Meaden plasma-vortex hypothesis (crop circles).
competing-explanationhypothesisPhysical Trace & Crop Circles
Meteorologist Terence Meaden's late-1980s hypothesis that atmospheric vortices (later an 'electromagneto-hydrodynamic plasma vortex') flatten crops into circles. Briefly credible (Waseda Univ 1990 aluminium-powder lab analogue; Stephen Hawking open to a version) but abandoned as formations grew complex and hoaxing was confessed - Meaden himself concluded most were hoaxed.
[DEEP DIVE] The principal NATURAL-cause hypothesis before the 1991 hoax confession. Real air vortices exist, so the physics wasn't absurd; Meaden escalated to a 'plasma vortex' to explain lights and multi-circle designs. Ironically the hoaxers (Bower & Chorley) added straight lines/squares specifically to defeat the vortex reading. Overtaken by evidence: Meaden accepted that most circles, especially elaborate pictograms, were hoaxed and moved on. COMPETING-EXPLANATION / abandoned - not discredited as physics, but not an explanation for the crop-circle corpus. See research_outputs/crop-circles-deepdive.md.
Connected entities
BLT Research Team / Levengood.Counterfactual advanced-tech crop-circle mechanisms (hypothesis).Crop Circles.Doug Bower & Dave Chorley.W.C. Levengood.