348 replies to this topic

[laver]

DingoLingo, on 17 January 2013 - 04:32 AM, said:

what facts?



While I have full respect for Arthur as a author.. you need to remember.. he writes science fiction.. and its all based around aliens visiting us.. so of course he would have that opinion..



no we dont.. what we have is people making the circles and you guys just cannot believe it..



No.. Occum's Razor actually shows that it is man made not the other way around..

Arthur C Clarke was much more than just a writer of Science Fiction and that was his, no doubt well considered, opinion.

Look at it another way.... man in court accused of criminal damage by creating a crop circle. He could raise all the issues that have been mentioned to prove that he did not do it, could not have done it, and a jury would no doubt find him not guilty. The result would be that the court would conclude that it was done by 'person' or 'persons unknown'. Since humans cannot replicate all the factors that occur in some crop designs we must conclude that some are created by non human 'person' or 'persons unknown'.

[DingoLingo]

you know I can see the circle maker crowd will make a circle that you guys will (again) say alien etc.. but they wont come out for a few months.. so when all the crop circle experts come out with the 'this is proof its not done by humans' etc.. the way the crop has laid over.. the maths inside the circle design.. so on and so forth..

they will release the video of them making it..

I just hope they do it right and get it time stamped properly this time..

[psyche101]

laver, on 16 January 2013 - 07:06 AM, said:

A complex design like this one needs a designer,

Maybe it does, maybe it does not. It would certainly appear so, but that does not make it so. I could say the same thing about the Ant Nebulae or the Helix Nebulae.

laver, on 16 January 2013 - 07:06 AM, said:

I think most people would agree.

But would they be right? It  would seem so, but like I say, one could say the same thing about many natural structures, and quite often do. Look at the nonsense of the Bosnian Pyramid.

laver, on 16 January 2013 - 07:06 AM, said:

As human involvement can be reasonably excluded on the basis of the facts of the case some non human creator is implied.

Not reasonably, not at all. One needs a very biased outlook to exclude human intervention. You have one witness that claims a process that sounds like natural phenomena happened, I have one witness that says he knows who did this, when, and pointed out a flaw most seem to have missed. Would an intelligent designer make a flaw, or would a prankster make a flaw? What is more likely?

laver, on 16 January 2013 - 07:06 AM, said:

If you think 'nature' as an instrument of a deity I would agee that this is a possibility, some 'foreign' intelligence must have been involved and we do not yet know what that was.

No I do not think that. I do not believe in deities. When it comes to scientific explanations, I see deities as nothing more than a cop out. Simply a variation of ET and vice versa.

No I do not think for one second a foreign intelligence was involved, I believe the guy who makes these things on a regular basis, and fools people on a regular basis. If he ever reads this thread, I am sure he would be doubled over laughing at you.

laver, on 16 January 2013 - 07:06 AM, said:

This is not a one off as the appearance of these designs is a frequent occurance particularly in the county of Wiltshire in the UK, 69 examples of human and non human crop designs last summer.

How does that exclude man? It does not at all. How do you prove a circle is non-human? A dodgy witness account? Hrrmzz , very scientific.

[psyche101]

Slave2Fate, on 17 January 2013 - 12:46 AM, said:

Therein lies the rub no?

It doesn't matter one whit if humans did or didn't create any given crop circle or if it could be proven one way or another. If someone claims aliens then that someone needs to prove aliens regardless of human capabilities. It just detracts and distracts from the main argument (the ETH) when one focuses on disproving human involvement. The pro-alien crop circle crowd needs to not worry so much about negative evidence and start to bring some supportive evidence* to the table.

*And by supportive evidence I mean something unquestionably alien, or at least pretty damn close.

Indeed therein lies the rub mate. With regards to this particular crop circle being discussed  only one person has come forward who claims to have seen the circle "take shape" and her recollection I do believe might well be why nobody else has come forward. Those who had noticed the design and pulled over for a gander were no doubt scratching their heads at the description, which sounds made up I have to say. I would not be surprised to find the "witness" is a practicing Wiccan or the like. What she claimed was:

Quote

There was a mist was about 2-3 feet off the ground and it was sort of spinning around and on the ground a circular shape was appearing which seemed to get bigger and bigger as simultaneously the mist gets bigger and bigger and swirled faster.

She never said it was the exhaust from a spaceship, she did not say a spaceship hovered and somehow created the design, she never mentions aliens. The woo woo crowd seems to have provided that piece of information for her.

