3 crop circles near Orillia

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 06:57 PM

Ah yes! The profit motive. That and the unhealthy desire for excessive accumulation of temporal power are the primary forces presently threatening life on this planet, and retarding the application of real scientific progress in a great many areas.

Not that it's wrong to make a profit...I certainly try to do so when running my export business, but I don't destroy nature and use 3rd World people as slave labour while doing so.

If the profit motive were not the dominant factor in high level decisions in our society, we would not presently be burning petroleum products in the form of fossil fuel...we would be using them to make much more valuable synthetic products (plastics, etc.), and deriving our propulsion energy from non-polluting sources. This could have been done decades ago.

We would not be embargoing Cuba (they interfered with the profits of some very big players in the USA). Cuba would most likely be a valued friend and partner of the USA.

We would be providing free health care for everyone.

Point is, the DOMINANT factor in doing anything should be the accomplishment itself...to do something which is valuable and beneficial to everyone concerned, not just to a few CEO's and stockholders. Secondary to that, one would of course try to make a profit in the process, which would be pretty straightforward, given that one was rendering a valuable service.

We would build cities for the health and happiness of human beings, not automobiles.

We would provide a hell of a lot more public mass transit in North America.

And so on.

Who is presently running this planet? The spiritual blood brothers of the Ferengi, the most morally corrupt aliens on Star Trek. "Rules of Acquisition"...that is the credo of our society. He who dies with the most toys wins. Shame, shame, shame.

Brendy - I didn't know there was an online dictionary...besides, it's more fun to just ask. It stimulates conversation. I could phone out for groceries too, but I prefer to go downtown and actually buy them firsthand. I could watch music videos, but I prefer to see a live show. I could have virtual sex, but I prefer the real thing.

"Badges? We don't need no stinkin' badges!"

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Naemanson
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 06:47 PM

Carol, I think charlatan carries a negative connotation that has no place in this discussion. I would agree to the use of the term as it relates to a specific individual such as Uri Geller. The people I am referring to as pseudoscientists are those who truly believe in what they are doing and could never conceive of using it for profit only. These people truly believe they are helping people.

I have a dear friend, my former voice teacher, who falls into this classification. She does voice analysis and reads auras, locates power centers in the earth and all that other stuff. We love each other as only the closest friends can but we also understand each other's position on this subject. She knows she will never convince me to change my mind without an accurate unbiased experiment and I know that she will never change her mind. Null set. We cancel each other out and maintain a healthy friendship.

The charlatan, on the other hand sees the believers as sheep ready for the clippers. No device is too low to use to take their money and explain away why the result was not as intended.

I'll let Bill address the subject of logic. He has done a great job so far.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: CarolC
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 05:28 PM

Bill D, was that the sigh of a martyr? ; )

I guess I have no real argument with you because I will never claim to use logic, either correctly or incorrectly. (However, when you say the rules of logic "just are", how is that different from someone saying non-terrestrial intelligences "just are"?)

Naemanson,

My only quibble with you is that what you call "pseudoscientists", I would call "charlatans". I am uncomfortable with the word pseudoscience because I think some people use it a little too liberally. I think that there are people who are doing legitimate research that is labeled pseudoscience by people who are unwilling or unable to accept it as a possibility within their accepted paradigm.

I think the difference is in the profit motive.

Carol

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Bill D
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 01:35 PM

*sigh*...Carol...I bring a **formal** use of the word 'logic' to the discussion, you reply with a 'popular' use...we cannot talk about it much this way....I repeat, you do not 'break' the rules of logic, what you have done...admirably..... in your life is overcome difficulties and go against 'odds' or popular wisdom...(not knowing the details, I can't say exactly)...my quibble is with those who claim to USE logic, and do it incorrectly...

If someone says, "I believe" in'X', I cant argue with him...it is his privilege...but if he says.."I saw 'this', and 'that' didn't happen, therefore 'X' is true, then he can be shown to be using either correct or incorrect logic...but not necessarily proven right or wrong. And IF his logic is correct, he may still be wrong, because 'that' may have indeed happened, and he missed it...etc...

