Observations from the
Alien & Code formation, Crabwood
found Aug 15, 2002

Why do others believe it is manmade?

It appears that the Chibolton and Crabwood formation have been generally judged to be manmade. This opinion is shared by some Crop Circle researchers in addition to the skeptics. There are many arguments to support such a conclusion and I agree with some of them (after all, I initially used similar arguments to support the same conclusion myself). Here I'm going to take a look at some of these arguments and check their validity.

The "human style", compared to other crop formations

These formations clearly differ from the "other-wordly" style of the other Crop Circles. These clearly display a human logic both within the consruction and the design of their message.

This is true. However, this does not prove anything about the source or motive of these patterns. I would like to make some remarks:

1. Crop Circles in general are likely made by several sources. There are people with different motives and styles, there are probably (I personally am very assured of this) many different non-human sources with different motives and styles.

2. Manmade formations are often symmetrical, abstract geometric patterns, imitating the serene "other-worldly" beauty of the genuine flower and fractal designs. Perhaps it would be reasonable to say that since a manmade formation doesn't have to be "human" in style, a non-manmade formation doesn't have to be "alien" in style.

3. The skeptics have considered the abstract patterns to be unlikely forms of E.T. communication. Rather they have expected a clear message in the same format as we use: "If the E.T. want to communicate with us, why don't they make it so that we can clearly understand?" Perhaps now a group of aliens (which I generally don't see a proper word to describe the genuine Circle makers), have decided to give such a clear message?

Binary code and ASCII code - unlikely methods of alien communication?

Why would the E.T. use binary code or English as ASCII code instead of plain English?

1. Why did WE send the Arecibo message in binary code? It is not just because the receivers would not understand English, but because a binary sequence is simple to transmit, as it is just a series of 1's and 0's (or two different pulses). A binary sequence may also be more practical to "transmit" into a crop field. Imagine how much space a 151 character English message would take in crop as plain letters. Considering the resolution of the crop, one character would have to be about one meter wide to be clearly distinguished. Whether applied as linear text or as a spiral, this would take more space and more work than a spiral binary code (in this case about 40 m in diameter).

2. ASCII code actually IS plain English. To understand the message you have to be familiar with computer technology, but if you are, ASCII is the most obvious way to binary code English.

3. This way the aliens may want to inform they are familiar both with our most commonly used international language, its digital coding and our computer technology. This information, together with the actual written message (and the apparent hidden code beneath it, more about this later) are delivered all at the same time.

4. IF the message had been written in plain English characters, would it really be more convincing? Would it not be considered too "human" style?

5. "If they can make a rasterized photo in the crop field, surely they can make a row of letters!" Yes, obviously, because letters can also easily be converted to binary streams. Both in the Chibolton and the Crabwood formations not only the code is binary, but also the face. To make a rasterized image, a binary matrix is needed to point out which dot is painted (flattened) and which is not. An additional definition is needed for each pixel to define its apparent darkness. In Chibolton it was dots with various diameters, in Crabwood it was lines with various thickness.

Couldn't it be, that these particular "aliens" use binary streams to transmit Crop Circles? Perhaps they sweep the crop field with a computer controlled ray or energy impulse. The sweep can be done either in linear or spiral fashion. A binary data can be used to control the intensity of the beam, defining which areas to be flattened and which not. So why convert letters into visual characters, since they can simply be swept down as a binary sequence? Sure it requires a little more work from us to decode it, but maybe that's not their problem. Or perhaps they think the message is more effective if we work on it a bit? Or perhaps they suppose we run the message through a computer anyway, and also for our computers a binary code is much easier to read than visual characters!

The differences between the Chibolton and Crabwood formations

The Chibolton and Crabwood formations are clearly executed in different style. The former was rasterized in newspaper style, the latter in television style (more advanced). Why would there be such a progress within one year?

Why would there? Obviously for some reason, WHOEVER made these formations. Obviously these two are connected, but does it mean they are made by the same folk, whether human or not? If they were manmade, why would these PEOPLE change theirs style? If they would, why not E.T? If people can use several kinds of rasterization, why not E.T?

Perhaps the first formation was manmade, but the second is not (there is still a connection)? Perhaps the first formation was made by a different group of people than the second. Perhaps the first was made by different group of ALIENS than the second. Apparently this arguments proves nothing.

The triviality of the English decoded message

The English message does not contain any important information and furthermore it is written in a strange, naive style with odd use of capitals and lowercase characters.

Even if this was true, would it be truly evidence against the E.T. origin of the message? If you suppose it is made by people, why do you think THEY would not give a meaningful logical message? If a group of people went through all this trouble, wouldn't they at least try to convey a message that says something profound? After all, they are clever enough not to get caught from deception!

From the viewpoint of a skeptic or a scientist the message may not contain any relevant information. From a spiritual viewpoint it is very relevant. When I initially thought this formation was most likely manmade, I still said "I like the message". If the E.T. want to advice us to stay away from the deceptive people and institutions running this world, if they want to say we still have time to make a change, if they want to say there is GOOD out there and we must not lose our faith, is this NOT RELEVANT?

If they say "We oppose deception", they also say "We are not deceiving". If this formation was manmade, it WOULD be deception. Would they really finish their message by saying "We are not deceiving"? To me this sounds a bit ridiculous at this point.

Finally, if we look at this message from a human angle, we should soon enough recognize that the plain English message is just the surface. Using short "oracle style" sentences, with capitals here and lowercase there, with '&' instead of 'and', with some extra bits in some characters, doesn't that ring a bell? Either there is another message encrypted underneath, or we are at least led to think that way. In any case, to omit this message just because it is written in a naive style (even if it eventually turned out to be a joke), would be really shortsighted!