SUBJECT: SOME MORE ABOUT CROP CIRCLES FILE: UFO2214 5] I have a feeling that it may be a misconception to think that it's raw power that sends a beam of light so far and so neatly. It may be that a coherent beam need not actually burn the plants; perhaps part of the test is one of adjusting power as well. Message #746 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Jeff Stuart 350 Date: 09-08-91 03:25:49 Subject: Circles There is an erratic crop circle thread on Compuserve; National Issues forum, Paranormal section (9?). There are a couple of Englishmen on it who report new apports timelily. Message #747 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Jeff Stuart 350 To: Tim Curnen 92 Date: 09-08-91 11:58:56 Subject: Livelier ideas How about this: If the crop circles are demonstrations of a human technology, money had to be spent. It was probably money from SDI, mingled in with other sincere/misguided/ calculated efforts. So Ronald Reagan made the crop circles. Or this: If the crop circles are a product of U.S. military technology, and were, in fact, related to the targeting systems used in the Kuwaiti liberation, to put a little proof in the pudding... knowledge of that system may have been the straw that broke the back of the Soviet Union. The New World Order made the crop circles. Actually, by "livelier," I'm going to guess you mean more imaginative, farther out there in the realms of SETI/UFOs/E.T.s/ mystic/Druidic/Stonehengic stuff. That's a lot of wish fulfillment. People desperately want something magical and special to happen, preferably to them, and the circles are a perfect mirror of their dreams. However, if the SABAROFF.COM utility et. al. are correct, the circles are evidence of a powerful, possibly world- dominating device, and that's a whole lot spookier than most people can handle. Thanks for the Compuserve tip - it'll be checked out. JS Message #748 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Duane Poole 447 To: Crop Circle Fanciers... Date: 09-09-91 09:56:58 Subject: Hoaxers step forward I saw a brief piece on the CBS Morning News this a.m. about a couple of men in England who've stepped forward to say that they're the ones behind what they refer to as "this hoax." I tuned in just after they explained how they've been doing it, but in time to hear them say it was just getting out of hand and they felt they had to 'fess up. Oddly, this confession itself sounded like a hoax -- or perhaps I just assumed that, having spent the last week or so reading through the fascinating theories put forth on this forum. Can it really come down to two men tromping through the fields at night? Did anyone else see this piece and get the whole story? D. Message #749 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Tim Curnen 92 To: Duane Poole 447 Date: 09-09-91 11:21:48 Subject: Crop Circles CNN ran a similar story this morning, adding to the fun. These guys could be for real, or they could be a couple of geezers having a little fun with the press. CNN interviewed a scientist who's heavily invested in crop circle speculation, and he said that he won't believe the "hoaxsters" unless they are willing to go on TV and demonstrate how they did it. Tim Message #750 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Jeff Stuart 350 To: Circle Watch Date: 09-09-91 12:32:39 Subject: More on the Hoaxers There was a report on National Public Radio this morning, between 8:00 and 8:30 AM PDT, which stated that two men had come forward to admit they were responsible for making the crop circles, using flat boards of some kind. They claimed they've been making the circles for over ten years, and that they were finally "tired of everyone else making money [from the circles] but them." I was preoccupied with Coldwater Canyon traffic at the time and can't recall the names. The story will probably be repeated on other news services. Of course, given the kind of paranoid slip knots we've been talking about on this thread, this admission may be one more form of disinformation, intentional or not, to keep more investigation to a minimum. And, of course, the circles should stop appearing now. I don't really want them to, but they should... Two guys finally show up, cop to the gig, and I still don't believe it. Sigh. I must be a member of the WGA. JS Message #751 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Gil Evans 31 To: Cropsters Date: 09-09-91 12:49:53 Subject: A hoax!? Damn... Let's see them duplicate it on Prime Time Live! Message #754 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Peter A. Lake 430 To: Gil Evans 31 Date: 09-09-91 13:04:32 Subject: Hoax I heard one of the hoaxers this AM on CNN. He said that they had taken most of their inspiration from art books c. 1900-1920. One of the figures was a Mandlebrot equation, however, unknown at that time. -pal Message #755 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: all Date: 09-09-91 17:47:30 Subject: In case no one else saw it, ABC News presented a solution to the crop circles tonight: two artists, middle- aged men, who working from little diagrams on scraps of paper walk about in the middle of the night with home-made treaders or rollers, scape out the designs. It would be pleasant and conducive to the peace of our minds if this indeed were the solution. But I would ask a few questions: 1/ These men are identified as "artists". Do we know where they come from and do we have other examples of their art? Do they have their own documentation of their work? This sort of performance piece does not spring full-blown from the artistic souls of white-collar or blue-collar functionaries. 2/ The single example of how they did it showed only a single circle and a portion of a line -- they didn't go so far as to reproduce any of their other designs. 3/ The design they said they worked from gave no indication of scale. How did they determine scale, working together? How did they maintain precise angles and preciser curves with apparatus comprised of a board hung around their necks on a rope. Symmetry that is exact over the area of a soccer field is difficult to maintain. 4/ How did they evade detection of watchdogs, and the alarms of other animals? 5/ How did they work silently together, how did they reproduce a freehand sketch with only their unequal foot-strides as measurement to give such intricate and careful designs? Operating not only silently, but without light or guide-lines? 6/ How did they reproduce designs following invisible ley lines, yet against visible field lines -- as if they had arranged living room furniture with reference to true north rather than according to the room's walls? 7/ How did they manage more than one field in a night? Producing two of their most complicated designs? 8/ The designs are based on a number of different sources, most of them English or Keltic? It would be interesting to see the range of the actual books or sources for their designs. 9/If they began simply and close to home, then the normal tendency would be to radiate the scope and placement of their work. The work only moved westward. What compelled this decision? 10/ With instruments that are meters wide how did they manage to bend individual stalks in a spiral pattern at the interior of circles? 11/ Would they please to reproduce one of their patterns, during the day? If these two artists are the genuine cause of the crop circles, they should be able to answer all of the above questions. And if they wish to claim credit for the circles and designs, then they ought to be anxious to do so. What they do show, quite convincingly, is how the stalks are bent not broken. I find his act kind of astonighing, too, but then, I always did. I remember at the Sportsman's Lodge rally we were talking and I asked him if it weren't time to contact the AFL-CIO and suggest a national boycott of cassettes and movies as a way of showing union muscle. His response? "You don't want to get into that, do ya?" Well, yes...... F. Message #756 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Philip S. Spencer 881 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-09-91 23:09:04 Subject: People claiming credit On a 2-year old BBC tape I have there's a group that deliberately set out to fake the crop circles - just the plain simple ones - and then they called in the experts. Almost to a man they said these were fakes. Bob's suggestion that masers or other beam weapons are "melting" the wheat is still more likely then these guys being for real. The biggest question is "how do/did you get the wheat to lie down like that?". It certainly wasn't trampled or raked. Philip Message #757 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Peter A. Lake 430 To: Philip S. Spencer 881 Date: 09-10-91 00:00:50 Subject: Crop Circles I'm pleased to announce that the Science and Health Forum moderator has stuck out his scaly tongue at all those who thought the crop circles came from outer space. I believe those old guys and I bet they had one hell of a good time making those circles. This opinion is purely that of the management, which will be pleased to see further entries which try to make a case for high-tech weaponry manufacturing what was actually done with a board and piece of rope and bit of ingenuity. While I thoroughly enjoyed all the postings here I must say that I thought they were a crock re the crop circles. Sorry, guys. I know you put in a lot of effort trying to figure thisone out, but I have far less trouble believing the new explanation rather than the fantastic theories. As pieces of sci-fi, though, all the messages here were first-rate and I hope no one will be put off by this personal view. --Mr. Lizard Message #758 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Peter A. Lake 430 Date: 09-10-91 00:58:33 Subject: Your opinion (on the crop circles) Is NOT shared only by "the management". The thread should be preserved as a wonderfully entertaining parable on "epicyclic" nature of conspiracy thinking, and the simple prosaic elegance of the truth. Message #759 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Peter A. Lake 430 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-10-91 03:56:41 Subject: Preserving the thread I also think it should be preserved for its considerable entertainment value. Some of the best reading on the BBS, IMHO. --pal Message #760 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Peter