(and no one exactly 'invented' those 'rules'...they have just been refined over time and names given to them...Laws of physics may be 'better understood' as time passes...not changed...but laws of logic just *are*...)

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Naemanson
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 08:56 AM

Carol - I think you are right about Edison. However, he strictly followed the scientific method and worked tirelessly to perfect his inventions. And he based his work on the work of scientists, not popular media.

As an example, People said you could not use electricity to light a city. Edison proved them wrong. However he was convinced that direct current was the best method. He was wrong but he worked very hard to show that alternating current was too dangerous. (As an aside: Do you know what he invented to prove his point? The Electric Chair!)

Edison was not a scientist. He was a technician and an experimenter. Down through history there have been plenty of people who say things cannot be. Fortunately there are plenty of people who do not listen.

There is an important difference between what Carol and Andres are talking about. The pseudoscientists resist a complete scientific analysis of their claims. They rely on the acceptance of a populace who wants to believe them. (Unfortunately they are making money off that populace which keeps them from revealing how they do what they do)

The scientists on the other hand want to see the pseudosciences explained. If it turns out to be possible to use telepathy then that will open up a whole new field of study and understanding. If it turns out that the UFO's are real then think of what that would mean to this world.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: CarolC
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 05:18 AM

Escamillo, I believe that Thomas Edison was largely self educated. As a child he was schooled at home. My understanding is that at least his early research was done independently. In fact, I think that many inventors in earlier times did their research independently. Sometimes it's necessary to be unshackled by any outside agency for true creative genius to take place.

Best regards,

Carol

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Escamillo
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 04:23 AM

Carol said: "I can point to quite a lot of things that were formerly considered impossible, that we now take for granted. "

Yes Carol, that is what I would like to see: the impossible dreams become realities, but how many of those things were demonstrated or put in practice by self-educated(?) people, who bypassed the scientific methods, or studied unrelated matters, not to mention Von Danikens and commercial fortune-seekers ? Let's try to recall one. None appears. When something important was discovered, it came from scientists and knowledgeable people, as the case of dodecafonism I mentioned above.

There is an interesting idea from the great Isaac Asimov (who was a believer in extraterrestrial life as well as a UFO detractor):

Arthur Clarke's Law of the Science Establishment: When a young and still unrecognized scientist states a weird theory which produces a negative reaction in the established old scientists community, there are high probabilities that his/her theory is correct.

Isaac Asimov's Corollary : yes, but when that weird theory is widely supported and acclaimed by the masses of the general public, then it is far more probable that the old scientists are right, after all.

Un abrazo - Andrés (not a scientist, unfortunately);)

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: CarolC
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 03:29 AM

Before it was considered possible.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 03:09 AM

When was it considered impossible?

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: CarolC
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 02:50 AM

Escamillo,

You say are eagerly awaiting the demonstration of something that we consider impossible. I can't predict which of the currently impossible things will become possible in either the near or distant future (and if I could, I certainly wouldn't tell anyone about it ;). However, I can point to quite a lot of things that were formerly considered impossible, that we now take for granted. You are using one such example right now.

Best regards,

Carol

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 12:29 AM

Oh, I don't think it really matters, soph. When it comes to definitions, that is.

Especially when it pertains to crop circles in Orillia.

B.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: sophocleese
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 11:43 PM

So that time when I was very nervous and was told my singing was "Very Schoenberg" it wasn't a compliment?

Drat!

Thanks Andres.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Rana
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 11:42 PM

Now wasn't it the White Queen who believed in as many as six impossible things before breakfast?

Rana

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Escamillo
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 11:36 PM

From the Greek dö deká and Phonos (twelve sounds), dodecafonism is the name given to the system of 12 notes in music composition, which are the same 12 semitones of the classical well-tempered scale, but used independently of any grouping or relationship (no tonic, dominant, etc) but only a SERIES of sounds, or a sound base for the construction of many SERIES, with which music can be made.

