What about this crop circle?

[Marduk]

I see what you mean
instead of the mundane explanation for crop circles of which the evidence is abundant you have chosen to go with a hypothesis which has no supporting evidence and for which you actually need to ignore evidence to carry on with your belief

pardon me for saying so, but your hypothesis is nuts

 

[TjW]

Maybe the crop circle phenomenon is subject to the sheep-goat effect and maybe you my friend are a goat. Your circlemaking and UFO hunting is quasi-religious for you, except that you have lost your quasi-faith.

Or maybe ... not.

 

[fls]

Maybe the crop circle phenomenon is subject to the sheep-goat effect and maybe you my friend are a goat.

I guess it depends upon how often goats poop. And whether they are tethered to the centre of the circle.

Linda

 

[I Ratant]

Saying prayers makes them 'bleevers' right? Or is it woo? Can't keep up.

Do you say the prayers with them?

.
Whatcha bet some of the prayers are..."Hey, who brought the beer?"

 

[Stray Cat]

Maybe the crop circle phenomenon is subject to the sheep-goat effect and maybe you my friend are a goat. Your circlemaking and UFO hunting is quasi-religious for you, except that you have lost your quasi-faith.

No, my circlemaking is purely creative and sometimes a social activity.

Do you still make circles? Year after year, thinking you are on the right track by making circles and testing the researchers who study them and hoping for paranormal encounters in the fields?

What's the 'right track'?
I enjoy the challenge, the night air, the small risk, giving art away... the creative reviews etc.
I leave the paranormal to everyone else who wants to believe in it. As I firmly believe anything paranormal is internal (in your mind) it's irrelevant to me. Of course, unless someone can show me a physical manifestation of it and let's face it... so many are claimed and yet none are ever proven.

Next time try making the circle with all shamans and pray with them and believe. A leap of quasi-faith is the only way to overcome the sheep-goat effect. If indeed it can be overcome.

Why?
My circles have the desired effect on their target audience without all that mystical mumbo jumbo... that's all I need.
However, if anyone wants to claim that something is paranormal because [insert BS crop circle 'evidence' here] then I want them to prove it's a sign of paranormal activity and not just their internal blind faith belief playing tricks on their mind.

 

[carlitos]

If I wasn't "on ignore," I would again ask Limbo why he is here. Does he expect a bunch of self-professed skeptics to say "gee, you are right," and accept a freaking God named Trickster as an explanation for man-made crop circles? Is he hoping to attract others who believe what he does? Really, I am curious.

 

[Limbo]

No, my circlemaking is purely creative and sometimes a social activity.

So you say. Of course you could be lying to yourself.

As I firmly believe anything paranormal is internal (in your mind) it's irrelevant to me.

Er, so do I. Anything paranormal is in our collective mind. As is reality itself. M3.

My circles have the desired effect on their target audience without all that mystical mumbo jumbo... that's all I need.

That attitude doesn't seem to jive with your claim that you hope for paranormal experiences when you are out in the field...

 

[I Ratant]

If I wasn't "on ignore," I would again ask Limbo why he is here. Does he expect a bunch of self-professed skeptics to say "gee, you are right," and accept a freaking God named Trickster as an explanation for man-made crop circles? Is he hoping to attract others who believe what he does? Really, I am curious.

.
Trickster is a typical South western Native American name for the coyote, known for its ability to adapt to quickly changing conditions, and a scapegoat...dog to put the blame on for the odd things that have no apparent source other than bad luck or misfortune.
.
"As will be suggested by the tales below, Trickster alternately scandalizes, disgusts, amuses, disrupts, chastises, and humiliates (or is humiliated by) the animal-like proto-people of pre-history, yet he is also a creative force transforming their world, sometimes in bizarre and outrageous ways, with his instinctive energies and cunning. Eternally scavenging for food, he represents the most basic instincts, but in other narratives, he is also the father of the Indian people and a potent conductor of spiritual forces in the form of sacred dreams."
.
I expect L sees him in the perjorative forms, in the pantheon of bizarre creatures that run around his head.

 

[Stray Cat]

If I wasn't "on ignore," I would again ask Limbo why he is here. Does he expect a bunch of self-professed skeptics to say "gee, you are right," and accept a freaking God named Trickster as an explanation for man-made crop circles? Is he hoping to attract others who believe what he does? Really, I am curious.

I know what you mean Carlitos.
But of course the structure of Limbo's theory is such that it can not be falsified and it makes it difficult to get him to state exactly what is paranormal about any of the physical aspects of any particular crop circle.

And as every single reported paranormal anomaly of the physical aspects of crop circles has been shown to be inaccurate, misrepresented or simply made up, I wonder why anyone should or would abandon the mundane in favour of the exotic, especially to argue something about some paranormal effect that is undetectable because of the trickster and a paranormal effect that the trickster allows you to see that isn't their... It all gets very confusing.

 

[Stray Cat]

So you say. Of course you could be lying to yourself.

Yes, sure I could be. But for proof of my desire to freely give away art as part of the creative process see this thread.
It still doesn't prove I'm not lying to myself but it's certainly good evidence that my creativity is not restricted to fields of wheat and supports that my motivation is to give/share and is not religious (or quasi-religious).

Er, so do I. Anything paranormal is in our collective mind. As is reality itself. M3.

Which is all well and good until someone looks at bent stalks and makes a claim. The claim is then not in their mind, it is physically in the wheat, the wheat is part of common shared reality. An external place purely physical, where the laws of physics apply.

That attitude doesn't seem to jive with your claim that you hope for paranormal experiences when you are out in the field...