A. Lake 430 Date: 09-10-91 04:06:36 Subject: Mr Lizard's Credulity You will be pleased to be reassured to hear that the equipment also included a baseball cap with a hole in it through which a piece of twisted wire formed a gun-site to align with the horizon in order to make straight lines. It was not indicated what was used to illuminate the horizon at dead of night. Or what happened when there were trees or hills in the way. And moonless nights are very black in that part of England. Message #762 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry & The Liz Date: 09-10-91 05:16:38 Subject: Immortality Seriously, disagreements aside, I'm pleased to have partici- pated in a thread which was an enjoyable read, regardless of the position taken re content. I'm also delighted that you consider it worth archiving. Many people asked good questions and made wonderful contributions, dissenters, too. Uh... stay tuned, folks. Bob Message #763 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Participants in the Crop Circle Thread Date: 09-10-91 05:21:19 Subject: Seeking Fame and Glory I can't believe this thread went all the way back to #693... There is a desire to upload the thread to one or more CompuServe forums - paranormal and straight. This would mean a global "read." I hope that all who participated will consider granting permission, to me and to the BBS Committee, before this is even considered. It doesn't address any "issues" per se, and in the context of the "M" forum in no way can be construed as the Guild or the BBS taking any position on an "issue." If you don't want your posting even considered, if you would like it included - names deleted from the headers or not, please let me know, preferably in a public posting. Having looked around some of "serious" forums on CIS, such as SPACE, etc., I was intrigued to find a number of messages in a number of section referring the message sender to ISSUES/PARANORMAL. There is a lot of interest, apparently, and a lot of discussion - pro and con - on the current hoax gig. If you're willing to be including in such a posting, or if you're not, please let me know. I posted a procedural question on "O", and welcome any feedback from any BBS Committee members who might have feelings on the subject. It'll all be by the book, if at all. Feedback is strongly desired. The points of view here are also absent from the CIS discussion, and why not put them on the table? Why not toss a rock in the pond? Bob Message #765 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Gil Evans 31 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-10-91 08:59:01 Subject: Lake's opinion about crop circles is one of the few I'm proud to share with him :-). Saw these great Limey jokesters on TV this morning. They had video of their technique: a four-foot piece of wood with a string attached to both ends. These guys made a circle, then they brought in one of the "experts" (accroding to the LA Times) who declared it real. But... The same experts, who have stuck their necks out with all these whacko theories, are *still unwilling to believe that this is a hoax! Talk about firmly held beliefs...it's no wonder communism, or the flat earth theory, lasted as long as it did! Message #766 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Gil Evans 31 To: Gil Evans 31 Date: 09-10-91 09:04:21 Subject: Oh, yeah... These blokes were *artists*! Message #767 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Gil Evans 31 Date: 09-10-91 10:52:19 Subject: Unwillingness to believe it's a hoax I guess there are also some folks who think the Amazing Randi is really a double agent for all those psychics out there who'd prefer to keep their dark powers under wraps. One of the neat things about conspiracy theories is that you can turn ANYTHING to your advantage: any disproof becomes only a further indicator of the magnitude of the conpsiracy. Message #768 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-10-91 10:56:29 Subject: But.... Far be it for me to turn down a chance at pixelic immortality. So let me throw my two cents in concerning something that's been bothering me (Columbo reading optional): if the crop circles WERE the result of weapons testing, why wouldn't the military have simply set up a site somewhere in the middle of nowhere, on land they owned, where they could check the results with ease, unhindered by locals, and unthreatened by the potential for exposure? Message #769 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Fred Haines 161 To: Larry Brand Date: 09-10-91 11:38:34 Subject: suspension of disbelief I'm as unwilling to believe that the crop circles were a hoax as I was and am to believe that they were caused by weather, testing of advanced military hardware, or Extraterrestrial Biological Entities in flying saucers. Until more proof is in, I remain equally skeptical of all explanations. If they really are a hoax, it shouldn't be too long before sufficient proof is available. The circles were studied not only by crazed amateurs, but by teams of university-based scientists, and it shouldn't take some of these people long to determine whether the explanation proposed by Doug Bower and Dave Chorly meets all of the desiderata. If Bower and Chorly are indeed responsible, they are very great artists indeed. It's easy for the sophisticated to sneer at the needs of ordinary people for romance, mystery, and magic in their lives, but it is, as those of us who toil to create it through fiction know all too well, very much harder to satisfy those needs. If Bower and Chorly made the circles, they created a work of art which reached into the depths of the myths of our time to fascinate and spellbind a huge international audience, including both the naive and the sophisticated, over many years. I hope they did do it - and, if they did, my hat's off to them. Message #771 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Sheldon Keller 78 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-10-91 12:02:08 Subject: Your message 758 I truly enjoy your postings on the BBS, Larry Brand - Half the time I don't know what the you're saying, but you do say it with panache and brio ...(Coincidentally, those are my attorneys as well) ... Best, SBK Message #772 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-10-91 12:49:47 Subject: Why England? If the crop circles had appeared in eastern Montana, say, or Saskatchewan, they might have remained undiscovered for some time, but not forever. But appearing there, it would have been fairly obvious that it was satellite work. But to do it in England? Where there's a history of such? And a history of pranksters? And where those who really are studying the circles can mask their work in the crowds of New Agers? Where there is the greatest potential for disinformational activity? Where, when it appears that some people are getting uncomfortably close to the real answer, you can pull two chuckly old English eccentrics out of the band box to cry aloud, "Hey I guess we fooled you guys!" To the infinite relief of those who are comfortable to think that conspiracies exist only in our past; and that there are no conspiracies today, only paranoid delusions. Message #773 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Fred Haines 161 Date: 09-10-91 13:03:48 Subject: I didn't mean to imply That I accept without proof that these two characters are responsible for the phenomena. Only that it's a far more likely scenario than most, and when the truth IS uncovered, it will probably be a simple and prosaic one. And as far as those science guys are concerned, bear in mind how many of them were fooled by the likes of Uri Geller -- and later complained that they didn't THINK he would CHEAT! Message #774 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-10-91 13:08:36 Subject: You're illustrating my point That ANY evidence to the contrary is merely used to "demonstrate" how truly sophisticated and wide-spread the conspiracy really is. By that reasoning, all those nice photos from space showing a spherical planet PROVE how deep the conspiracy runs to prevent us from ever finding out that the earth is really flat. Message #775 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Jeff Stuart 350 To: Circlers Date: 09-10-91 13:54:50 Subject: Update The SABAROFF.COM utility graciously provided me with the latest Compuserve postings on the circles and the hoaxers. Briefly: 1. Different news services have decidedly different attitudes on the revealed hoax. The story on NBC (owned by General Electric) was basically, okay, mystery solved, everyone go home. There was more perceived skepticism on ABC and other feeds. 2 Given the sheer number and size of the circles, and given the fact that 30 circles allegedly appeared all in *one night* sometime in 1990, there is ample room for disbelief that these two gents are alone responsible for everything, and that disbelief is being expressed. It is being expressed by people who *want* the circles to be UFO paw prints, of course. The sound of dreams shattering is not pleasant. Of course, here at Temple Beth Doubt It, we're keeping an open mind. JS Message #777 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Durnford King 745 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-10-91 15:07:14 Subject: Paranoid delusions........... Having just returned from Western Canada I must tell you that the papers were full of reports of the same phenomena last week. Perhaps it's a virus that's spreading. *DK Message #781 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Ian Abrams 910 To: All Date: 09-10-91 20:26:17 Subject: The Amazing Frauds Anyone interested in learning about the gullibility of scientists when encountering a determined con artist should AT ONCE read two books by Martin Gardner: "Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science" and "Science: Good, Bad and Bogus." Great reads about all branches of pseudoscience. Message #782 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Ian Abrams 910 To: All Date: 09-10-91 20:27:52 Subject: Crop Circles and Hoaxters: A Precedent Anybody remember the story of von Meegerin? My memory for details here is a bit hazy, but it's something like this: V.M. was an art forger in Holland in the 30's who specialized in Rembrandts-- an artist of whom there are a notoriously large number of uncatalogued paintings. Van Meegerin