THE ANATOMY OF DECEPTION.
A look at the claims of a 'leading' group of supposed circle makers.
Since 1994 a group of three artists has laid claim to some of England's most elaborate crop circles. The group originally named Team Satan has since changed its name to 'The circlemakers'- a name seemingly adopted to cause maximum confusion; after all, the real Circlemakers have been involved in making crop circles around the world as far back as the late 1800s, some supported by eyewitness reports claiming that an invisible whorl motion, lasting under fifteen seconds, flattens the crop in spiral fashion, without damaging the plants.
When a massive crop circle materialized beneath the gaze of Stonehenge in 1996, it was alledged by one of their close friends that the group made the said fractal pattern- a representation of the computer-generated Julia Set fratal- despite the fact that two pilots, a security guard and a gamekeeper all claim the formation appeared within a fifteen minute window one Sunday afternoon. It subsequently took a team of eleven surveyors five hours just to measure the design.
The same claim appears to have been made on a pattern three times the size at Windmill Hill, since its blueprint now adorns the home page of their web site- all this despite the logistics requiring a circle to be made approximately every 58 seconds. A surveying company who analyzed the site quoted a minimum of five days just to mark the site alone.
No wonder that with their ability to bend the rules of physics, levitate above the untouched wheat and master the laws of invisibility, 'the circlemakers' have since become media darlings, gaining commissions from the BBC and Sky Television, even Mitsubishi, for whom they made a crop circle shaped like a van over the course of two days, requiring the use of daylight and police protection.
At the end of the 1998 season they were commissioned by the BBC to construct a simple roulette of 100 circles (above left), without getting caught. As it turns out, they were caught within the first few minutes of their endeavour, proving just how hard it is to hoax patterns in the English countryside. Even in the dark. The final design, based on straighforward ninefold geometry, failed to reproduce any of the unusual biophysical and electromagnetic features already proved to exist in the real phenomenon; even the geometry itself was flawed. Despite the hit-and -miss result, this is Team Satan/the circlemakers best attempt at generating a pattern that almost fits the unalterable laws of sacred geometry, although it has taken them five years to get this far.
In the summer of 1999 'the circlemakers' were sponsored by the Daily Mail to create a crop formation beside Avebury stone circle (above left). The triangle format, containing 33 rough circles and incised with straight edges, was supposed to depict the 3-D illusion often referred to as Necker's Cube.
Despite the effort, the damage caused by the trampling of plants quickly showed how people systematically fail to leave them undamaged; from the above analysis, the geometry shows just how far off alignment the simple design is.
We can see a classic comparison between hoaxers' work and the genuine phenomenon: above right, a fabulous example from 1994, the year the hoaxers claim to have started, and ironically also placed beside the famous stone circle. This pattern is visually far more complex than the 1999 hoax design, suggesting that the hoaxers are getting worse at their craft in relation to their experience! While the latter is merely a design without meaning, the 'spider's web' design, by contrast, incorporates the harmonic laws of sound frequency, as proved by experiments in cymatics during the 1960s.
The 'spider's web' crop circle also encodes Hawkins' Fifth Theorem- part of a series of new mathematical theorems discovered in crop circles. These are based on the works of Euclid, yet these theorems are missing from Euclid's thirteen Treatises on Mathematics- the foundation of our system today. Additionally, this design is encoded with diatonic ratios- mathematical fractions fundamental to the music scale, and the chances of anyone hitting these by accident are one million to one.
How is it possible these forgers have the ability to encode such complex information one night, yet fail miserably the next, even with the aid of light?
Take another example, from Longwood Warren in 1995 (above left), a crop formation depicting the orbits of planets in the inner solar system to an accuracy of 99%. The number of circles in the 'asteroid belt' depicts the exact number of years the alignment shown actually occurs in the heavens; furthermore, the overlay clearly demonstrates Hawkins' Theorem II, where the relationship between the large circle and asteroids is an exact octave. This one occurred in total darkness. Compare this to TEam Satans' effort on the right, created in remote New Zealand with help from two powerful lights suspended above the field, and witnessed by the local townspeople. The hoaxers clearly fail to bisect a simple hexagonal framework in the centre, and the rest of the design falls out of alignment at most points. Furthermore, the depiction of the Mandelbrot Set- normally an elegant cardeoid shape made from a computer-generated series of mathematical calculations- is nothing more than a crude circle with a chunk removed from the top.
