Antikythera Mechanism and . . . technology re-sets

Geared clocks appeared in the 1500's; watches with miniaturized, sophisticated gear systems appeared in the 1800's; computers were invented in the 2nd half of the 20th century. Except for an analog computer that was used in the Mediterranean, about 100-150 years before Christ was born. ............... In 1900, the Antikythera Mechanism was discovered in sea wreckage of Atikythera Island at a depth of about 130 feet. The "manual" on its side is inscribed with Greek characters from the era 100-150 BC. The date of the mechanism is not controversial. How the culture of that time could have obtained such technology is controversial. The mechanism contains from 30 to 70 gears, has three external dials, and is made of bronze, enclosed in a wood casing only 13 x 7 x 4 inches. On it side is the "manual" with 3,000 Greek characters that describes how to use the device, and which contains references to heavenly bodies. Professor Michael Edmunds, who led the examination of the device, said:
"This device is just extraordinary, the only thing of its kind. The design is beautiful, the astronomy is exactly right. The way the mechanics are designed just makes your jaw drop. Whoever has done this has done it extremely carefully." and added: "in terms of historic and scarcity value, I have to regard this mechanism as being more valuable than the Mona Lisa."
The device is essentially an analog computer, made with gears (the teeth being equilateral triangles, as opposed to the squared teeth that Archimedes attempted). When a date was entered (with a dial or crank), the machine accurately calculated the position of the Sun, Moon, and other heavenly bodies (relative to an observer's position on Earth) and indicated them with hands on the side of the casing. (Do you think that you could construct such a gear system, even given the manuals and information available to you now?) ............ It is difficult to imagine exactly how this machine was used, in view of the fact that science of the time did not understand gravity, much less orbits or planetary motion. Plausible uses of the machine might have included:
1. Calculation of religious dates and festivals. 2. Astrology. 3. Calendar adjustment.
Near the area of the wreckage, Rhodes Island had museums with display of other mechanical devices -- about 100 interesting mechanical devices of the time are known to exist, though none with nearly the level of sophistication of the Antikythera Mechanism. Cicero, Archimedes, and others refer to astronomical machines in their writings. Also, it is unlikely that it was built for public display only, because its size and the "manual" on the side clearly imply that it was meant to be used by non-technical travelers. And yet, eclipses of the moon are not important for navigation. ............... See reconstruction at right.  This machine -- which is a computer, not a clock -- would have been an incredible accomplishment -- in 1800 A.D.  If Thomas Edison had invented it, it might have been one of his greatest achievements. So, here is another case in which we learn that ancient cultures used machines far beyond what we would have expected them to use. The explosion of technology in Western civilization occurred over, relatively, only a few years. It is tantalizing to meditate on the Babylonian, Egyptian, and Greek halls of learning and the libraries that could have sprung up over a century or two, and then been sacked and burned by invading conquerors. Yet: why were these super-valuable inventions always destroyed by the kingdoms that appropriated them? That the Greeks came up with surprisingly advanced, non-powered, machines in a few centuries does not seem implausible to me. The interesting question, for me, is this: how did the Greek technology disappear so suddenly and so utterly? ................. If you want a paranormal suggestion (and you didn't say you did), here's mine: the Tower of Babel (Gen. 11) emphatically states that Higher Powers suppressed the advance of technology. The earth bears the marks of having technology suppressed on at least three major occasions: in Egypt, in Babylon and in Greece. This may also have occurred in Central America and in China, if not in other places also (consider Stonehenge, the Nazca lines, etc.). This time around -- in Western culture -- there has been no suppression. We wonder why? Cheers, Jeff ....................... images:  http://onter.net/art/antikythera_mechanism.jpg http://www.mlahanas.de/Greeks/Kythera-Dateien/image009.jpg

Crop Circles

The believers say that many, if not most, of the world's crop circles are indeed hoaxed. But that there are a certain number of them that could not have been, because of specific attributes. The skeptics say that all crop circles, without exception, are man-made. Hoaxers with boards on ropes walk around, flattening plants, to create the designs. The believers point out that, first of all, in an "authentic" crop circle, the plants are not broken towards the bottom the way that they are when boards are used to flatten crops. They are bent and fused over, with blown-out "nodes" that show exactly the same characteristics as if heated by microwave radiation. The skeptics are a bit challenged to come up with a reply on this, but in 2002 a group from MIT (1) flattened a design and (2) microwaved the area afterwards to produce some "blown nodes." Skeptics see this as a complete response to the "nodes" challenge. The MIT group's results fell woefully short, in the opposing view: their sprayed iron filings appeared in an unsatisfactory pattern, the nodes were not elongated, the team had to use night-vision headsets, portable microwave emitters, and other equipment out of the reach of hoaxers, etc.