would bake his canvases to age them a few centuries overnight, and made a fortune selling ersatz old masters. Anyway, after WWII, he started to resume his trade, and was promptly arrested-- and accused of, not selling phony Rembrandts, but selling *real* Rembrandts which were supposed to have been looted from Dutch collections by the Nazis. In other words, V.M. was accused of having been a Nazi collaborator now cashing in. In order to clear himself of the collaboration charge, V.M. had to reveal that he was, instead, the master forger of the century-- which he was barely unable to do, because the experts who'd vetted all his phony Rembrandts as the real thing in the 30's were now unwilling to admit they'd been duped... Anybody know more about this story? I can't even remember how it came out. Message #783 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-10-91 20:35:06 Subject: However... First, welcome to pixelic immortality. After I log off (I still need my Read Since Flag), I'll post the message numbers) in which Ian Abrams raised those very questions, and several, not all by me, which offered answers to it. Which is not to say it isn't a perfectly valid question. If you do a Scan Back and pick up Ian's entry, then check out Michael McDowell's riposte, you'll see it's been covered. I'll still send the appropriate numbers. (I hate Scan Back, myself...) I'd do it now, but I'm low on time. Bob Message #784 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Fred Haines 161 Date: 09-10-91 20:41:31 Subject: Addendum (crop circles) Fred, there were simultaneous "advanced" design happenings in several fields at the same time, separated by miles. There have also been happenings in fields which were under surveillance by night vision equipment and thermographic devices. There are still others, which if the total linear length is measures, add up to a total line length of over 900 (some more) yards. In the CIS threads I found, including tabloid quotes "MYSTERY SOLVED!", the reactions are generally contemptuous and refer to the artists as "No way these bozos could have..." etc. Bob Message #785 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-10-91 20:54:41 Subject: your question Larry, when I posted the prior, I hadn't yet read ahead and found the responses following your posting. Just as a general FYI for those who are getting here late, the thread begins with #693. Bob Message #786 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Jim Houghton 649 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-10-91 20:59:26 Subject: This thread You say that crop circles happened in fields that were under observation by night-vision devices and thermographic sensors? What, pray tell, did they see? Message #797 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-11-91 01:47:23 Subject: The point, in science, as in conspiracy theories Is that one must offer PROOF, or, at the very least, compelling evidence. But to simply assert that every fact that contradicts your assumptions only "proves" another layer of the conspiracy is reminiscent of the Ptolemeians simply adding another "epicycle" onto their scheme every time an astronomical observation indicated that the far simpler, if heretical, notion of a sun-centered solar system was closer to the truth. Message #799 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Jim Houghton 649 Date: 09-11-91 03:15:54 Subject: What the night vision and thermographic sensors saw. Nada. Zip. Just new circles in the morning. This is one of the reasons I lean toward masers as opposed to lasers - presuming the exposure and the effect are closely connected in time. But then, I have no idea how many units of heat a laser would have produced, relative to the sensitivity of the devices. They would have seen any warm blooded critter taller than a wheatstalk, however. Even shorter, maybe. Bob Message #801 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-11-91 04:06:16 Subject: Proof in Science Earlier on this forum, I posted a long message positing a number of questions I had about these men's claims. If they could answer them satisfactorily, I would be pleased and unashamed to declare that no conspiracy exists. But it is just as unscientific to accept an unsubstantiated claim -- or at any rate a claim that has provided for proof a couple of small circles done during day, and the testimony of the two men themselves. Your conjecture has no more been proved than mine. It will be interesting to see what becomes of these two men; and it would be interesting to know where they sprang from. One from Australia, I hear, from the time certain circles appeared there. If your conjecture is true, then it is obvious what happened. But if my conjecture is true, then it is equally obvious that this man's job is to follow the circles. Or it might be a coincidence, or someone might have made that bit of information up. How will the British gov't react? Trespass. A public nuisance. Fraud. Causing unnecessary expenditure of pounds. I have a feeling the gov't will bluster a bit at the beginning, with rhetoric about the wounded dignity of the nation, the cruel slaps against the beliefs of sincere people, involving everyone in a pointless hoax -- and then I believe they will do nothing. Mr Sabaroff ought to back me up or knock me down here, for his is the honed mind in this matter. One of the tests of a theory is the ability to make predictions. And so I add the above paragraph, which makes sense if I am right. I am all for the scientific method. As a tool. Not as a screen. Message #802 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-11-91 04:39:53 Subject: The point, in science, as in conspiracy theories Larry, it sometimes happens that something new is noticed, is an actual happening, leaving us with a single fact - the fact remaining that the fact remains. The fact being the happening. Sometimes it happens that this newly noticed happening requires that we ask what is happening. Many options get put forth, the simplest first, and as they become less tenable than other options, they are put aside and we move on to other options. Some of these are conspiratorial, but if there weren't conspiracy freaks, who would protect the world from conspiracies? The circle thread is not about "proofs," which are only as good as yesterday's data base - not about hoaxes, but about something which is happening which needs to be put to rest. Jeff Stuart put it very well when he changed the word "hoax" to "stunt." Somebody's doing it, and however whoever's doing the whatever, it's a helluva stunt. Precluding options by diagnosing conjecturers as conjurers went out with Benjamin Franklin, not to mention Einstein. I haven't read anybody as asserting facts which contradicts one's presumptions "proves" another layer of the conspiracy. What I am reading, and am gratified by, is that people are brainstorming freely and seeking pattern recognition. Pattern is not conspiracy. It is just pattern. Invoking the Ptolemaian (aic?) "epicycle" rap re seeking the simplest, albeit heretical solution as the truth of a sun- centered solar system is, to be as merciful as possible, engraving angels on the head of a pin. I thought we *were* seeking the most simple possible solution. That's what real science does. To me, SDI seems like the simplest possible solution. An exploration of its "doability" compared to other simple solutions must, by nature, involve exploring a lot of the known science which makes it a viable option. As I said in a prior, I really hope I'm wrong. But PROOF of anything is a process of elimination, and in the end only exists on paper, until some new surprise requires that a previously asked question be asked again. To learn that what one considers the fundamentals are riddled with bull, that tomorrow's Obvious may be today's Invisible - this is the stuff of creative inquiry. Many bright, sincere practitioners of a variety of disciplines suffer only the fear that their fundamentals will be undermined by the successful demonstration (as close as we can come to "proof") that some basic questions need to be asked again. There is much value in negative truth - learning what isn't true. Without it, we wouldn't learn diddly, and revisionist/conspiratorial/paranoids would still be heretics. Bob Message #803 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-11-91 05:12:50 Subject: Proof in science. Michael, conjecture about the reaction of the Brits to all this is one of the more fascinating things I'm waiting to see take form. The scientific method of analyzing their reaction requires that certain questions be resolved first, or their reaction is meaningless on the face of it, whatever it is. Presuming the SDI scenario for the moment, are they involved? I'm inclined to think they would have to be, because that presents a simpler scenario. Is the proximity of the Greenwich Observatory to the area an asset, considering the importance of its location to accurate terrestrial mapping. It sits on what we call the Greenwich Meridian, designated as 0 degrees because that location is one of the world's few, where true north and magnetic north tend to remain the same. It also contains a lot of the position plotting computers already in uplink to the satellites by which shipping and air traffic receive direct readout of their geographic po- sition, to very high accuracy. So there is a potentially useful technology, uniquely British, also present in the pattern under discussion. Of course, to some, this just adds another layer to an already incredible conspiracy. To others, it's another piece that might or might not fit the pattern whose leads we must follow. I also doubt that a geosynchronous satellite or set of linked satellites could operate over southern England un- detected. The Brits have a lock on radar technology. I think some archeologists are going to be very pissed off if their choice sites get ed up. Who's to blame them? At the risk of sounding paranoid and conspiratorial, an Anglo-American (and maybe other) co-venture seems like the simplest speculation. I wait by your side for the cover stories and/or reactions that will emerge if this speculation of ours enters the main stream of discussion on the matter - which is not yet the case. I anticipate some laughers, until the implications set in. All the more reason to get it on the public table ASAP. Bob Message #806 