Then maybe you just don't understand or maybe I didn't make myself clear enough that what I hope for is the physical manifestation of something considered to be paranormal. And maybe 'hope' is the wrong word because it's not like I consciously long for it or wish for it, but as scepticism is evidence based, I'm open to the possibility that one day, some evidence may actually arrive... Still waiting.

 

[Limbo]

Yes, sure I could be. But for proof of my desire to freely give away art as part of the creative process see this thread.
It still doesn't prove I'm not lying to myself but it's certainly good evidence that my creativity is not restricted to fields of wheat and supports that my motivation is to give/share and is not religious (or quasi-religious).

It's the 'purely' part. Your circles and investigations are not 'purely' about creativity. They are also about chasing the mythology you were virtually indoctrinated into as an impressionable kid, chasing that 'close encounter', and which still has you in its grips. But naturally you don't want to think of it that way. Naturally you will try to spin it in a way that buffs your ego and avoids words you have grown to dislike. Well I'm not so inclined.

Which is all well and good until someone looks at bent stalks and makes a claim. The claim is then not in their mind, it is physically in the wheat, the wheat is part of common shared reality. An external place purely physical, where the laws of physics apply.

Can't quite make the leap can you. I don't blame you, it's a tough one. In an M3 reality, there is no external place purely physical. The universe, the laws of physics, the wheat...all are manifestations of collective, cosmic non-local mind. All is within mind. Matter and energy and time and space are all 'illusions' which emerge from mind in such a metaphysic as M3.

 

[Marduk]

It's the 'purely' part. Your circles and investigations are not 'purely' about creativity. They are also about chasing the mythology you were virtually indoctrinated into as an impressionable kid. But naturally you don't want to think of it that way.





Can't quite make the leap can you. I don't blame you, it's a tough one. In an M3 reality, there is no external place purely physical. The universe, the laws of physics, the wheat...all are manifestations of collective, cosmic mind. Matter and energy and time and space all emerge from mind in such a metaphysic as M3.

what is it thats stopping you from realising that your claims for crop circles are absolute lunacy Limbo
its not that anyone else needs to make a leap, its that you need to come down off the building before you hurt yourself

 

[fls]

Can't quite make the leap can you. I don't blame you, it's a tough one. In an M3 reality, there is no external place purely physical. The universe, the laws of physics, the wheat...all are manifestations of collective, cosmic mind. Matter and energy and time and space all emerge from mind in such a metaphysic as M3.

Who cares unless it is useful?

Linda

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Can't quite make the leap can you. I don't blame you, it's a tough one. In an M3 reality, there is no external place purely physical. The universe, the laws of physics, the wheat...all are manifestations of collective, cosmic mind. All are within mind. Matter and energy and time and space all emerge from mind in such a metaphysic as M3.

I'll leave it to Stray Cat to comment on your belief that you know what he thinks better than he does.

As for the rest; can you make the leap to see how condescending and preposterous that looks from the point of view of people who don't live in your fantasy world of cosmic consciousness?

 

[fls]

The collective mind can come up with Gauge Symmetry, but can't figure out the circumscription of a circle? Yeah, that makes sense.

I'll pick the metaphysics that doesn't require I pretend to be an idiot, thank you very much.

Linda

 

[Toke]

Who cares unless it is useful?

Linda

Oh yea, you are one of those types who will ignore the beauty of the manifestations of collective cosmic non-local mind, and instead admire e.g. a functional vaccine.

 

[Angel Love]

No, I disagree. There is no evidence that circlemakers carrying out ritualistic activities has any influence on the resultant formation or those that visit it.

How would you know? What evidence would be required?

 

[Angel Love]

These are the kind of people who encourage the circlemakers to keep going.

Speak for yourself Stray Cat. Not all Circlemakers create for the same reasons as you might.

 

[23_Tauri]

There is no evidence that circlemakers carrying out ritualistic activities has any influence on the resultant formation or those that visit it.

How would you know? What evidence would be required?

That's a very interesting question Illusion and the short answer is that without an experimental setting it would be nigh on impossible to do this. It can’t be proven, as far as I can see, and I made the comment because limbo was suggesting that by getting in a shaman and performing some rituals would have a direct influence on those visiting a crop circle in terms of their ‘experience’. I appreciate these are incredibly woolly terms but limbo was going off into woolly territory.

Let me widen the discussion a little by exploring the purpose of ritual in society. The most effective rituals tend to be simplest. Think of a judge banging his gavel at the opening of court. This is a well understood, simple ritual that signals to those present about the commencement of an event. It serves those present at the time, no one else. Logic dictates to me that a ritual cannot have an effect on those not present, which is what limbo was intimating in his posts.

What is also apparent to me is that the New Age seems to have expropriated elements of traditional belief systems (limbo mentions shamanism) and dressed them up with elaborate rituals that are functionally completely different to traditional rituals that have a positive role in society (like the judge with his gavel). In my experience, the over-the-top showy ceremonies characteristic of New Age practitioners and designed for a Western consumer are not found in traditional shamanic societies which, being very literal, actually have minimal ritual and ceremony in the lives.*

*which roughly translates as: if they're going to get down to shamanic shenagigans, they don't do all this faffing around with robes and crystals, they just call the place to order and get down to it.

 

[Stray Cat]

Speak for yourself Stray Cat. Not all Circlemakers create for the same reasons as you might.

Indeed, many people are motivated by different... well... motivations.

My point wasn't circlemakers enjoy having people doing a lot of unnecessary work though, just that the level of work put into examining and publicising a circle attracts an audience. As the number of circles per year is quite consistent with several factors, public interest in them being one, it follows that the audience is essential for the majority of circlemakers and therefore any interest it gets from researchers is, on the whole welcomed.
But yes, broadly you are correct it was a slight generalisation and there are clear examples of people making circles for various other reasons.