Serialism (the use of subsets of those 12 sounds in particular orders) is what governs a great part of modern academic works. Arnold Schoenberg was the father of dodecafonism, about whom you may find a good article in This clicky thing

One can like this music or not, but it is a good example of things that were considered absurd and impossible circa 1911 when Schoenberg invented it, but was finally widely accepted.

However, the similarity with pseudo-science and science ends here. He was not a pseudo-musician, he was an important musician and tonal composer, he knew everything about scales and modes before inventing a new way of expression.

Un abrazo - Andrés

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: sophocleese
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 11:32 PM

Oops damn, I made a wrong guess. I figured on this thread it wouldn't matter if I didn't check another source but just made up my own language rules. Seemed logical to me.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 11:26 PM

There is such a beast as an Online Dictionary, LH

B.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: sophocleese
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 10:56 PM

A wild stab at the term, Little Hawk, comes out as 20 tones or noises. I'd guess its a 20 toned scale instead of a 12 tone scale. Either that or its the mating call of the dodo bird, which is now extinct.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 10:48 PM

Y un abrazo a usted, Andres...gracias!

What is dodecaphonism?

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Escamillo
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 10:29 PM

I like people who beleive in the "impossible", who have hopes, as long as they don't try to sell me their books and T-shirts, and as long as they don't blame scientists for not acheiveing those impossibles yet.

Dodecaphonism was a "no-no". Non-tonal music was an aberration. Until someone demonstrated that music could be made another way. I would be eagerly waiting for someone to demonstrate what we consider impossible. AND if someone shows me a viable way of reasoning, not based in fallacies, I would work hard to help him/her give birth to his discoveries.

Un abrazo - Andrés

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: little john cameron
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:37 PM

http://online.itp.ucsb.edu/online/colloq/

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:35 PM

To quote Bob Dylan (which I love to do): "I believe in the impossible, you know that I do."

Bob is right.

Today's scientific assumptions will soon be added to and modified, and sometimes discredited and discarded, by new scientific discoveries. This has been the case throughout history. Modern physics has already thrown much of the old Newtonian model of reality on its ear.

Numerous things are considered impossible by most people until somebody does them...and then, if and only if that somebody gains public notice and acceptance. If she (I say "she", just to break a certain habit that's prevalent out there...) doesn't gain general notice and acceptance, then those things continue to be considered impossible by the authorities and the general public.

Here's an example of something like that:

Shortly after the Spanish-American War in 1898, a Cuban doctor proposed the theory that yellow fever was being transmitted to people through mosquito bites...an unheard-of notion at the time. Yellow fever was a scourge in Cuba, particularly to visiting American troops.

Virtually the entire existing medical and scientific community in both the USA and Cuba absolutely ridiculed and vilified him for even suggesting such a ridiculous notion. The general opinion was that it was unsanitary living conditions, bad food, and impure water that caused yellow fever.

Eventually the US Army medical staff decided to shut up this lone dissenter once and for all by conducting a test. Two groups of soldiers were sequestered in tents for an extended period of time. The first set of tents was absolutely filthy...even human excrement and rotting carrion was liberally rubbed on the floors and walls (pity the poor guys inside those tents!)...but they were very well sealed with screens so no mosquitos could enter.

The second set of tents was kept scrupulously clean, but had openings to allow mosquitos to enter.

After a testing period of a few weeks, not one soldier in the filthy but screened tents came down with yellow fever. Numerous soldiers from the clean tents did contract yellow fever. Bingo! Case closed. The Army set about at once eliminating mosquitos by removing sources of stagnant water or coating such water with a thin layer of oil to kill the mosquito larvae. During the next 12 months they drastically reduced yellow fever in the island of Cuba, especially in Havana, by this approach.

The REALLY ASTOUNDING postscript to this, however, is that the general medical community in North America (outside of the Army), and the media continued to hound and ridicule this Cuban scientist for some considerable time after the aforementioned experiment had confirmed the truth of his theory. It took several years before his views received general acceptance...and became the NEW orthodoxy.

