PARADIGMS AND IGNORANCE PART 2: Beauty and Imperfection
Crop circles of this year 2018 are often called 'stunning', 'impressive', 'unbelievable' or 'amazing' and at first sight they can be.
Seeing the overhead photo's of a new crop circle always makes my heart pound at a higher rate as well.
The slight disappointment comes later, after importing the photo and drawing the design.
Then the inconsistencies appear: elements which were probably supposed to have the same size differ from each other, construction lines are clearly visible, no -diatonic- ratio's, no good -sacred- geometry.
Drawing crop circles is much fun!
Twenty years ago I did this on paper, only using compass, ruler and a pencil and following the instructions to create 'Sacred Geometry'.
Michael Glickman, Allan Brown, Bert Janssen and Zef Damen are some of the 'ancestors' showing how beautiful and ingeneous crop circles can be and they paved the path of my interest in 'Sacred Geometry', Pi, Phi, the Fibonacci sequence and more of the mathematical 'bits and pieces'.
There are at least two ways of re-constructing a crop circle on the computer: by measuring in the field and drawing it in scale or really constructing it as if you are only use compass and ruler.
Zef Damen reconstructs crop circles this way since 1998 and with great results.
His method is -in his own words-:
“....not only based on measurements, but goes one step further. It tries to find the relationship between all the constituent parts of the formation. Many patterns of crop circle formations show such an intriguing internal coherence that it invites, so to speak, to be discovered. "Ruler-and-compass constructions" are found to be very suitable for these reconstructions – literally”.
See for further explanation his excellent site and his reconstructions.
After the reconstruction he takes a difficult but probably the most important step:
“The aerial image is used again as the background image, and the geometric drawing (exported from AutoCAD) is imported and layed over it. Then, an elaborate part of the work begins! I mean, changing "position", "elevation", "rotation", "zoom factor", "viewing angle", "distance" of the drawing in 3D all in close cooperation!”
This method is the only right one and often shows the perfection in the execution and the precision of the circlemakers but many times also the flaws and the mistakes.
I think that most reconstructions of crop circles these days (at least when they are not done by Zef Damen) are sketches of an ideal situation which doesn't exist in the field. In other words, they are to idealistic.
The last step (the overlay of the drawing over the aerial image) is not done and the question is: why would someone make a drawing which is not a rendering of the real situation?
Why making things more beautiful than they are?
To sell more books or postcards (maybe sell her/himself) or to keep the mystery alive that crop circles are always perfect so they must be the result of the actions of an unknown agent, even when they are not?
This year (and it is about time after 20+ years of following the phenomenon) the slightly unpleasant feeling a have since a few years is creeping in on me more and more.
One side of this feeling is that a lot of crop circle researchers are not researchers in the true meaning of the word.
They only 'research' within the boundaries of their own paradigm and this (see Paradigms and Ignorance Part 1) makes them
-literally- go round in circles which lead nowhere.
To exclude any other idea different than your own is no 'research', nor excluding other possibilities or even proof that things are otherwise.
This kind of research is only looking for confirmation of your own paradigm or belief.
When someone questions that paradigm or belief he is encountered with contempt, arrogance and -in the worst case- hate.
The small world of crop circle makers and researchers is sometimes a one-to-one copy of the 'big' world where misunder-standing, rivalry and quarreling dominate.
Please have a look at:
https://www.michaelglickmanoncropcircles.com
http://cropcirclegeometrie.com/index.php/crop-circles-2018/
http://www.cropcirclesandmore.com/content/welcome.html
And last but certainly not least a relatively new star at the firmament:
https://www.facebook.com/Geometry-of-crop-circles-521809964687469/
In PARADIGMS AND IGNORANCE PART 3: Fact and Fiction in Longwood Warren I will give an explanation of my thoughts
Stay Tuned!