos of really shabby crappy circles that look like someone has knocked them out, Ive also seen ones that are made for advertising, but I dont think all of them are made this way.

The julia set ones (think thats what they are called) are really complicated, I cant believe anyone could make these overnight, some circles cover areas of thousands of square feet, could this really be possible that people could do that overnight?

[squarebear]

Yes it was all exposed a few years ago. Am I talking to myself here?

[WaldoMcFroog]

There's an interview here with a guy about the Julia sets.

http://www.circlemakers.org/la.html

Crop circles are amazing works of art but that's all they are.

[aka pixi]

cheers waldo, i enjoyed reading that but im still not convinced...I get that the person who reported it may not have seen it the first time but I honestly dont see how 3 people can make 149 circles, some of them over 60 feet across and probably in the dark in less than 3 hours. The formation also measured 915 feet along its spine. To me that just doesnt seem possible.

It is possible however that I have misread the article and the times, sizes I have said are wrong, if thats the case then ignore me lol