Point is...old mental habits die hard.

We will one day have faster than light travel, auric diagnosis of illness (physical or mental or spiritual), and all kinds of things that are presently considered impossible by most scientists. We will also have brotherhood and equality on this planet, and eliminate poverty and war...and that's also considered impossible by cynics everywhere.

Or...we'll blow ourselves up and die from pollution and other assorted follies...all in service to the dollar and military supremacy.

The choice is yours and mine.

I believe in the impossible, you know that I do. I've already seen the possible, and I am less than enormously impressed.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: little john cameron
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:29 PM

Ah never said he was right ah said he was a physicist wi a hypothesis

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: CarolC
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:27 PM

Brendy, yes, I do love Quantum Physics (what I understand of it).

Bill D, I have spent a lifetime overcoming odds that to others would seem impossible by doing precisely that, by changing and evading the rules of logic. The history of my life is proof that it can be done. Who decided on these rules, anyway, and who is going to try to enforce them? They may work for you, and maybe that's a good thing, but they have never worked for me, and I think I prefer it that way.

Best wishes,

Carol

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:14 PM

Sorry. My HTML is all over the place tonight!!! It should have been:

Don't you just love...etc.

B.
(I hope)

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:12 PM

Don't you just love Quantum Physics!!!

B.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Bill D
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:11 PM

*smile*...big difference between investigating physics and believing in your own hypotheses before they have been tested....

(and you don't violate the law of Gravity...you overcome it!)..and you need to be careful what you mean by 'rules'...a rule in a game or social situation can easily be broken, whereas rules of logic cannot...You can ignore them, but you can't change or evade them...Thus, it is possible to be absolutely correct in a theory, but for bad reasons...or to use perfectly consistent reasoning and be wrong because you started with incorrect premises..etc, etc...

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: little john cameron
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:04 PM

How about Planck's Hypothesis, was he not a physicist?

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: CarolC
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 07:21 PM

Bill D,

What good are rules if you can't break them every chance you get? We wouldn't be flying today if someone hadn't decided to try to find a way to violate the laws of gravity. Granted, they used other physical laws to do it, but who knows what other physical laws there could be that would make things that we now consider fantastic to be possible. I don't think we know all of the laws of physics yet, do you?

Only those who can see the invisible can do the impossible.

Carol

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Bill D
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 07:00 PM

Why are saints portrayed with halos?...maybe because someone with eyes as bad as mine saw a guy standing in front of a candle while they were in a religious mood..*shrug*

Why do you feel more comfortable with certain people immediately upon meeting them than with certain others?...because they smile?..because their body language is nicer?...etc....

"modern physics, which has hypothesized "...sorry,physics doesn't hypothesize ANYTHING...a few physicists may have presented something like that...but that doesn't make them accepted...Nobel Prize winners(Linus Pauling) have had 'theories' about vitamin C (outside his field)....but they haven't convinced all the other scientists

be careful that your speculations do not violate the rules of logic

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:11 AM

Hey guys,

Lots more great stuff. Thanks. Congrats to LJC for bringing in the vibratory stuff. It's my impression that these vehicles (the first one anyway) had some way of isolating themselves entirely from our normal reality, because given the speed at which it moved at certain times it would certainly have started burning itself up in the atmosphere, had it been subject to the normal friction of something passing through the atmosphere. It did not do that at all, nor did it appear to cause any disturbance to the air, sonic boom or anything else like that.

Auras? Hell, I can even see those occassionally under the right light conditions. Auras ain't no big deal. They can be detected in a number of ways.

I will be out all day at an RC sailboat regatta. Weather looks good. See you tonight sometime.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Naemanson
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 09:01 AM

I'm sorry Andres, I should have actually looked at the site you posted. I promised myself I would look at it later. That's what I get for skimming rather than taking my time.