But how were they able to achieve such a complex pattern anyway? It has since been revealed that this field was staked out for two days with ropes and pins, prior to the making of the formation. Little wonder that when the work was aired in 'Secrets of Deception' no measuring appears to be taking place as the formation is made.
Not to take credit away from their elaborate endeavour on the other side of the world. Yet when the hoaxers tried to achieve the same exercise back in more densely-populated England, they were immediately caught, a problem the real Circlemakers have never experienced. Which just goes to show how much harder it is to pull the wool over people's eyes when you try to do this kind of thing back in a country where the local residents actually outnumber the sheep!
So when you see Team Satan/the circlemakers (names Rod Dickinson, John Lundberg, Will Russell) laying claim to crop circles whose geometrical, biophysical and electromagnetic properties have, to this day, proved to have been created beyond the capacity of boot and plank of wood, you are witnessing a deception in itself. By grafting their inferior work to the real phenomenon, they gain attention through association and without showing a slither of evidence in support of their outlandish claims.
It is worth remembering that any number of terrorist organizations often claim the same bomb, demonstrating just how much easier it is to get credit and the glory than to perform the work yourself.
UPDATE
New evidence suggests the above team has laid claim to someone else's work. According to their claim, featured in The Daily Mail, they made the Avebury hoax between 11.30 pm and 5 am. But two people have come forward to say they were standing by the said field between midnight and 12.45 am, and no pattern was evident in the crop; since this was the night of the full moon, visibility was perfect, and besides, the field in question lies on a prominent incline. A local shop manager whose bedroom window overlooks the field also verifies that at 2 am no crop circle was in place.
There is no doubt the design did not conform to the accepted phenomenon, but this brings up more questions: If Team Satan/the circlemakers did not make this design, who or what did?
The Daily Mail article also states that a number of eight bar gates were crossed as the team reached the field. The problem is, farm gates in Wiltshire are either five- or six bars. So one has to wonder, were the team even anywhere near Wiltshire when the hoax was made?
Further evidence uncovered by researcher Lucy Pringle adds to the scam. The originator of the article, reporter Sam Taylor, appears not to exist. Queries to Ms. Taylor are directed to the Daily Mirror, specifically the desk of Graham Brough. Long-time followers of crop circles will know this man as the creator of Doug and Dave, another crop circle scam story. Readers are encouraged to ring up both newspapers and demand to know why this obvious deception has been perpetrated at the expense of the public.
My own analysis is suggesting that this crop circle, along with two other crop circles of the season, may have been the product of weapons testing. The ground evidence suggests that an energy in the microwave region has been used. Genuine crop circles contain traceable electromagnetic energy (in the mid to high MHz range), which ally with biological and brainwave states (these would be responsible for the changes in chromosomes in crop circles plants, and for the range of physiological affects on visitors); microwave however operates in the GHz range and tends to leave plants and soil sterile (the opposite is true in genuine crop circles). Technology capable of transmiting coded information at such a range was recently switched on in Alaska, under the U.S. military's secret project HAARP. It's just a thought...
By Freddy Silva. This article can be disseminated free, for non-profit use only.
Images © Freddy Silva, Colin Andrews, The Southland Times.
REPLY TO DICKINSON CRITICISM.
Since this report was uploaded, Rod Dickinson of the Team Satan/ the circlemakers has responded with a number of accusations and observations on his web site, which he is perfectly entitled to do since I have taken the trouble to dissect his claims. Here is my reply:
DICKINSON: claims NOT to have made the Julia and Triple Julia Set crop circles.
REPLY: Judging from the way Mr. Dickinson exhibits these colossal formations on his web site, one is led to believe he did, after all if you are claiming to be 'England's circlemakers' why would you display work that does not belong to you? Unless, of course, the intention is to claim through association, a technique often used to great effect in advertising. Secondly, the original allegation was made to researchers by another well-known hoaxer Rob Irving, a friend of the team. Mr. Dickinson now claims that he knows who really made these formations. And frankly, I would love to know- given how a number of very reliable eyewitness place the 'Julia Set' as having materialized within a fifteen minute window, and beside a busy tourist site during daylight, the perpetrators would have mastered the ability of invisibility and levitation alone to do the work.