The believers respond by pointing out that such plants are killed in the process, while in an "authentic" circle, the plants continue to grow, even those specifically flattened. Believers also point out that there are many surprising phenomena associated with "authentic" circles, such as:
1. A magnetic profile mimics the actual design of the crop circle. 2. Traces of metallic, magnetic material are found in the soil, and sometimes implanted in the plant cells. 3. The swirl symmetry is smooth and there are usually few rotations of the spirals in the flattening (implying huge 'boards' used to flatten the plants). 4. Often the floor of the circle features an interweaving of the plants. 5. The circles are extremely large and complex, considering that they have to be created in a night.
Skeptics don't generally dispute the above points. They set about trying to demonstrate how humans might have produced the microwaved nodes and metallic deposits. The above five points are not essentially controversial, in terms of whether they occur or not. .............. As you might have surmised by now, I personally don't find it plausible that college students with boards are going out and producing the best of these circles in four hours of darkness, and then spraying the soil with magnetic shavings. Many of these circles would require huge teams of "flatteners" working with cranes and lights and so forth, and this would disturb the neighbors who are typically located fairly proximate to the circles. Also, for a group of college students :- ) to produce spiral circles, they need to plot a number of points around the circumference and then survey the area. Early on, it required only 3- or 4-point geometry to produce the simple circles, but since then the stakes have been raised. Some of the circles require 30-point geometry to design (!), and many are larger than football fields. Many of the designs show a smoothness of symmetry, and complexity of geometry, that can't be done in a few hours with surveying equipment and/or compass tethers. . === So, Who Gets the Blame? === If you're satisified by the idea that amateur hoaxers were able to produce 100% of these circles, you have no cognitive dissonance here. ........... Personally, I (jemanji) do not believe that intelligent life exists in the Milky Way outside of earth. This is not because I'm biased against the idea of aliens. It is because I find Fermi's Paradox completely convincing. However, if there were one UFO argument that I would find credible, it would be the crop-circle argument. Reports of dancing lights, 8 meters above the ground, creating these circles, could feasibly be attributed to civilizations a million years more advanced than ours. In Arthur C. Clarke's "Childhood's End," he put forth the idea that when aliens do decide to integrate into our societies, they will do so very carefully, in slow stages, "warning" us first, so as to give us the chance to get used to them. Carl Sagan's "Contact" echoes this theme. Again, this doesn't do it for me, because Enrico Fermi proved convincingly that if intelligent life were extant in the Milky Way, it would have colonized the galaxy long, long ago. .................... I would not totally rule out the notion of spiritual beings intervening in our society, but do not believe that they would use electromagnetism to create circles. :- ) .................... The idea that high-technology governmental devices create these is farfetched -- but for me, it's less farfetched than any of the alternatives. When you have ruled out the impossible, Mr. Spock, then whatever is left -- however improbable -- must be true. Well, maybe not. ................... For me, crop circles represent an entertaining cognitive dissonance: they can't be happening, and yet they are. For me, crop circles are the number-one example of cognitive dissonance on the planet. I have no idea how they occur. They're impossible. Cheers, jemanji ................ image: http://www.futurehi.net/images/cropcircle.jpg