I've been crunching numbers for SETI for a long time now. I have donated 9,566 hours of CPU time to them and completed 158 work units. It takes my computer, a 450 MgHz machine, about 60 hours to crunch through the 340 kilobytes of data. I feel like I actually doing something important with this thing. It certainly beats playing games but, of course, can't hold a candle to participating in the Mudcat.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Escamillo
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 04:23 AM

You're right, Johnny, I guess that we all know that music is our primary (or secondary) concern. But curiosity kills me.:))

Ok Sorcha, it is reasonable to expect another viable explanation, this happens very frequently in science, and sometimes drives us to new discoveries. What would be really misguiding is the line of reasoning that says "if this could hardly be done by humans, then it should have been made by the aliens" (what neither you nor me are saying).

Thanks Naemanson, we cross-posted above !

Un abrazo - Andrés

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: GUEST, Banjo Johnny
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 02:28 AM

I guess it's alright for people to fool around with crop circles, auras, pyramids, astrology, UFO's, ghosts, etc. But I hope they are not wasting a lot of money or time which could be used for truly important phenomena, such as MUSIC. == Johnny in OKC

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Sorcha
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 01:21 AM

Andres, I will checkout the site. I just have a difficult time believing that 2 legged humans, as we know HomoSapiens, could create some of this stuff (like Mandlebrot sets ) in the time span allowed for the occurance. It seems to me that it would take DAYS for a drunken fraternity to stamp out this stuff using boards and ropes, and get it RIGHT both visually and mathematically, surely someone would see them? I am waiting anxiously for another viable explanation. And, Carl Sagan died disapointed. No proof that he would accept was ever found, even if he looked more diligently than anyone else.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: hesperis
Date: 19 Aug 00 - 01:04 AM

When LJC said "everything has a vibratory rate" he was referring to modern physics, which has hypothesized that what we see as 'matter' is composed of particles vibrating together at Extra Low Frequencies, or ELFs.

I might be out of date on that.

As for Auras,
Why are saints portrayed with halos?
Why do you feel more comfortable with certain people immediately upon meeting them than with certain others?

Science, to me, just doesn't line up answers to those mysteries
(much less to Extraterrestrials, or UFOs, or whatever).
And maybe these things will always be mysteries,
I don't know.

The further science goes, the closer it seems to get to saying things that the Wise Elders have said for millenia.
"We are all made of energy" is just one example.
Now science has found out that we are all made of molecules made of protons and electrons, and those are energy, and that we exchange energy with other energies all day long.

I am willing to believe it, if I can experience it,
even if my experience is just a hallucination,
or even if I am just another human being searching for patterns
and finding that I have created my own
in this chaos theory world.

~*hesperis*~

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 11:46 PM

Nice one, Andrés.
I'll download that tommorrow and have a decent look at it.
Interesting site!

B.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Naemanson
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 11:46 PM

For those of you who want to be a legitimate part of the search for extraterrestrial life please visit the SETI@HOME website at http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu.

You too can show that you believe there is intellegent life beyond our atmosphere without believing in UFO's.

The site has a program you can download which sets your computer up with a new screen saver. The screensaver is actually a program that crunches the data gathered by the SETI team. Your machine will download a block of data, run an analysis on that data, upload it back to Berkeley and get another block of data. All you have to do is leave your machine turned on.

Check it out!

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Escamillo
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 11:34 PM

Sorcha, you may beleive or have your hopes that we are not alone, and this is a genuine field of science research, absolutely not related to UFOs of any kind. This the MAIN FALLACY of all UFOlogists. They tell you "Aha! you don't beleive that UFOs are extraterrestrial ships ? SO you dont beleive we may NOT be alone ?" (read: SO are you so ignorant ?)

One thing does not imply the other. May be they exist, as we exist (why would we be so privileged?) but aliens visiting us, that's another thing, and is not related at all, until someone demonstrates it scientifically, not by personal impressions. That day I will probably die drunk during the celebrations.