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Michael and Bob Date: 09-11-91 10:07:09 Subject: Reasoning, circular and otherwise As I've said before, I DON'T take these two codgers at their word any more than I would Uri Geller. At the very least they could certainly be a couple of garden variety non- conspiratorial publicity seekers. I'll await evidence to make a judgement. As far as the scientific criterion of "making predictions" is concerned, here's my problem with conspiracy thinking: it can make any prediction it wants, but it holds open the option of finding ANY result acceptable to its thesis. For example, were these two guys to produce detailed maps, plans, travel ticket receipts, and a home video of them MAKING the damn things, you could still say, "See? This only shows how deep the conspiracy goes." Bob, as you well know, any credible scientific theory allows for the potential of "disprovaility". So let me throw it back to you: what evidence could turn up that would cause you to reassess your theory, and not simply add another layer to the conspiracy? Message #808 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Jeff Stuart 350 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-11-91 11:56:42 Subject: Conspiracies The late Mae Brussell, the queen of conspiracies, used to broadcast a show called World Watch from a hippie radio station in Carmel. Much of what she had to say was based in valid research, clipping stories, tracking individuals as they moved around the government, etc. She was absolutely dead on about Watergate a day or two after the break-in. The problem was, Mae went overboard. Every event fell into her cosmology. No prominent political figure simply "died." She would see a cliche like "white knight" in a newspaper article and infer that it was a code phrase for the CIA, stuff like that. So her credibility suffered. To take fresh information and incorporate it into an ongoing cogent theory is not necessarily going overboard. Virtually nobody is buying the media jive that the Quaint English Eccentrics did all the circles all by themselves. That means all options are still open. The only wild-eyed conspiracy person in this thread is me, and that's because I'm linking a discussion about possible technologies to a series of possibly unrelated current events. I'm the one playing with international motives and implications, and I apologize if that in any way clouded the issue. My own reservations about the theory that have had to do with technology and secrecy. Those reservations are pretty much gone now - apparently the means, the manpower, and the back channels neccessary all do exist. It's just not pleasant to think they exist. That's when the implication machine kicks in, because nobody would go to that much trouble just to doodle on the lawn. So to speak. And, whatever the crop circles do turn out to be, there are still technologies we (the public "we") don't know about yet, there are people deployed all over this planet doing stuff unknown to us, and those back channels do exist and will continue to do so. Of that I am more than certain. JS Message #809 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Jeff Stuart 350 Date: 09-11-91 13:24:12 Subject: Mae and Watergate One of my favorite lines of all time: just because you're paranoid doesn't mean people aren't really out to get you. Message #810 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Peter A. Lake 430 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-11-91 14:01:04 Subject: And the converse.... Just because you're not paranoid doesn't mean people are not out to get you. (or is that the inverse? Logicians, please....) -pal Message #812 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-11-91 18:00:30 Subject: What evidence would turn up? If they could reproduce one of their more complicated figures in daylight and silence and a length of time comparale to what they would have had on the night the figure actually appeared. It's why cold fusion claims have mostly died out -- lack of reproducibility of the first claims. I don't embrace conspiracies because I like conspiracies -- God knows I abhor them. I only accept a conspiracy theory if it is the best explanation for a series of pheneomena. If all simple explanations for something are ruled out, then the remaining explanation, no matter how complex or unlikely, must be the real one. Message #813 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-11-91 18:12:35 Subject: Even closer than the Greenwich Observatory is the former National Observatory of England, located in the beloved home of Augustus Hare. (I forget what the country house is called.) Abruptly a few years ago, the British Government announced that it was closing the place down. They did so. The house, on large grounds, is located in the middle of all the activity. I do not know if it was National Trust. Message #814 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Peter A. Lake 430 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-11-91 19:58:25 Subject: Greenwich Observatory I thought it had shut down. There is no more Greenwich Mean Time, for example. Now it's Universal Standard Time and I thought that when GMT went out the observatory also went. --pal Message #821 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-12-91 04:14:07 Subject: What evidence would cause me to reassess my theory? A staged demonstration that accounts for all the extant realities. That would satisfy me, and put my mind totally to rest. A revue of the circle thread offers a pretty good list of situations that would have to be duplicated. If this is done, I will happily concede the point. The worst possible case will have been eliminated. I will no longer have to worry about the Manhattan Project of the 21st Century hanging over my head. I hope you get a chance to study the detailed photos and scientifically documented multiple events. If you do, I trust you to at least grant that such a demonstration would be a tall order. At least my theory offers a means of doing it, by technology already conceded to exist. Surely you can't believe I hope I'm right about this. But unless the option is seriously examined, we'll never know. So far it has not been, to my knowledge, except here. Let me ask you one, Larry? On what grounds would you exclude my theory from the menu of options, given that I'm willing to concede "some of the above," on a "happening by happening" basis? Bob Message #822 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Peter A. Lake 430 Date: 09-12-91 04:31:37 Subject: inverse and converse I love 'em both. Either way it makes paranoia look like one hell of a useful Natural Selector for survival, huh? Bob Message #824 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-12-91 04:34:56 Subject: National Observatory closed down...? Located in the middle of the activity...? A new datum for the puzzle. I hadn't known that. Rather than seem to seize on this new information to further my conspiracy theory, I'll leave it on the table as yet another bean on the Go board. One of the things that tends to reinforce conspiracy theories that are true, is the way one thing leads to another. When I mentioned the Greenwich Observatory's possible function, I didn't know it would lead to yet another parallel element. I wonder of that's where Professors A, B and C (pondered in someone's prior) are living. It must be lovely there. Thanks, Michael. Bob Message #825 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Peter A. Lake 430 Date: 09-12-91 04:51:51 Subject: Greenwich Observatory I think they only shut down the observatory part, as in "telescopes." There is still an operational facility there not unlike our Bureau of Standards, and it does house a number of operational mainframes networked into the global navigation system. They also have classified sections, which wasn't the case when I visited the place in the '70's. Even then, it was far more than an observatory. The site is still also a benchmark for what is probably the best mapping service in the world, the British Ordnance Sur- vey. Bob Message #826 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Gil Evans 31 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-12-91 09:04:07 Subject: The great Etch-A-Sketch in the sky Just a thought, Bobby, but even *if* these wacky Limeys can prove they did make all the crop circles...and you're satisfied that SDI wasn't responsible...that doesn't mean that there *isn't* some hideous death ray over your head, does it? It only means that the ray wasn't responsible for the crop circles (which is most probably the case anyway). Ahhhhhaahhahahahhhhh! Message #828 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-12-91 10:33:28 Subject: At this point I'm an agnostic On both your theory AND the two fellas' tall tale. (Technically speaking, of course, "agnostic" is not an accurate description, since I believe eventually we WILL know the answer.) The single most implausible part of your theory remains the notion that the government wouldn't simply set up a test site on its own land, and avoid all the potential for exposure. I apologize for not going back through all the messages, and would greatly appreciate you clarifying this one aspect. Michael's explanation looked a bit along the lines of "epicyclic" conspiracy thinking, when logic would dictate that a true conspiracy would try to keep things as simple and private as possible. Message #829 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-12-91 18:37:05 Subject: Epicyclic Thinking My understanding of epicyclic thinking is a little different from yours. It was with Ptolemaic astronomy as it is now with the Big Bang: you start out with a nice reasonable, elegant theory that explains a great deal more than was ever explained before. But then new evidence comes forward which contradicts that theory, so an adjustment is made -- the inflationary period of the universe at about what? 10e- 35 sec or so. Then we learn about the bubbles and the voids, so we have to posit a mass to the neutrino, or believe that the very heavy Higgs Bosom exists in incredible numbers, or that there is cold dark matter out there sufficient to solve our problems. The originally simple theory gets tweaked and pinched and buffeted and fitted with artificial limbs to the point that it is far beyond simplicity or elegance. That's epicyclic