The Crop circle reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004
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Crop circle

Crop circles are areas of a grain or similar crop that have been systematically flattened to form various geometric patterns that began appearing in England in the late 1970s. One popular belief among a certain segment of the public is that crop circles are created by flying saucers landing in a farmer's field and flattening a neat circle of the crop—however the increasing complexity (not to mention the implausibility of the idea that beings from another planet would travel all the way to Earth and then be unable to figure out a better course of action than vandalizing some poor farmer's field) of formations makes this theory seem unlikely. Others hypothesise that these formations are sniggles or hoaxes engineered by humans. While some farmers view them as vandalism others gain revenue from charging viewers. People who study crop circle phenomenon sometimes humorously call themselves "cerealogists". Many crop circles have fine intricate detail, regular symmetry and careful composition. Some have inspired the discovery of new theorems of Euclidean geometry[1].

Early examples of this phenomenon were usually simple circular patterns of various sizes, which led some people to speculate that it was a natural phenomenon, but in recent years complex geometric patterns have emerged. A popular explanation among flying saucer cultists is that they are either formed by extraterrestrial spaceship landings themselves or by spaceships hovering over the field to form complex patterns that contain codified messages. However for the more scientifically oriented researchers, ideas relating to cymatics (the visualisation of vibration or sound) seems to provide a more plausible explanation. The patterns produced being the 2-dimensional geometric or visual representation of the frequencies, with higher sound frequencies producing more complex shapes similar to both mandalas and crop circle designs. Other ideas on their formation have been proposed include; tornadoes, freak wind patterns, ball lightning, and something called "plasma vortices".

Mainstream scientists, disagreeing with the cereologists, have come to the conclusion that, as far as can be determined, the phenomenon is purely and solely the result of human beings playing pranks; this hypothesis has the advantage of not requiring us to first assume the existence of flying saucers and aliens.

In the summer of 2002 Signs, a Sci-fi movie about crop circles which was directed by M. Night Shyamalan (the author and director of Sixth Sense) was released and attributed sinister motives to extra terrestrials in forming the circles.

Most scientists are skeptical of unconventional interpretations, preferring the guidance of Occam's Razor, which would favor a mundane explanation like human activity. However a number of witnesses have claimed to have observed circles being created, saying that it takes a few seconds and the corn falls flat like a fan being opened. Crop circle enthusiasts, though they do not always have scientific background or credentials, claim that there are other features of crop circles that undercut the hoax theory. They say that bends in the corn in many circles occur just below a joint, while the flattening of the corn by hoaxers produces a crack at any point in the stem, and some scientific studies on apical nodes bear them out. Also the flattened corn often lies in groomed layers, rather than random crushings. While there have been cases in which believers declared cropcircles to be 'the real thing', only to be confronted soon after with the people who created the circle and documented the fraud, the bending issue remains in dispute. For this reason, skeptics prefer the explanation there are simply different hoaxers employing different techniques and note that some crop circles photographs were simply created with photo-editing software such as Adobe Photoshop.

Not long after WWII, aerial archaeological surveys were made over large areas of Britain. They photographed ripening crops to reveal crop marks, the differential ripening of the crop revealing differences in the subsoil caused by the buried remnants of ancient buildings. Though many previously unsuspected archaeological sites were found, no crop circles were ever recorded. Skeptics argue this points to circles as a modern phenomenon; believers reply different agendas may simply be at work in the modern day.

A decade after the phenomena began, two men announced that many crop circles were a hoax of their doing. Doug Bower and Dave Chorley argued that they had been making crop circles since 1978 using planks, rope, hats and wire as their only tools. Doug and Dave stated to reporters that a small group of people can stomp down a sizeable area of crop in a single night. "Stomp" does not mean using the feet: simple tools to make crop circles have been described. [1]. However Doug and Dave would often retract their claims of which circles they hoaxed, and when confronted and asked to provide details relating to the geometric relationships of certain crop circles they would merely reply "oh we didn't do that one". This sparked controversy that they were merely trying to confuse the issue and in so doing made crop circles seen as a 'fringe' or 'esoteric' field of research, because the sort of people who have a religious need to believe in things like "crop circles" and loathe Occam's Razor.

Many subsequent crop circle makers have claimed that making what self-appointed cerealogist experts state are "unfakeable" crop circles is easy. One such cerealogist, G. Terence Meaden, was filmed claiming that a crop circle was genuine when the night before the making of that crop circle by humans was filmed. On the night of July 11-12, 1992, a crop-circle making competition, for a prize of several thousand pounds (partly funded by the Arthur Koestler Foundation), was held in Berkshire. The winning entry was produced by three helicopter engineers, using rope, PVC pipe, a trestle and a ladder. Another competitor used a small garden roller, a plank and some rope. The size and complexity of the designs produced demonstrated the minimal equipment and preparation required to produce a crop design, lending even more credence to the hypothesis that this phenomenon is purely and solely the result of humans playing pranks.

Scientific American published an article by Matt Ridley (August 2002, p. 25), who started making crop circles in Texas in 1991. He wrote about how easy it is to develop techniques using simple tools that can easily fool (later) observers. He reported on "expert" sources such the Wall Street Journal who had been easily fooled, and mused about why people want to believe supernatural explanations for phenomena that are not yet explained.

Methods to create a hoaxed crop circles have been well-documented on the Internet. A counter argument to hoaxing is that circles often appears in crops mature-enough that they carry seeds, seed-pods are unbroken, whereas trampling causes seed-pod breakage. Crop circle hoaxers counter that it is easy to leave dry seed pods unbroken during stomping and also leave no trace of entrance and egress trampling when the plants and ground are both dry and some care is taken while walking. Several crop circles that were later to have been determined to be hoaxes were at first certified as being genuine by cerealogists due the lack of seed pod breakage. Entry to a field without leaving traces is also easy, since there always are several tracks made by the machines used to spray insecticides on the crop that people can use.

Farmers tend as a rule to be unhappy with crop circles, as they prevent the harvest of grain that has been flattened. Occasionally, perpetrators have damaged fences or other parts of farms on which they have trespassed. However people who visit the circles claim enchantment, healing, and a variety of phenomena, so whether these events are wonderful or terrible depends on particular points of view and how much one believes the farmer in question did not desire the attention.

This said, there remain stubbornly odd phenomena around the circles. Some circles have occurred in waist-high thistle fields that would have discouraged the most ardent hoaxer, and there exist rigorous detailed scientific studies (see link below) examining apical node elongations and X-ray crystal diffractions in circle soil versus unaffected soil which indicate statistically near-impossible non-thermal high-energy effects. 



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