Do you know what my screen saver is doing while it is active ? Mathematically analizing radio signals from outer space, seeking for an intelligent pattern. Anybody can contribute to this project, see their site at Berkeley University: Click here

By the way, I would like to see much more programs like this, to distribute the present backlog of data analysis relative to medical research, metheorology, astronomy, etc. among millions of inactive PCs, each one more powerful than a VAX of 1980 !

Un abrazo - Andrés

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Gary T
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 11:23 PM

My interpretation of some of the comments in this thread is that some of us differentiate between "hoax" crop cirlces (i.e. those obviously made by humans) and "real" crop circles (those made by unexplained/unexplainable forces, but surely not humans). I think this distinction gives short shrift to the imagination and capability of Homo Sapiens Mischieviens.

Read the link Escamillo provided to Carl Sagan for some background. The original "crop circlers" fooled a lot of people for a long time. One thing that's been brought up is lack of footprints. Footprints in a wheat field? It's not hard to arrange things so you don't leave footprints. Expert trackers might be able to find evidence of a path, but how many expert trackers have been called in on these? It's not exactly a high priority manhunt.

I don't find it any stretch to consider all crop cirlces as having been intentionally created by humans. Some are just more sophisticated than others, in design, execution, or both. Heck, I've heard of college pranks that are more intricate and baffling than crop circles. To embrace the notion that they're caused by extraterrestrials or hypothetical (read nonexistent) weather anomalies, while dismissing the possibility that there are people out there clever enough and skilled enough to make them without leaving obvious clues, strikes me as naive.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 10:25 PM

Any crop circle can thus be called a hoax by someone who cannot accept that it could be anything but a hoax...which doesn't prove necessarily that it is a hoax...but that the person in question is scared of things which lie outside of his usual beliefs and assumptions.

That is a rather large assumption in itself, George (you don't mind if I call you George, do you?), and also assumes that everyone else is wrong, except you.
But then, you've been born and re-born, numerous times, and have this all sussed out.

Who am I to argue in the face of such facts.

B.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Bill D
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 07:03 PM

"Everything has a vibratory rate"..??? where does this 'fact' come from?...I know everything reflects light in different ways, etc..and I know about theories of movement/'vibration' in sub-atomic particles....but 'vibratory rate' sounds a bit like 'aura' to me.....

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: little john cameron
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 06:39 PM

I will converse in standard english for this subject as the Scots vocabulary is not very conducive to noumenal subjects.For those of you who are familiar with the varying vibratory rate of material and non-material objects in the universe i will try and postulate a theory i have on the seeming speed of these alledged UFOs.
I am kind of starting in the middle here but in order to have a modicum of brevity i am assuming that some knowledge of vibration is understood.
Everything has a vibratory rate that determines how it appears or does not appear to our senses.When i have watched videos of the aforesaid UFOs i was struck by the speed at which they could vanish from sight.This to my small brain could be caused by the rapid escalation of vibration which in turn would give the illusion of speed as the object disappeared and re-appeared in a different location.
Now, this brings us to the question of alternate realities.It seems to me that if an object in another reality whose rate of vibration was higher,or lower,than ours would be invisible to us.Therefore if it were possible to control the vibrations then travel from one dimension to another would be possible.
This could also by pass the problem of faster than light travel as the objects in question are really just moving in and out of our reality.

AH hae tae stop noo as this typin in english has got mah brain jist aboot puggled.Onyway it wis only ah thocht.Mibbe mah psychiatrist is richt an ah'm awa wi the fairies. LJC.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Sorcha
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 06:16 PM

I'm not getting involved in this discussion, because I am an UN informed skeptic, with I hope, an open mind. I would LIKE to beleive that we are not alone, that Nessie et al exist, but as of yet, I have no experiences, nor have I seen evidence I would accept----such as body parts, or pieces of a craft. Carry it on, people, it is VERY interesting, and I am learning a lot. And isn't that why most of us are here? To learn something, that is?

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Naemanson
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 05:50 PM

You know, this is really great. At last it is possible to have a reasoned discussion of this kind of thing without anger or flame attacks. I love it.