thinking. Beyond saying that there are masers and lasers shooting down beams of coherent light from geosynchronous satellites, we've not had to make any revisions. But those who posit the two guys are already saying, "Well they started it and did the important ones, but obviously other hoaxsters were getting in on the act as well. And these guys aren't really so attractive as solutions, but it was obviously something like this, right?" That's epicyclic thinking. I also am not sure why you think that the government would want to keep things simple. The government most often wants things very complicated. Layers upon layers of deceit and coverup and fingerposts that point you in the wrong direction. Was selling arms to Iran in order to fund the Contras a straightforward transaction? Message #830 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-12-91 18:51:23 Subject: Shutting down the observatory No, no, no. You're talking about Greenwich. I'm talking about Hurstmonceaux, an 18th-century country house in south- central England which for many years was the Royal Observatory. Just a few years ago, the gov't announced that Hurstmonceaux was being shut down, and that the property would be sold, telescope and observatory intact. This seemed strange to me because Hurstmonceaux had long been a National Trust property, and those places are only rented to those willing to show off their interesting homes to the occasional horde. I never saw an announcement of what happened with it. This is what I meant when I said that this observatory was in the middle of the region of the crop circles. Message #832 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-12-91 20:06:06 Subject: Epicycles etc. My point is that one may either begin with a DOGMA (e.g., a conspiracy exists, or the earth is the center of the universe), in which case every contradictory bit of data must be accomodated by an increasingly unwieldy set of assertions (a new layer of the conspiracy, or a new Ptolemaic epicycle); or one begins with a THEORY, which is subject to refutability, and, if the facts warrant, may be replaced by a new theory. Now, unless you've got witnesses or documents to back up your assertions, your reasoning is merely speculative, which of course is fine. But it would be spurious to claim, for example, that your LACK of witnesses and documents only PROVED a conspiracy must be afoot. And others may find the speculations of a more earthbound origin to the phenomenon somewhat more plausible. Message #833 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-12-91 22:46:53 Subject: Crop Circles I did not begin with dogma. I worked through this in July in Compuserve. People put up theories, and for me there are very obvious reasons these causes were not plausible. The nearest that I came to anything remotely satisfying (for myself) was that the patterns replicated something that was under the ground, some military project long abandoned. (These fields were also used in World War II for secret landing fields, for disguised hangars, and for fake runways, and for disguised flight path signals.) Also the conspiracy part of this is merely an adjunct to the central question of what causes the patterns. I believe as Mr Sabaroff suggested first: masers and lasers lodged in geosynchronous satellites. That is the solution that we are embracing. If this is so, then there has to be a reason we have never been told this. Conspiracy here is only of issue if we are right about the real cause. Proving or disproving the conspiracy is a misleading exercise. At most it is helpful only to point out that there have indeed been secret military enterprises in the past, and those were kept secret with a fair number of people being privy to parts of the whole. Good God! How many Americans knew about Los Alamos? Yet there were thousands of people directly involved with it. Satellites and crop circles are small (but elegant) potatoes when compared with the government's wish, attempt, and success to keep secret most of the atomic bomb tests it conducted above ground. When it comes to physical phenomena, atomic bombs aren't exactly on the diddly end of the scale. I believe we are only positing the equivalent or even less stringent amount of secrecy round the masers and the lasers and the quivering grasses. Message #834 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-13-91 01:29:17 Subject: Encryption, Gov't Standards, Committee Recommendations Now, here is a new situation for everyone to cut some teeth on. Or perhaps there are many who will see in this nothing at all for comment. Our government has been slothful when it comes to the devising of national standards: we can't get together on HDTV, there are no standards for cellular phones, none for computer operating systems (and there was a time when such a standard was eagerly sought by the community), and we should be on the metric system now -- but the government decided to freeze all the funds that were to be used to implement it. With this in mind, I was very surprised to learn today that a governmental commission had come up with some very specific recommendations for national standards on an issue I consider less important than any of those above. The issue: computer data encryption. As things stand now, encryption is in a very good state, by using two different keys, one of which is secret between sender and receiver, and another which can be public. This allows not only for the encoding of data and message, but can also guarantee the authenticity of the sender's "signature". I have read no dissent to the evaluation of this public key encryption: it will not be solvable in our lifetime. This encryption is available on PCTools (as PCSecure), and this little program is capable of meeting the encryption and destruction standards of the US Department of Energy, and it cannot be exported. Our encryption standards committee, however, has recommended a different method of encryption, one based on the calculation of discrete logarithms. It is acknowledged to be not as secure as the public key method; it has not even been extensively tested yet; and at present, no one actually uses it. If this becomes standard, then any encryption required to meet government standards will actually be less secure than those which do not have to meet federal standards. Now, you may look at this as another example of puzzling bureaucratic inefficiency. But I see patterns here, and a not-very-well-hidden agenda. When I first heard of this, I said to myself, the CIA or the NSA is in this mix. Someone had to give a push to get this standard proposed before other committees on national standards could even get a Sub-Committee Interim Report on much larger issues. And even bureaucratic stupidity can't make a Committee on Security say that they recommend a standard than is less secure and untested from what we have now. Unless the purpose is to make encryption a crackable code. To me this makes sense if I think of information-gathering agencies who are distressed to find old sources drying up. If they are unable to crack a code that I use even to encode a file I upload to USR2USR, then they are missing out on a lot. They want to be able to understand what they eavesdrop on. In their position, I might well do what I could to turn back the clock. Oh yes, and I was right: for the Committee acknowledges with gratitude the assistance provided them by representatives of the National Security Agency. Message #835 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Gil Evans 31 Date: 09-13-91 04:59:28 Subject: Etch-A-Sketch in the sky Well, Gil, that about sums it up. Being a conspiracy freak has it's downside. I may be a little paranoid, but I'm not into S & M. At least not M. If those wacky Limeys actually blow me away I'll stop taking my Prozak and go back to the "1" forum. But then... you're right. It won't mean there isn't still a death ray hanging over my head, will it...? AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!! Message #836 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-13-91 05:05:58 Subject: three observatory monte Thanks for the clarification, Michael. Where's that damn eraser... Bob Message #837 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-13-91 06:24:22 Subject: The circles, why there? (part I of II) Larry, the question you raise about "why there" is a good one and deserves repetition. These are exerpts from larger messages. which also deal with your question. I refer you also to Jeff's #743, in which he gives all the information necessary to find the one high quality book of good photographs I've seen, and which is referred to in some of the messages as "the CCCS" book. He refers to it also in #693. My use of terms like "weirdo" and "freaks" isn't meant to ridicule those with a more metaphysical bent. In re-reading the stuff, I wish I'd phrased it differently, but those connotations are part of why the location works so well. #698 (me to Jeff Stuart) ~~~~ Stonehenge marks the crossing of *many* major ley lines. This, plus the overwhelming linguistic evidence of the older place names at major intersections of leys and where they lead, has brought a lot of what academia calls its "weirdo fringe" (real, credentialed scientists) into the study of this stuff since Watkins first published on it in the '20's. It also brought out the druid-freaks, the New Wavers, and the old guard students of the paranormal. Given the nature of the crop circles, and their placement, this would have been predictable. So, in dealing with such a delicate matter in which peoples' faiths and cosmologies are confirmed or challenged, depending where they sit, what better place to make crop circles than inside a hundred mile circle with Stonehenge at the center, where a 4K year tradition of them is already in place. The rules of evidence become unmanageable. "It's an old story, you see..." A brilliant cover for a new story. #714 (me to Ian Abrams) ~~~~ When remote test sites are used, even those on military property, there is usually a lot of ground and air movement to those sites to analyze them. Being able to place the test range in a place where such activity is already going on, and with muddled reasons, gives a very convenient cloak to analysis. Nothing unusual takes place. Except for the ground markings, of course. #716 (Jeff Stuart to Ian Abrams) ~~~~ ...The Wiltshire area