The most puzzling crop circles

... for me, would include these: .......... The 2002 Alien Face formation. First of all, if done by aliens, why the 'scary face' image. Why, on any number of levels. If they were benevolent, slow-moving 'Prime Directive' aliens following the agenda in 'Childhood's End' and 'Contact,' why reveal their image at all at this point? Why the stern face? Certainly such aliens, at this point, would be versed in human-oriented body language and facial expression. We don't want to anthropomorphize, but neither should we assume that the Blues and the Greys are idiots. :- ) They might as well have put fangs on this thing. Remember the Balok dummy from Star Trek? ................ The disk is obviously an info-code, and when decoded in ASCII it reads,
"Beware the bearers of FALSE gifts & their BROKEN PROMISES. Much PAIN but still time. (Damaged Word). There is GOOD out there.We OPpose DECEPTION. Conduit CLOSING (BELL SOUND)".
Per this message, the Greys :- ) are trying to warn us about the Blues. Very cheesy, to me. Maybe it hits you differently. I don't know whether this formation had the elongated nodes, the magnetic fields and magnetized iron with it. If not, would assume it's a hoax, and I don't buy it, in any case. But that's awfully nice imagery to put in crops over the course of a night. Great puzzle. ................ Gerald Hawkins had a Ph.D. in radio astronomy and ran one of the best Circles sites. He pointed out the geometric theorems latent in this crop circle: ... as Hawkins explains,
This combines the side of a hexagon, OB, with the side of a pentagon, AB, to get the radius of circle 1, OA. From Ptolemy's theorem of chords, with G equal to the golden mean and OF=1, we can prove that: 20A= G+AB (square root 3), or OA= 1,82709. Therefore by Rule 2, circles 1 and 3 give a ratio of 3.338, note A in the second octave. By crop circle theorem 4 the hexagon circles 1 and 2 give a diatonic ratio of 4/3, note F. Is the raised circle a clue? D is the center of the arc of the crescent E. Angle CFD is 72 degrees, so CD is also the side of the pentagon. This example of mathematical art gives the same diatonics as T448, notes F and A2, but the design is better. The diatonic circles now go through the tips of the moon, not the center, and the accuracy is 0.1%, not the previous 0.5%. Artistic as it is, the pattern contains math, and no previous artist has used mathematics as a theme. Ptolemy's theorem of 150 AD is a prehistoric landmark, because it is the foundation of trigonometry.
Some crop circles have presented undiscovered geometric theorems. Many relate to the musical diatonic scale and present interesting puzzles for mathemeticians. ................. This crop circle (Wiltshire, August 2001) measured 800 feet across and contained 409 circles.

The sheer size of the pattern creates difficulty for those imagining that a handful of hoaxers created it. This pattern is the size of a cruise ship. Had one (huge) circle been created every 120 seconds, it would have taken more time to create than darkness was available. ............. . . . . . . . This crop circle (Barbury Castle, June 2008) encoded the value of Pi to the 10th decimal place, and finished with " ... ":

If you're having a bit of trouble with the encoding, here's a fine diagram from sciencepunk.com:

..................... Some circles contain other information, such as (Earth-bound) historical information, names, dates, etc. Dr. Gerald Hawkins offered a rapier summary:
If crop circles are made by hoaxers, then they should stop doing it, because they are breaking the law and damaging the food supply. If they are made by UFO aliens, they shouldn't give us back the dates of our trips to Mars and the names of the men from the Titanic era - famous, clever, but now forgotten. If some are transcendental, the power behind it should realize that our culture is not now willing to accept transcendental happenings. But if they are indeed transcendental, then society will have to make a big adjustment in the years ahead.
For those who suspect transcendental beings are responsible for the crop circles -- as Dr. Hawkins apparently did, before his death in 2003 -- then the circles could be interpreted as a type of "balancing-of-the-faith-scale" in a time of increasing skepticism and unbelief. According to this interpretation, some circles could also be done by malevolent transcendental beings in an effort to "muddy the water" or create competing messages and interpretations. ........... On the other hand, there have certainly been instances in which crop circle "experts" have declared circles unfakeable, and then been embarrassed by video footage of the hoaxers creating them. This permits the hoaxers the gloating that they had hoped to set up all along: "Why are people so ready to believe in the paranormal simply because they don't yet have the explanation for a phenomenon?" It's easy to imagine skeptics hoaxing scales on a massive scale, for precisely this motivation. However, they have not yet demonstrated the ability to flatten plants without killing them, to leave no footprints, to leave iron imbedded in the soil, etc. ............. As mentioned earlier, I personally find every explanation unlikely, which is why the circles form such an entertaining puzzle. Everything about them is not possible. Those circles which seem least possible, are in some ways the most interesting. Cheers, jemanji ................. http://www.cropcircleresearch.com/articles/alienface.html http://www.cropcirclesecrets.org/ccimages/crop_circles_7031.jpg http://www.crystalinks.com/cropchilbolton01.jpg http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3026/2614585745_8ef1240dd4.jpg?v=0 http://www.sciencepunk.com/v5/gallery/cropcircle.jpg

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