Wolfgang, I think you've hit the nail right on the head. I'll bet your Hypothesis Number Five is the one most people fall prey to. I too do not believe that any of those in this discussion are hoaxers. I think every one on the "believers" (for lack of a better term) truly believe that what they saw or experienced was an actual occurrence. Those of us in the Circle of the Skeptic truly believe there are simpler explanations.

Where do we go now? We are stuck. Little Hawk will never be shaken from his position and we skeptics are also firm. It has been a lovely discussion but we need some new fodder so...

FLAME!!!

(Just kidding! Someone had to do it!)

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 03:35 PM

Wolfgang - Fair enough. I understand your line of reasoning just fine. Here are some more pertinent details...

There were no clouds in the sky on either of the nights in question. It was a very clear starlit sky on both occasions.

I've seen the "disco laser effect" on cloud layers, but there were no clouds on those 2 nights. There was no such disco in that rural area anyway. Disco illuminations do not have the kind of observable surface details on them that I say through the binoculars, nor do they have running lights on the vehicle, as far as I know.

Why do you think it's unlikely that we are being visited in this particular time? I'm curious about that, since I think it's likely we have been visited since time immemorial. Are you aware that there's an extensive area in the Peruvian mountains where so many of the local people have seen UFO's so frequently that it is simply taken for granted around there? The government has even put up signs on some of the roads indicating that it's an official UFO (meaning extraterestrial craft) sighting area. Read Shirley MacLaine's book "Out On A Limb" for a larger exposition on this and other matters. Shirley, my friend, is no airhead. She's a level-headed, practical and tough woman.

Yes, I could be a hoaxer. So could you (regarding your German sceptics scientific association). I don't think you are, and I'm not either.

For a somewhat useful article on the Orillia crop circles, go to this address:

http://www.simcoe.com/news/stories/ostories.shtml

The "most likely explanation" could be one explanation for one person, and a completely different explanation for another. It depends on one's subjective view of reality. Scientists are not immune to this tendency, but the more open-minded ones are certainly ready to modify their customary views in the face of new evidence.

Brendy - I'd say that a crop circle hoax is a crop circle that has been created deliberately by humans for the purpose of fooling other humans. A real crop circle is one that does not meet the above criteria, and has been caused by some other agent in some other manner. I won't presume to say what that agent might be, because I don't know.

Any crop circle can thus be called a hoax by someone who cannot accept that it could be anything but a hoax...which doesn't prove necessarily that it is a hoax...but that the person in question is scared of things which lie outside of his usual beliefs and assumptions. Or maybe he's just scared of being fooled by someone.

Remember, I was a complete non-believer in extraterrestrial visitors or their machines until I had my first sighting of one...it was at age 17 or 18, as I can best recall...I didn't keep a diary at the time.

The most likely explanation for me is obvious...extraterrestrial visitors. But of course, I'm the guy who had the experience. I can understand that this would maybe not be so compelling to someone else...unless they already knew me pretty well.

Here's another possible explanation: The US military has built some extraordinary (and completely secret) vehicles that it decided to test over Skaneateles and the surrounding area, where it might be observed by hundreds or even thousands of civilians. HIGHLY UNLIKELY, but what the heck? It's another possibility.

Here's another possible explanation: Time travellers. People from our own future taking a brief look at our era.

Here's another possible explanation: Interdimensional travellers, hopping in and out of different universes.

Here's another possible explanation: Satan did it in order to mislead people from the gospel, mom, and apple pie. Yes, I'm being facetious, but there are some people who literally believe stuff like that.