already had a history of circles in the fields which the locals knew about. There is a reproduction in the CCCS book of an English pamphlet dated *1678* that describes a "mowing devil," with a woodcut so similar to the modern circles that it leaves me a little chilly when I look at it. There is evidence that wind spouts do touch down in the area and leave crude circular impressions. There are also rings on the ground that are the afterimage of ancient stuctures, burial mounds, henges, fortified sites, and so on. Mingling the new circles with the old ones in an area w.k. for historical weirdness would be very elegant camouflage. (CONT'D) Message #838 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-13-91 06:27:27 Subject: Why there & technological footnotes (II) (CONT'D) #734 (me to Ted Lang and Gil Evans) ~~~~ Ted, you're right about the antiquity of corn disturbances in that region, and it goes back much further than 100 years. One of the pictures in Jeff's book that gave us both the creeps was a 16th or 17th century woodcut of a diabolical creature with a scythe, mowing an elliptical swath in a wheat field, with the same pattern of layover. It even had a traditional name - something like "crop demon." I hope Jeff will correct me. Such a phenomenon, were it really rare, could be accounted for by as the brief touchdown of a strong whirlwind, like a dust devil. (Interesting parallel nomenclature.) All the more reinforcement for the power of the local mythology already in place, to be exploited as a confounder. #745 (Michael McDowell to me) ~~~~ ... Every question that is raised about other possible solutions is a proof that the choice of England / Wiltshire / Stonehenge was the cleverest possible. The phenomenon was immediately and inextricably confused with millinnea of mystic plausibilities. If these same patterns appeared in a single county of a single US state, would there be any question that they were of military origin? The sincere mystics and spiritists are providing a campaign of disinformation that money could not buy -- though I find interesting the possibility that the lavishly produced coffee table book was so free of suggesting human agency. ------------------------- For questions and answers about the technologies which might be involved - technologies which do currently exist, try #'s 698, 699, 700, 701, 706, 731, 733, 734, 735, 737, 741, and 745, #'s 734 and 735 are my own compressions of the technology aspects of the thread, with some independent confirmations from Michael McDowell in #745 which made my day. The other messages are full of the good questions which are so necessary to organizing pertinent answers. I appreciate your inquiry, Larry. Those themes could use some back-referencing now, given the time this has all been forming up. Bob Message #839 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Elisberg 456 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-13-91 09:24:27 Subject: Encryption and govt standards Knowing as little as I do about this subject, my question might have no basis in reality. However -- Just because the govt standards are lower than they are now, wouldn't it not only be possible, but likely that private software companies will sell encryption programs which are marketed -- in blazing letters -- "BEATS GOVERNMENT STANDARDS!"? Bob Message #848 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-14-91 01:03:42 Subject: In under the Compuserve wire? Some might see in the existence of similar artifacts from earlier eras the perfect "cover" for a military conspiracy. Others might simply cite them as prima facie evidence that a technology significantly inferior to that of SDI is sufficient to account for the phenomena; and that now, as then, a couple of guys stomping on the wheat and sighting along the horizon is a far more likely scenario than lasers and masers shot from satellites. Message #850 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-14-91 01:24:45 Subject: Under the wire. That's what's so neat about this thread. It boils down to relative likelihoods. Like you said in a prior, when a qualified "agnostic," I agree that whatever's happening, we WILL eventually solve it. It would conform to the history of inquiry if it turned out to be "none of the above." Bob Message #853 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Elisberg 456 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-14-91 20:49:36 Subject: Crop circles I think this discussion is interesting. I don't know what the truth is about them. Bob Message #857 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Bob Elisberg 456 Date: 09-14-91 23:44:56 Subject: What the truth is about the interesting crop circles. Finding out is what this is all about, Bob. If everybody comes away with your concisely stated reaction, it'll be a big step. Bob Message #862 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Ed Mann 58 To: Bob Elisberg Date: 09-15-91 11:30:31 Subject: Crop Circles I have watched this discussion with interest. I am probably the only one who knows the truth. I lived in England for many years and through friends met White Witches in Devon, who revealed to me all about mystic circles, ley lines, etc. The circles are made by elves. Yes, there's no doubt. Many people have seen these little men in Lincoln Green darting about in the forest making mischief. That is the salient fact. These creatures are PRANKSTERS. They are always up to tricks and games to torment humans. "Doth circles and symbols lay midst thy crops and fodder, beist dwarfen and faeries at play." Message #868 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: all Date: 09-16-91 00:27:12 Subject: New Info In the past few days I have done a little research into the literature of crop circles, and have come up with some information that is new, that is interesting, that is peculiar, and that is available on the various Compuserve databases. I'll give here some of the highlights -- I'm sorry, but copyright prevents me from uploading the articles and reviews en masse. First, regarding Herstmonceaux Castle that I had mentioned. Bob Sabaroff was right, and so was I. This was the home of the Royal Greenwich Observatory for 40 years. It was sold in 1988 to James Developments, who announced plans to turn it into a golf course and country club. Nothing came of this. In 1990 it was put up for sale again, and the two bidders were Kyoto Broadcasting and an unidentified group of American investors. The Americans won the bid, but failed to come up with the cash. There is now no buyer, and since 1988 the obversatory and castle, in the midst of extensive grounds, have been unoccupied. There have been protests against the government's inept handling of this sale, claiming that initially the property was grossly underpriced. Second, regarding the Hoaxters. The crop circle that they reproduced was not actually documented -- there is no videotape of their work on that circle nor on any other. They are no longer granting interviews, and have not been questioned by crop circle experts. They left England the day before yesterday, embarked on a world tour sponsored by Rupert Murdoch. Speakers at the Crop Circle "Cornference" last week saw this as possibly more sinister than an attempt to sell more of Murdoch's newspapers. "Looking at the way the British Army hoaxed a circle last year in order to get rid of the media attention, they feel that there is some intelligence Service involvement in this." Third, a few statistics. (I know that I neglected to think these through and perhaps others did as well.) Crop circles of course require crops to be seen. This pretty much limits them to the English growing season, which for these cereals is approximately mid-June to late September - - generously, 120 days. In 1990 there were 710 recorded crop circles, which means just about 6 every night, 7 nights a week for the entire growing season. This suggests several things. The schedule is too much for two retired men to accomplish. But let us suppose that all of these circles were hoaxes -- how many hoaxters does it take to accomplish this startling feat? And can that many hoaxters all work with the same nuances of technique? (Where are they practicing and training?) And who are these hoaxters that they are so silent when others claim credit? England is a very small country -- the size of Alabama, in fact -- and this region is only a couple of counties. Ventura and Los Angeles counties would be a good approximation of size, I would think. What large-scale human movement can be hidden on this small scale? Even if you could have it all done by six highly-trained crop commandoes, you're going to need a central planning committee to map out possible fields, someone to make assignments, and making contingency provision for finding fields under surveillance. Other than the various groupings of military researchers, the only people bizarrely imaginative enough to orchestrate something like this are involved in investigating the phenomena. In an upcoming message: The Scientific Explanations and Research into Columnar Microwave Radiation... Message #869 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Stanley Sheff 86 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-16-91 01:09:41 Subject: Hoaxes Have you considered the possiblity that there could be a community of hoax perpetrators? Just because the method is currently unkown does not indicate any supernatural or high- tech explantation. I firmly maintain the source of the circles is human, and a trick. Not unlike a group of magicians keeping their secrets to themselves. To those outside the group, the circles look weird and mysterious, but to those in the know, I'm sure it's all a big laugh. This all reminds me of the file NIGHTMARE ALLEY, and how easy it is to hook a sucker into the spook racket. Stanley Message #870 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-16-91 05:07:37 Subject: Circles. Michael, the 20/20 piece includes footage of the British soldiers hoaxing one. In Jeff Stuart's book, a copy of which I'll have within days, is included that very same circle. That's the book which makes no reference to human origin. Kyoto Broadcasting...? I'm looking forward to the next installment. Bob Message #872 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Jeff Stuart 350 To: Circle Fans Date: 09-16-91 15:35:48 Subject: Summaries R