Bronze-level articleCrop circles

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Reg Presley, lead singer of 60s rock band The Troggs (creator of hits such as "Wild Thing" and "Love is All Around") is a keen [[ufology|ufologist]] and has funded research into crop circles, many of which he believes to be the work of extraterrestrial travellers. He also believes in a government [[conspiracy theory|conspiracy]] to keep the truth hidden, and that the earth is gradually changing shape.<ref>[http://www.bbc.co.uk/southampton/news/042002/6/crop_circles.shtml BBC Local News Story], 2002; [http://www.darkstar1.co.uk/Reg.html Reg Presley review] at Dark Star (a pseudoscience site).</ref>
 
Reg Presley, lead singer of 60s rock band The Troggs (creator of hits such as "Wild Thing" and "Love is All Around") is a keen [[ufology|ufologist]] and has funded research into crop circles, many of which he believes to be the work of extraterrestrial travellers. He also believes in a government [[conspiracy theory|conspiracy]] to keep the truth hidden, and that the earth is gradually changing shape.<ref>[http://www.bbc.co.uk/southampton/news/042002/6/crop_circles.shtml BBC Local News Story], 2002; [http://www.darkstar1.co.uk/Reg.html Reg Presley review] at Dark Star (a pseudoscience site).</ref>
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Another thing, why do the aliens leave messages that are in spirals, circles etc. Why don't they just write ''We come in peace'', or ''We want to take over your planet.Resistance is futile'', or something like that.They can travel millions of light years through space but can't learn English.
  
 
==Natural explanations==
 
==Natural explanations==

Revision as of 17:37, 28 October 2010

The woo is out there

UFOlogy

Icon ufology alt.svg
Aliens did it and ran away

Crop circles are geometric designs of crushed or knocked-over crops.

These strange things were initially made by two Englishmen in the late 1970s, who thought up the idea in a pub when they should have been reminiscing about the good times with their beshhtt friend evah.[1] The phenomenon grew - thanks to publicity in the tabloid press and many copy-cat pranksters - and although now widely known to be hoaxes were often used as evidence for alien visitations during their heyday in the 80s and 90s.

Contents

Paranormal expanations

Rare photograph

Gullible people, however, continued to believe they are made by flying saucers, even though the original pranksters 'fessed up to starting the craze in 1991. The assumption is that although the aliens are intelligent enough to evade the radar detection systems of the entire earth, they are not smart enough to notice they have left quite clear evidence of their landing. Further theories even say that the aliens have nothing better to do than knock over crops, leaving the marks intentionally as coded messages. Alien visitations aren't the only "explanation" for crop circles, although they are by far the most popular, as others think that they are the result of plasma vortexes, various forms of secret government activity or some kind of "Earth Energy".[2]

The supernatural explanations also don't account for exactly why the aliens are carrying planks and rope in the boot of their space-Skoda when they come visiting Earth in the first place. The best explanation here is that they probably had a few too many space-Kronenbourgs and thought pranking the humans would be funny.[3]

Reg Presley, lead singer of 60s rock band The Troggs (creator of hits such as "Wild Thing" and "Love is All Around") is a keen ufologist and has funded research into crop circles, many of which he believes to be the work of extraterrestrial travellers. He also believes in a government conspiracy to keep the truth hidden, and that the earth is gradually changing shape.[4] Another thing, why do the aliens leave messages that are in spirals, circles etc. Why don't they just write We come in peace, or We want to take over your planet.Resistance is futile, or something like that.They can travel millions of light years through space but can't learn English.

Natural explanations

People who like to appear too skeptical to call aliensdidit, but don't want to completely spoil the fun by mentioning "hoax", often use naturalistic phenomena as explanations for crop circles. These skeptical explanations include very isolated tornadoes, or ball lightning. However, many crop circles - particularly the more recent ones - are quite complex geometric patterns and sometimes aren't even pure circles. These more advanced shapes cannot be the result of such natural phenomena, even if they were shown to exist and be capable of creating crop circles. Both the hoax-theory and the alien-theory proponents point to the complexity of their shapes as evidence of an intelligent source, though they quite obviously disagree on what the intelligence is.

Real explanations

Urban aliens had to think up new ways to make circles.

These explanations, both paranormal and natural, seem unnecessary when it is known that teams of perfectly ordinary - if not entirely "normal" - human beings construct crop circles for a hobby (which everyone should have).[5] Human night vision turns out to be quite good once it's developed, enabling circle makers to operate perfectly well without artificial light - indeed, better without it - explaining why no one ever sees them at night. There are several websites dedicated to cataloging notable examples of this variety of earthform art and competitions are even held to see who can do the best. Numerous techniques and tools are also well known, such as using ropes to get a constant radius, a flat plank of wood for bending the crops down, and specially linked ladders to get over crops without leaving trails.

None of the supernatural or non-hoax natural theories explain why, during the quarantine of the British countryside during the foot-and-mouth epidemic of 2001, the number of crop circles being made fell dramatically, to rise again when the footpaths were re-opened.[6] Except, of course, if the aliens were afraid of exposing their livestock to such a disease - or were busily engaged in spreading that particular plague themselves.

See also

External Links

Footnotes

  1. Doug and Dave down the pub
  2. Crop Circle Connector - FAQ
  3. Crop circles found on Mars
  4. BBC Local News Story, 2002; Reg Presley review at Dark Star (a pseudoscience site).
  5. Circlemakers
  6. Disease brings poor crop of circles
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