DICKINSON: (referring to the Milk Hill hoax 1998) "we made a formation for the BBC consisting of 100 circles in 2.5 hrs ...An average of 60 seconds per circle"
REPLY: We'll have to take the 2.5 hrs at face value since no independent judge was there to witness. To their credit, this is a very good endeavour, created under accepted circle-making conditions. However, their far superior creation in New Zealand, also containing the same number of circles, pre-staked with string, under artificial lighting, took three hours longer to make. Perhaps the team was sluggish in New Zealand! Mr. Dickinson claims that his Milk Hill effort matches the rate of 58 seconds per circle required for the 'Triple Julia Set', but what he conveniently forgets is that the size of circles in this genuine crop circle were far in excess of his; that each of its three spiralling arms measured over 900 ft- by comparison, his Milk Hill hoax was a mere 180 ft in diameter. Furthermore, I was at the 'Triple Julia Set' the morning of its appearance- no plants were damaged, every circle was created by an organized spiral pattern, the centre of every circle was crafted individually with every conceivable variation of swirl. The Milk Hill floor pattern was nothing more than a trampled mess with no semblance of spiral or central ornament other than signs of hasty movement by planks. So Mr. Dickinson's criteria for creating crop circles 'under similar conditions' appears to be a little misleading.
DICKINSON: "The logo in the middle of the formation (belonging to our sponsors Yellow Pages, which Freddy mistakes for 'bad geometry'!)..."
REPLY: In my original analysis I made this error based on rash judgement, so it's a lesson to me to avoid doing it again. My apologies to all. That said, my analysis on this page is of the TOTAL design. This is certainly not rash, and clearly shows that the only geometry that fits the design, the ninefold type, is clearly missed by a substantial margin. Genuine crop circles, whose alignments are based on the laws of harmonics and sacred geometry, do not contain these errors. Mr. Dickinson also conveniently avoids my analysis of 'his' Avebury hoax which contains even more noticeable errors despite it being a simpler triangular format (probably because he had no hand in it, according to the eyewitness reports stated above).
DICKINSON: "Freddy also feels that the connecting paths that lay out the geometry of the BBC formation were uncharacteristic of the 'genuine' phenomenon. But oddly in a fit of selective amnesia Freddy forgot that both Windmill Hill and The Stonehenge Julia (he regards both as 'genuine', not man made) were characterized by very prominent 'connecting paths'."
REPLY: Mr. Dickinson confuses a 'connecting path' with an 'underlying path'. An underlying path is often a trace marker used as a skeleton from which the crop circle design expands. To my knowledge both hoaxers and Circlemakers (the real ones) use this technique, often in association with more complex patterns. Roy Dutton, Pat Delgado and Stanley Morcom have researched this at length, some postulating that a thin 'pencil-type' energy source programmes the stems to bend and lay in this fashion. This is certified by dowsing, which reveals a residue of electromagnetic energy; the hoax underlying paths do not dowse.
What I refer to as 'connecting paths' are the breaks in the circle walls that people make as they walk from circle to circle; they are also created by the initial treading of plants to establish the reference points of the design to be created. These connecting paths are evident in Mr. Dickinson's work, but were not evident in both Julia Sets until after groups of people began walking through the formations.
DICKINSON: "Freddy also didn't like the the profile of a new car model for Mitsubishi that we created a few weeks later - claiming the wheels were crooked."
REPLY: They were crooked- I measured them. If someone else who measured them can tell me I'm wrong I would be more than willing to admit an error on my part. Regardless, the car was a good piece of work- but once again the mess on the ground revealed the human origin.
DICKINSON: "The background to Silva's criticism of our efforts last year and in previous years is coloured by the fact that when Silva reported the Avebury triangle on his website 'the crop circular' he claimed it had been Psychically predicted... As soon as the story broke in the media, that we had made it, this report mysteriously disappeared from his web site to be replaced with less than complimentary commentary, claiming we, the local farmer and the Mail were, in our own ways ridiculing crop circle researchers."