Us We have deduced that, given the sheer quantity and placement of the circles, more than a single set of two perpetrators is necessary. Even those among us who opine that all the circles are made by humans, physically, on the ground, can accede to that point. For the other hoax teams to remain silent while two and only two people grab the press limelight seems to go awry from the usual human expectations. Rival hoax teams would naturally want to claim their share of the glory, unless we are talking about a) shy, deferential, altruistic hoaxers willing to work for no credit, or b) individuals who would prefer to remain unknown. Meanwhile, given the ever-tightening news budgets of the major media, it is logical to assume that the English Eccentrics effectively put the story to bed in this country. No one has the bucks to follow up on a shaggy dog item. JS Message #875 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: all Date: 09-17-91 03:03:41 Subject: Scientific Investigations of Crop Circles Now, on to the scientific studies that have been conducted, and the theories that have been put forward. Terence Meaden, "Britain's chief circleologist", argues that the circles are caused by small whirlwinds made of plasma (ionized gas), such as those that can be caused by strong microwave radiation in air. Peter Handel (U. Missouri) suggested that a low temperature plasma generated by microwaves might explain ball lightning, which is thought to be a related phenomenon. Yoshi-Hiko Ohtsuki, a Japanese scientist, who is the foremost scientist to study the phenomenon has modified this idea: "He envisages a spinning core of positive ions ... surrounded by a shell composed of the liberated electrons. The two are kept apart by pressure from microwaves trapped in the plasma. It is here that the questions start. The trapped microwave field inside the sphere needs outside energy to keep it going. Where that energy comes from is not yet clear." ... But even closer to what Sabaroff has proposed and what I entirely agree with is the conclusions of the following article: "Atmospheric plasma-vortex phenomenon and its circular ground traces known as the circles effect", by G Terence Meaden in the Journal of Meteorology, May/June 89. Meaden works for the CERES (the Circles Effect Res. Unit) or the Tornado and Storm Research Organization, Bradford-on-Avon. From an abstract: This precision of airflow in a tight, ultra-circumferential belt strongly hints at an origin promoted by an induced current of atmospheric ions. ... Furthermore, good evidence is available for attendant acoustic, luminous, and radio-frequency electromagnetic effects. High rotational speeds could give the shape a flattened spheroidal or discoidal appearance, while a continuously-replenished electrical discharge illuminates it, causing the humming noise so typical of atmospheric vortices. Lifetimes are considerably longer than for ball lightning because it is expected that steady losses from discharge effects due to recombination and leakage are balanced by inputs piped along the conducting channel of the parent columnar vortex. ... The dangers posed to low-flying aircraft by the presence of such poweful vortices as a form of low-level clear air turbulence are stressed. All of the above is consistent with maser microwave radiation directed to the ground from a satellite poised above England. In fact, the scientists' chief difficulty seems to be finding a method for microwave radiation to be replenished. It should also be pointed out that while maser/laser output absolutely does produce the effects noted above, there is no evidence whatever of atmospheric conditions which do. Ball lightning, probably related, was reproduced in the laboratory for the first time last year; before that few scientists believed the phenomenon even to exist. Message #876 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-17-91 04:26:24 Subject: Can it be that the circle is closing...? Michael, I'm not saying this because your awesome research tends to validate our particular POV's (well, it did cross my mind...), but because that's an awesome piece of research. Even given my own, to put it mildly, predisposition to the satellite-borne maser theory, I found it stunning. I look forward to digging up the cited sources. If you have any out-takes lying around, or even more stuff, I hope you are able to add it to the thread. I also hope that skeptics or holders of other beliefs will take the chance to pile on, as there's no rule that says a skeptic can't have the last word. Bob Message #881 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Fred Haines 161 To: Michael McDowell Date: 09-17-91 10:43:07 Subject: Circles again There are several reasons, Michael, that I have been unable to embrace wholeheartedly the two-duffers-with-a-plank explanation for the crop circles, several of which are touched on in your message 875. First, ten or so years ago I saw BBC footage of a large group of British university students attempting the two- duffers-with-a-plank idea, with equally inadequate results for all variations of method. There was as well a number of circles mixed in among the real ones which were clearly the work of amateur fakers. The scientists had little difficulty discriminating between the real and the fake - especially when the fakers, discouraged, abandoned their stakes, strings, and planks as well as their half-completed circles. What caught my eye in your message, though was, 'Furthermore, good evidence is available for attendant acoustic, luminous, and radio-frequency electromagnetic effects.' I saw footage on that too. The acoustic or electromagnetic effects, or some of them, anyway, are detectable with an ordinary microphone, and the film crew resorted to the simple expedient of filming their own soundman walking first around the circumference of a circle which had appeared some hours previously, then along a diameter, and letting us hear the attendant noise. It was quite pronounced - we heard it against the foreground of the people's voices. I don't remember the nature of the anomalies, but the sound changed quite markedly from the perimeter of the circle across the radius to the center, where there was a very dramatic shift. This could easily be faked, of course, but what couldn't? The people making the documentary seemed to have no vested interest in any particular theory about the circles. These anomalies have been studied by much more sophisticated means than a soundman tramping around with a Nagra, but it was interesting that evidence of something rather beyond two duffers with a plank could be picked up so simply. The other point from your message which I think the hoax theorists fail to note is that real scientists like Terence Meaden, Peter Handel, and Yoshi-Hiko Ohtsuki are seriously studying the phenomena, their work published by a Journal of Meteorology, and perhaps by other scientific publications. Since highly reputable scientists have been known to commit scientific fraud and, even more commonly, entertain wildly ludicrous hypotheses, I wouldn't begin to suggest that their interest in the subject compels belief in any particular theory, but it does suggest that there are people around who can make short shrift of the two- duffers if they fail, for instance, to produce or account for the characteristic 'acoustic, luminous, and radio- frequency electromagnetic effects.' Message #886 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Ed Mann 58 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-17-91 18:47:13 Subject: Circlews It's the pixies, Michael. Message #888 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: All Date: 09-17-91 22:07:55 Subject: Scientific RoundUp & News on Herstmonceaux I'm going to try to make this my final message on the Crop, and indeed I have just a few points more to make on the scientific question. This season, 1991, crop circles have spread across Europe, with notable formations appearing in Sweden, near Wiesbaden and near Cologne in Germany, in the Netherlands, in Italy, in Bulgaria, in Yugoslavia, and in Siberia. About three dozen have been formed in Japan. State-of-the-art scientific explanation for the circles: very rare and particular atmospheric and topographical conditions trigger: "a spinning, mini-whirlwind or "vortex", which accumulates highly electrically-charged matter and descends, spinning, to the ground." This ionized mass can be luminous, and it makes a noise. If there's a crop underneath it, the crop is flattened. (John Vidal, The Guardian, 2 Aug 91) The Japanese scientist Ohtsuki has managed to create artificial plasma vortices by concentrating microwaves into a small space -- i.e., he re-creates them using a laser. (The Observer, 23 Jun 91). *** I think I'd like to close with a very pleasing confirmation of one of my conjectures. The following from a correspondent Englishman on Compuserve, in response to the information that the telescopes at Castle Herstmonceaux were no longer in use: "The Satellite Laser Ranger scope at Herstmonceaux is still used by the RGO [Royal Greenwich Observatory] for measuring orbits of artificial satellites, for measuring precise earth-rotation parameters. The work of the RGO is quite interesting -- mostly design and maintenance of the equipment at La Palma, and development of new technology in astronomical research (both telescopes and data collection/processing equipment)." Message #890 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Michael McDowell 1018 Date: 09-18-91 04:45:00 Subject: Circles - Herstmonceaux Plus My goodness... "pleasing confirmation" is putting it mildly, Michael. I'd heard there was still activity at the RGO, but hadn't realized just how relevant it was. That is clearly the nucleus of a "wrap." Your message speaks for iteslf. I'll give it til Friday night, and then also bail out. I would like to add another conjecture, something I wasn't going to comment on until a) seeing your information about the expanding geography of happenings, and b) programming my VCR. I noticed the following blurb regarding the contents of the season premiere, tonight (Wed.), of "UNSOLVED MYSTERIES." "...U.S. military officers discuss a 1980 sighting of an unidentified flying craft near a U.S. air base in England." I recall from the beginning of the thread, (and Jeff Stuarts CCCS book) that the record got heavy starting around 