The Pilot who supposedly corroborates the story because he did not notice anything the first time he flew over (which circle makers say would be quite right due to terrain) yet even with this dubious verbal, not a spaceship in sight. No Aliens. Again, the woo woo crowd have decided to accomodate that little hole.

Not an alien in the story, no aliens in sight, no ships, not even a light in the sky, but that does not stop the faithful from invoking them.

Edited by psyche101, 17 January 2013 - 07:03 AM.

[psyche101]

laver, on 17 January 2013 - 04:23 AM, said:

Regarding the matter of Occum's Razor there are too many unanswered questions if we just said 'all crop designs are designed and made by humans', too many facts about the matter that would not fit this proposal.

No there is not. The only claim you have come up with is the dodgy microwave musing that comes from Russian Scientists and a person who faked a test result.

The claims have to be valid to be considered to have an impact.

laver, on 17 January 2013 - 04:23 AM, said:

So it is a matter of each person's individual mind set as to the probabilty either way.

Of course, or we would not be subject to Aliens claims when Aliens are nowhere to be seen.

laver, on 17 January 2013 - 04:23 AM, said:

Arthur C Clarke said that the chances of Earth having been visited from outside during its long history far outweighed the chances that it had not. So if we have inexplicable signs that we may be getting messages from outside this orb of ours and human creation does not fit the facts of the matter to say that these come from elsewhere is the simplest and most straightforward answer and hence quite in keeping with the principle of Occum's Razor.

Robert Heinlein did not have that opinion, and he was one of the "Big Three" (comprising of Clarke, Heinlein and Asimov) and when Clarke expressed his views on the strategic defence initiative, he attacked him right in Niven's home. Clarke said they reconciled  but they most certainly remained distant until Heinlein's passing. Clarke was a writer who had a fascination with the paranormal. As such, do you really find such a comment a surprise? This is the time when people thought Aliens came from Mars and Venus.

There is no reason at all to believe crop circles are not 100% earthly and you have not supported your claims. You have that fantasy in your head, and you want it to be true. In reality, that is where the buck stops. Have you not noticed you keep trying to push the Occam's Razor ideal, and still not a single person agrees with you?

But I suppose it is not you who is wrong, it's the rest of the world, right?

Edited by psyche101, 17 January 2013 - 07:15 AM.

[psyche101]

DingoLingo, on 17 January 2013 - 04:32 AM, said:

While I have full respect for Arthur as a author.. you need to remember.. he writes science fiction.. and its all based around aliens visiting us.. so of course he would have that opinion..

Mate it is a bit weird how some people are hanging onto old authors and trying to sell them as prophets. They had their moment in the sun, we respect their imagination, stunning that some think an imagination is real. Maybe the ETH is closer to religion than I originally thought.

I guess Tolkien made some rather cryptic comments about middle earth, sometimes it seemed he believed in his own tales, yet at other times, he outwardly pooh poohed the idea. Maybe these guys thought sucking in the gullible was a form of immortality.

[psyche101]

DingoLingo, on 17 January 2013 - 05:41 AM, said:

you know I can see the circle maker crowd will make a circle that you guys will (again) say alien etc.. but they wont come out for a few months.. so when all the crop circle experts come out with the 'this is proof its not done by humans' etc.. the way the crop has laid over.. the maths inside the circle design.. so on and so forth..

they will release the video of them making it..

I just hope they do it right and get it time stamped properly this time..

I think they should make a point, and only do circles of boobies or something. Something painfully obvious to drive the message home once and for all.

I mean if every crop circle looked like this, it would be hard to dismiss.

Edited by psyche101, 17 January 2013 - 07:26 AM.

[psyche101]

laver, on 17 January 2013 - 05:25 AM, said:

Arthur C Clarke was much more than just a writer of Science Fiction and that was his, no doubt well considered, opinion.

[Sir Wearer of Hats]

laver, on 17 January 2013 - 05:25 AM, said:

Arthur C Clarke was much more than just a writer of Science Fiction and that was his, no doubt well considered, opinion.

Indeed, Clarke was a man who revelled in playing word games, distracting you, engaging you in thought and saying one thing while believing entirely another.
Case in point "Childhood's End", which although not nihilistic is a rather depressing read with a depressing view of the possibility of human achievement, Clarke actually went out of his way in the author's tract to say "this isn't what I believe, it is just an interesting train of thought to engage in".
He was a man who believed in the infinite possibility of man's achievements.Hell, he contributed to it in the form of satellite technologies.

