Posted 2008-July-24, 17:22
It's a nice arrangement and I see it as virtually conclusive proof that these various crop pictures are created by human hand. Here is why:
True, Pi is sufficiently universal that it is reasonable to think that it would be discovered by other intelligent species. The decimal representation of Pi is another matter. Base ten is arbitrary, presumably because we have ten fingers/thumbs on our two hands. In many ways octal would be better. I think the Incas used base 12, more or less (their system was weird).
Of course the ETs could have been reading our mail, noticed that we used base ten, and decided to show themselves by sending a message in base ten. Uh huh.
The usual guess is that an intelligent civilization would show their presence with primes. $$$$$$$$$$$$$ is a prime number of dollar signs whether the number is written as 13 base ten, as 15 base eight, or as 1101 base 2. Primeness is an intrinsic property of a number, independent of its representation. The sequence $$ $$$ $$$$$ $$$$$$$
$$$$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$$$$$ would be recognized immediately by (many not all) people in another galaxy. $$$ $ $$$$ $ $$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ would be recognized as the start of the representation of Pi only by a civilization that represented numbers in the Hindu/Arabic style, using the base ten.
BTW Despite the title, the pattern has nothing to do with fractals. No big deal.
Ken