1980. I haven't seen the show, yet, so I don't know what it contains, but wouldn't it be ironic if after all these years of hedging, the military suddenly got serious about it and started fueling the UFO issue? Maybe the year and place and sudden openness of military officers on the subject is all a coincidence. If not, why? Maybe to cover a movement of activity from the current dominant site? Something to watch in the future will be whether scientific/military investigators start to openly travel to investigate these sites, conceding a "mystery." It would serve the needs of expanded deniability. I may be reaching, especially since I haven't seen the show yet, but what a break in military form that TV-GUIDE blurb suggests. I am looking forward to the show. Bob Message #891 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Elisberg 456 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-19-91 10:26:20 Subject: The TV show As I said earlier, I have no idea about lots of things in life, notably what's making the circles. However, your message about the show intrigued me. It is quite, quite odd that -- after years of poo-pooing UFO's, the military suddenly becomes interested in them...just around the time the circles begin appearing. Now, certainly, coinkydinks are possible. But still, this is a pretty darn big one. I took a great astronomy course at Northwestern University, taught by Dr. J. Allen Hynek, who was probably the world expert on UFO's and, in fact, headed the Air Force's Blue Book Project, before the government closed it down. As part of the course, he gave a two-day lecture on UFO's. And, as I recall it, the Air Force just wasn't interested in the *slightest* in pursuing the subject. And when you add to all this that the sightings of the circles were in the Stonehenge area -- a place, as pointed out earlier in the thread, just rife with mysticism, where lots of people would be more apt to believe anything going on -- it seems like there could have been a whole mess of diversion going on there. As one of the precepts of government and military seems to be, "Cover Thyself," there just appears to be a lot of covering going on. Mind you, none of this proves diddly. Nor is it meant to. Just that, when there *are* coincidences, it's good to look at them and see if there's a connection or not. If not, fine. There often isn't. Though sometimes, of course, there is. Bob Message #893 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Michael McDowell 1018 To: Bob Elisberg 456 Date: 09-19-91 18:54:08 Subject: Adding more facts The Gulf Breeze phenomena have just started up again, in earnest, in the last day or so. These are sighting of strange aircraft, and some were photographed. These photographs were shown absolutely to be fakes by a de-bunker who subsequently used them as evidence for the reality of UFOs. Gulf Breeze is a stupid but astonishingly beautiful little tract community near Pensacola Florida. Condos are built for people like my aunt and uncle, who are semi- retired and wanted to live on the beach, but near to a PX. (My uncle is an ex-Marine lieut colonel.) I was clumsily trying to make a point back there -- Gulf Breeze is a few miles away from Eglin -- an enormous Air Force/Navy training facility. They specialize in training helicopter (and I think, small jet) pilots. Gulf Breeze itself has a preponderance of retired and current military residents. My aunt Roberta says that she goes out on the golf course to see if she can see any UFO's, but knowing Roberta, she does it so she can call the cutest and youngest caddies over and say, "Did you just see something over there? No, over there. No, here, look along my line of sight..." Message #894 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Bob Elisberg 456 Date: 09-19-91 19:52:22 Subject: "Unexplained Mysteries"... the UFO diversion Bob, the show, for those who missed it, was unusual in several ways. One was that the actual participants (taking it at face value) included Air Force personnel either still on active duty or in the Reserves. This is new, in such matters. They had on one UFO debunker who gave a preposterous debunk, but only after an unusual disclaimer - "not impossible, but certainly extra-ordinary. The program stated that the Air Force was withholding comment, but there's no way those personnel could have done that show without either permission or rehearsal. It was especially interesting to note that recreations of the phenomena were as though someone had taken the script from the research papers on plasma energy and "ball lightning," with the exception of a "classic" UFO which appears only once, at the beginning. The base in question was in S.E. England. The overall effect of the show, as you noted, was to reinforce the SDI scenario, but only if one has been primed with the other pieces of the puzzle, such as those presented here. Then another logic clicks into place. Your summation is a reasonable one, and one on which I'm willing to wind down. The CIS upload file is getting large enough to approach intimidation-size, re downloaders, so I plan to send it over the weekend. Let's call Sunday morning the deadline. (I'll be deleting the CIS reference in this message, so as not to intimidate anyone in advance. ..) Thanks for the message. Very rational, and very fitting. Bob P.S. The show also included a key memo obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, which is also unprecedented in such "revelations." Message #897 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Larry Brand 922 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-19-91 20:49:55 Subject: Clarification I'm not sure how the "UFO diversion" serves to "reinforce the SDI hypothesis". Surely, the military wouldn't want people thinking it was UFO's causing the crop circles, would they? Message #898 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Sabaroff 56 To: Larry Brand 922 Date: 09-19-91 21:12:40 Subject: Clarication (circles) Larry, given the recent accounts of an expanding range of heavy duty "events" in other countries, That could mean that the work (if the SDI theory is correct) could be developing to where testing and experimentation needs to be moved. "They" will no longer have the _in situ_ mythology to confuse it, and need another deniability that will also make reasonable the need to move people and things to remote places, openly. The hoaxters have been thoroughly discredited. The "Unexplained Mysteries" segment on the UFO events at the air base in S.E. England, from 1980, contains a LARGE pullback from the usual military position on the thing. I don't find it unreasonable that they'd rather refuel the UFO-logists than admit to what some of us are speculating. It also is likely that we're not the only ones speculating, and it's gaining on them. For me it's more than ever a matter of "stay tuned, folks." Bob Message #902 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Jeff Stuart 350 To: *.* Date: 09-20-91 14:12:19 Subject: Fin de circles (For musement purposes only). If any of you take the time to look back on the crop circle thread, strip it of the details and just look at the structure, you'll find something interesting has happened on the Science Forum. We've been doing science. We've been on a field trip without leaving the keyboard. We took a very large, visible, touchable yet mysterious set of evidence and tried to see it in a new way, a way that was otherwise overlooked, dismissed, or denied. There have been over 2,000 of these suckers in England alone, and now that we have tapped into international news, we know that they have allegedly appeared all over the world (actually the northern hemisphere, if I read the map correctly with Michael McDowell's information). They're too big to ignore and they're not going away. So we took a fresh train of thought and sent it out on the rails. A theory evolved, and each piece of this ambiguous puzzle fell into a niche in that theory (although some of you may think we've kinda jammed them into place). Every step necessary to the theory was reality-tested as best as the contributing brains knew how. The theory was presented to a limited audience of questioning minds, and almost immediately: Some people just outright booted the theory. Some people tried to pick the theory apart. Some people questioned the theory and in doing so, made it stronger. Some people made cases for alternate theories. Some people kibbutzed, a reminder to keep it light. Some people embraced the theory. Some people did the baffled thing. Pretty soon our bit of armchair science will be pushed out into the real world (if you choose to call Compuserve the real world). It will take its turn among other theories, and it will be interesting to see how many lookers we pull into the tent. To mix metaphors one last time. A round of digital finger snaps to the SABAROFF.COM utility for the hard work of compilation. Hats off to all contributors, and to everyone who keeps an open mind. JS Message #903 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Ian Abrams 910 To: Jeff Stuart 350 Date: 09-20-91 16:16:48 Subject: Yeah, but-- --if Sabaroff and McDowell and the others start vanishing into Government Chevy's in the middle of the night, it's gonna up the quality of this BBS. Message #905 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Bob Levinson 489 To: Bob Sabaroff 56 Date: 09-21-91 07:22:20 Subject: Sometimes, going around in circles gets a bum rap it doesn't deserve. Message #906 - SCIENCE & HEALTH FORUM From: Peter A. Lake 430 To: All Circle People Date: 09-22-91 01:19:16 Subject: Thanks from the Moderator A personal note of thanks for everyone who contributed to the discussion about crop circles, even as I remain a sceptic. You have brought out the best in the Science And Health Forum and I know I speak for many on the BBS who have enjoyed this thread with fascination and wonder. As fall begins, it's time to swing into action here again and I assure you that as a sign of rejuvenation we will be convening soon in the field. The announced goal of this Moderator will be to sponsor one field trip per month, starting in October. Thanks for the inspiration, all. --Mr. Lizard ----------------------------------------------------------- ********************************************** * THE U.F.O. BBS - http://www.ufobbs.com/ufo * **********************************************