[laver]

Wearer of Hats, on 17 January 2013 - 07:51 AM, said:

Indeed, Clarke was a man who revelled in playing word games, distracting you, engaging you in thought and saying one thing while believing entirely another.
Case in point "Childhood's End", which although not nihilistic is a rather depressing read with a depressing view of the possibility of human achievement, Clarke actually went out of his way in the author's tract to say "this isn't what I believe, it is just an interesting train of thought to engage in".
He was a man who believed in the infinite possibility of man's achievements.Hell, he contributed to it in the form of satellite technologies.

Arthur C Clarke was talking about the probability of a visit which most people would consider valid when the vastness of the Universe and time are taken into account. The creation stories in the bible have over very many years been shown to be incorrect and often based on a rehash of much earlier accounts from places like Sumer. The Sumerian creation stories clearly indicate a visit or visits from external sources. So a reasonable person would no doubt conclude that this is a possibility and that if it has happened in the distant past could well happen again. This affects how we consider the balance of probabilities when looking at crop circles and some which do not
due to the way they are formed and/or the circumstances in which they appear seem to be of human origin

[Sir Wearer of Hats]

no, actually it doesn't "clearly" indicate aliens. Like many many other mythologies, the gods were just really powerful and intelligent people, who bickered and fought and made man beause they were fundamentally lazy.

nothing to say they're from Mars or Skaro or whereever. Just that they're just like us, oddly enough the "god as powerful man"  style myrhologising has a lot to do with trying to make uncontrollable and unfeeling forces relatable - hense a god of floods who needs to be appeased, or a goddess of the harvest who needs to be thanled.

Edited by Wearer of Hats, 17 January 2013 - 11:03 AM.

[DingoLingo]

Wearer of Hats, on 17 January 2013 - 11:01 AM, said:

or Skaro

Well if you think about it.. Davros was basically god to the Dalek's since he created them.. though he did go one step further then our god.. he did not create them in his image..

[laver]

Wearer of Hats, on 17 January 2013 - 11:01 AM, said:

no, actually it doesn't "clearly" indicate aliens. Like many many other mythologies, the gods were just really powerful and intelligent people, who bickered and fought and made man beause they were fundamentally lazy.

nothing to say they're from Mars or Skaro or whereever. Just that they're just like us, oddly enough the "god as powerful man"  style myrhologising has a lot to do with trying to make uncontrollable and unfeeling forces relatable - hense a god of floods who needs to be appeased, or a goddess of the harvest who needs to be thanled.

Even the bible indicates that the gods 'went down', in Sumer  'came down', so although only myth and legend it indicates the possibiity of some sort of visitation from above. Only a possibility maybe but since the creation myths of the bible have been shown to be a fabrication which was done by writers with agendas, and are a reinterpretion of much earlier stories to suit these agendas, what is a reasonable person to believe? The seven days of creation story is clearly nonsense so opens up all sorts of lines of enquiry including the intervention of a 'foreign' intelligence. This is only relevant to the crop circle issue because if it has happened before it makes the chances of it now happening again much higher.

[Slave2Fate]

laver, on 17 January 2013 - 02:19 PM, said:

Even the bible indicates that the gods 'went down', in Sumer  'came down', so although only myth and legend it indicates the possibiity of some sort of visitation from above. Only a possibility maybe but since the creation myths of the bible have been shown to be a fabrication which was done by writers with agendas, and are a reinterpretion of much earlier stories to suit these agendas, what is a reasonable person to believe? The seven days of creation story is clearly nonsense so opens up all sorts of lines of enquiry including the intervention of a 'foreign' intelligence. This is only relevant to the crop circle issue because if it has happened before it makes the chances of it now happening again much higher.

As children we are forced throughout our developmental stage to 'look up' (both figuratively and literally) to the adults that guide us. We are basically conditioned with the thought that those who are our betters are above us. Is it any wonder then that we would automatically assume that Gods would come from above. The fact that supposed aliens would also come from above is merely a coincidence. They may come from the same direction but they wouldn't be coming from the same place.

[Sir Wearer of Hats]

laver, on 17 January 2013 - 02:19 PM, said:

Even the bible indicates that the gods 'went down', in Sumer  'came down', so although only myth and legend it indicates the possibiity of some sort of visitation from above.

And where, exactly, does the English translations of the Bible place Heaven?
Ohh yes "up there", "above the clouds" - "above the stars" even.
So if you're coming from God's side, then you're coming from Heaven, tehn you're coming from "up there".