Check out the link...

http://www.simcoe.com/news/stories/ostories.shtml

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Wolfgang
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 06:57 AM

Little Hawk (and others),
challenging someone else's perception and/or recollection is always a bit difficult for it seems to amount to saying 'I have no trust in you'. Well, the person I trust most in my life (that's myself) has had quite a few wrong and sometimes embarrasing false perceptions in his life. I do not mean to say that most of our perceptions are wrong, only very few are and I bet you are a person whose perception and recollection is about as reliable as everyone else's (including mine) - usually.
What do I do with your description of what you have seen? Well, I look for the most likely explanation. Skip all paragraphs until the last if you want to know immediately what I consider the most likely explanation. If you don't skip I'll take you through several hypotheses from extremely unlikely to likely.
Hypothesis 1: You've seen a real craft controlled by alien intelligence. I personally do believe in the possibility of other lifeforms in the universe, some of them even intelligent in our sense, but for reasons outlined in other posts I consider it extremely unlikely that we are 'visited' at this time. Are there more probable hypotheses? Yes.
Hypothesis 2: You're a hoaxer. From your posts and your way of writing I consider this also extremely unlikely and I am not working on that hypothesis (though I won't forget that possibility in general).
Hypothesis 3: You were deluded at that time. It can happen rarely (see grab for a fine explanation and description), but I have good reasons not to believe this hypothesis in your case.
Hypothesis 4: A complete illusion of memory. Not very likely, but it can happen. Think of it as, e.g., the recollection of a movie scene(or a vivid description in a book) in your mind transported into personal reality . Remotely possible, but I don't go for it for there is still a much better hypothesis.
Hypothesis 5(number 1 hypothesis for most UFO sightings): Mixture of real perception and partial illusion of memory/perception. This hypothesis goes as follows: You have seen something real which you couldn't find a mundane explanation for. The details of your description are not necessarily all correct, for under difficult sighting conditions we all make bold guesses as to what we see and our brain is wired in a way that we try to make sense out of what we see at nearly any price (conjurers work on that knowledge to fool us). So I do not have (nor need) explanations for all UFO sightings fitting all details of the descriptions. There are ample experiments to show that what we think we see will heavily influence our memory of what we have seen (an experiment in a nutshell: researchers had arranged that UFO believers on a hill were shown lights. Since the lights were under experimental control the researchers knew exactly which position they were and how long they were on. They compared UFO believers recollections with reality and found that many errors like reporting movement when there was none were made. These errors were not random, they were in the direction of the UFO hypothesis). And then there are a few facts from perception usually not know to lay persons like that especially in the dark you can mistake your eye movements for object movements.
There may be some more hypotheses possible but I am contented with these five and I won't go for the first one as long as much more probable hypotheses remain.
So in most cases I think the reporters have seen a UFO that is a flying object that was unknown to them but mundane and their descriptions from memory do not really fit the object they have actually seen for the combined work of illusions of perception and memory. But the appearance must not necessarily have been flying nor an object at all. And that brings me to what I considers the most probable single explanation in your case.
Your description #1 is a beautiful textbook description for UFO sightings originating from the action of laser lights from, e.g., a distant disco on the lower cloud surface (which itself is invisible at night). It fits the soundlessless, the cycling, the illumination, the lack of interior details, the standing still and sudden movement, the lack of clear size and distance and some other details. That's the single explanation for this case I would place my bet on.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Escamillo
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 04:38 AM

This is what Carl Sagan had to say about crop circles: Click here - This scientist was one of the directors of early Mars missions and of the Voyager I and II projects, thanks to which we acquired more knowledge than ever in history, about the Solar System. He was also in charge of all the research on extraterrestrial life at Cornell Univ. for many years. He was also author of the most famous TV scientific series: Cosmos, and many books.

Un abrazo - Andrés

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 01:29 AM

What?

Like a cake-mixer or something?

B.

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: GUEST, Banjo Johnny
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 01:26 AM

Wouldnt a "crop circle hoax" be something that was made to look like a crop circle, but was actually something else disguised as a crop circle? == Johnny

Subject: RE: 3 crop circles near Orillia
From: Brendy
Date: 18 Aug 00 - 12:52 AM

I'm a bit puzzled, though.
What's the difference between a real crop circle, and a hoax, if nothing can be proved anyway?

B.