REPLY: The background to my criticism, like most other researchers, is that Team Satan/the circlemakers have been deceiving people and the press into believing they are behind the crop circle phenomenon. There is no doubt that this team is perhaps the most talented in terms of creating the more elaborate man-made crop circles, and certainly provide a good barometer with which to judge the real thing by. This is useful for research. But the media then hails them as the answer to the enigma, helping to confuse the issue in the public's mind and making people switch off; a similar technique was used by the British Military at Bratton in 1990, and even Doug and Dave's story was traced to an establishment in Somerset with connections to the military.
They have also, no doubt, profited financially from this. In my original article I DID claim that the design had been predicted- I did NOT claim that it was genuine. As I explained to Mr. Dickinson's colleague, John Lundberg, at a lecture last year, psychics predict an EVENT. If you ask for specific information, a good intuitive will also tell you if the event will be man made or otherwise. It was established beforehand that a formation was about to appear at Avebury, that was all, so my report was correct. Secondly, the formation was declared a hoax by myself when I visited Avebury shortly after its appearance that morning, and I e-mailed several colleagues of my opinion. The design was a mess, crushed plants everywhere, and no reference to the local lines and eddies of electromagnetic energy, of which there is plenty at this location- even sheep can locate this stuff! The confusion in my original report stemmed from an interview with a local resident who had commissioned a crop circle design to be made at the same location to advertise a concert. Since I was stretched to analyse far more important events, it then took me a week before I found the time to update my report with more complete evidence, by which time the Daily Mail had printed their article (why does it take a newspaper a week to print a piece of news? Odd). So it did not 'mysteriously disappear', nor was my initial- and correct- observation brushed under the carpet, as Rod implies; it was made public and at the rate I was receiving it.
In the end, the Daily Mail DID use the event to trash and humiliate the phenomenon and the people involved, once again without referring to the vast amount of evidence that already exists in support of the real phenomenon. Mr. Dickinson and co. are astute individuals, and given the manner in which the cynical press views crop circles, I doubt they believed for one minute that the work they were well paid to perform would have been used without malice of some kind by their employers. As for the farmer who granted permission for the hoax, he went on to make a hefty sum by charging people entry to what he knew was a fraud all along. A nice piece of deception all around? I'll let readers decide for themselves.
As it now turns out, Mr. Dickinson and TEam Satan/the circlemakers' story does not match the evidence and the eyewitness statements, so it is now doubtful these individuals made the formation at all.
Regardless, I thank Rod Dickinson for taking the trouble to express his side of the story and to point out any discrepancies in our opposing points of view.
Return to MEDIA FRAUDS.
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In 1998, however, the surviving member of the deceptive duo did make an incredible admission to British newspapers that he'd been guided by an unknown force.
The issue is that no man-made crop circle has satisfactorily replicated the features associated with the real phenomenon, and this has baffled scientists and researchers. Crop circles are created by a force seemingly at odds with modern science. Central to the hoax argument is that a physical object is required to flatten the crop to the ground, resulting in the breaking of the plant stems. In genuine formations the stems are not broken but bent (left), normally about an inch off the ground and near the plant's first node. The plants appear to be subjected to a short and intense burst of heat which softens the stems to drop just above the ground at 90ª, where they reharden into their new and very permanent position without damage. 
Plant biologists are baffled by this phenomenon, and farmers, who know how the land ticks, have no explanation either. It is the singlemost method of identifying the real phenomenon. Research and laboratory tests suggest that microwave or infrasound may be the only method capable of producing such an effect.
Yet in all cases, the plants are not damaged and will continue to grow and ripen if left untouched. This would not be possible had they been trampled by force.
Crop circles are generally formed at night between the hours of 2-4 am, traditionally during the shortest evenings of the English year when darkness lasts but four hours, in fields eagerly watched by farmers, military, laser alarms, scientists or hundreds of enthusiasts in their sleeping bags hoping to be the lucky ones to witness a crop circle forming. Some of those lucky few have witnessed large balls of brilliant colour project a beam of golden light into a field which next morning displays a new crop circle.Yet despite many stakeouts and fields rigged with top surveylance equipment, crop circles have appeared out of the mist right under the noses of those looking for them. On one occasion, the Circlemakers even materialized in full view of the British Prime Minister's heavily-guarded country residence.
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