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NASA
In 1977 NASA's Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft launched into space carrying phonographs called the Golden Records containing pictures and sounds meant to show extraterrestrials a glimpse of life on Earth. The records were engraved with pictures explaining how to play them. Click on the picture for an explanation of the code.
When E.T. sends us Earthlings a message, what should we say in response? Three alien hunters suggest in the journal Space Policy that we should develop an international protocol for sending effective, intelligible communications. A website could be set up for people around the world to leave messages, following the protocol, so that we can then figure out what messages are best-suited for cross-cultural communication.
"An effective message to extraterrestrials should at least be understandable by humans," Dimitra Atri of the University of Kansas, Julia DeMarines of the International Space University, and Jacob Haqq-Misra of Penn State University write in their paper.
The concept of creating and testing such a protocol fits with the thinking of other space experts, according to Douglas Vakoch, director of interstellar message composition at the California-based SETI Institute.
Cornell
This graphic was transmitted in coded form in 1974, using the Arecibo radio telescope. Click on the picture for an explanation of the code.
The proposal from the three researchers "is on target in really wanting to encourage an open, transparent process for engaging the world community in thinking about how we would want to represent ourselves, and how we would create a message that stands a chance of being understood," Vakoch told me today.
Talking to E.T.
Unless E.T. comes to Earth in a spaceship and gets out for a meet-and-greet, the chances of a face-to-face encounter anytime soon are close to nil. Instead, cross-civilization communication will have to span vast distances, using technology such as radio waves and pulses of light.
Astronomers on the lookout for these types of communications have already established protocols for making sure a communication received isn't just a natural noise or interference from a satellite. They've also established first-order steps to decipher the message, such as determining the basic units of the information sent.
This same community of researchers has also spent the past 50 years chewing on the question of what to say to E.T. The trick, noted Vakoch, is finding something that is universal.
"Some have focused on pictures, with the idea that vision has been very helpful here on Earth and so too might be helpful on another world," Vakoch said. "You might expect intelligent creatures on another world to be visual creatures as well."
But what may be a meaningful picture to a person from a Western culture may be gibberish to the indigenous Maori people in New Zealand, for example.
"Similarly, a Westerner may look at some ceremonial carving from the Maori and say, 'You know, that's a beautiful geometrical shape,' but a Westerner may miss the fact that there's a human body being depicted in that message," Vakoch said.
Another idea is to use basic math and science. After all, if alien beings are able to communicate with us, they must have the engineering and technical know-how required to send messages across interstellar distances.
"I think the key to creating a message that has a reasonable chance of being understood is to send as many distinct messages as you can, with the hope that at least one of them might be understood," Vakoch said. "Anyone who claims they have one message that will undoubtedly be understood is overly optimistic."
Sharing ideas
The Space Policy paper calls for setting up a website where users around the world can submit messages that fit the protocol. This will allow the discovery of "the types of messages better suited for cross-cultural communication," the authors write.
The SETI Institute's Earth Speaks project is built along these lines, notes Vakoch. The website solicits suggestions for the most important things that people want E.T. to know about life on Earth at the beginning of the 21st century.
Vakoch said the idea proposed in the Space Policy paper is complementary and attracts another audience to mull the questions surrounding what to say to E.T. "We need more people involved in space policy to be thinking about these issues," he said.
More on the alien quest:
- E.T. calling? Here's what to do
- How should we 'talk' to aliens?
- What to do if we find alien life
- Are we missing E.T.'s call?
- Calculate the odds of finding E.T.
- Stephen Hawking worries about the aliens
- Too risky to phone E.T.? Too late — NASA's tried
- Six frontiers for extraterrestrial life
Tip o' the Log to Lisa Grossman at Wired.com.
John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by hitting the "like" button on the Cosmic Log Facebook page or following msnbc.com's science editor, Alan Boyle, on Twitter (@b0yle).
Leave a Comment:
It should be mathematical, and as simple as possible
Binary code can be used to represent text in any language, sounds and images.
As for what to say,
Uh... like The Newsvine? Maybe not. I can just imagine it now...
"Hello Aliens!"
"Don't be a dumbass, there are no aliens"
"I'm not a dumbass, you're a dumbass!"
"Well, at least I'm not a kool-aid drinking atheistic gay muslim Obama luvver!"
"Oh yeah? Well, at least I'm not a gun totin' bible thumpin' bigoted redneck wingnut!"
"Screw you A-hole!"
"No. Screw you dick wad!"
Dear aliens, we'd like to introduce... America.
Mikey Mike, your comment is hilarious.
But I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that the two stereotypes you point out are only a small percentage of America. True they are the loud mouth percentage and as such have no problem letting EVERYONE know their opinions, repeatedly, especially if you say you don't want to hear it... They are not "America". You and I are America and we are better than that. I would say that most of America is better than the extreme lefty and extreme righty folks out there. I'm all for convictions but some folks take it too far.
Whatever we do, when we talk to aliens we need to take that discussion seriously. At least until we get a feeling for the aliens sense of humor. :-)
And we could also use actual photos, you know, real pictures.
But using math, binary and physics is also something that is necessary.
Mathematics for sure, but the conversion needs to establish the numeric base. For example is it base-2 binary or something else. We can't assume that ET uses base-2 for computers and we use base-10 as a default.
and very loud with lots of exaggerated hand gestures
Don't worry about language. They already understand us.
I think this is just putting the cart ahead of the horse. To stand out from the noise of space, there just needs to be a simple, unmistakably intelligent message. Prime numbers in beeps like in Contact would be perfect. You could follow it up with an icebreaker of the periodic table with lingual descriptions of each. At least there would be the possibility of telling each other what we call hydrogen, oxygen, etc then.
beep - one
beep beep beep - three
beep beep beep beep beep - five
etc
beep - one - hydrogen
beep beep - two - helium
etc
Mob, I respectfully disagree. America is dominated by people who dropped out of HS (with some States having 60% or more drop out rates), under-educated and un-educated, ill-informed (many of who like being willfully ignorant). This is why the US can't compete globally anymore. Part has to do with the high cost of education, and an even larger part has to do with both societal and ethnic tendencies toward a dislike (to open hostility) of people that are educated. This country needs to turn those beliefs around, but in the past four decades nothing seems to have worked to change that. In truth, the opposite appears to be the upward trend. More drop outs than ever, more ill-informed people, and more people who do not want to listen to opposing viewpoints in order to come to their own conclusions.
Any Aliens sophisticated enough to make contact will not be impressed with the US.
We use a big sign, the words spelled out with Reese's Pieces.
Vakoch say ""I think the key to creating a message that has a reasonable chance of being understood is to send as many distinct messages as you can, with the hope that at least one of them might be understood,""
This seems like a problem to me. I guess it all depends on what he means by "distinct". We should try to formulate a way of communicating different things the same way. but we should not (in my opinion) send one signal in a thousand ways. Do you say "hello" in every known language and hope that one language gets recognized or deciphered. Or do you say a thousand different phrases all in English or Binary or whatever the accepted transmission for is? I go for the latter as it would provide a greater data set to derive patterns from.
Seriously, pictographs. An illustration or series of illustrations like heiroglyphics and a rosetta stone included to translate the pictures into words or number representing words.
Like the universal symbology we use for traffic signs, etc.
That's completely wrong. If somebody doesn't speak English, using a tremendous variation of English words or phrases won't help anything -- they don't speak the language. Try a thousand different languages, and you are vastly more likely to be understood. The ones which aren't understood will be ignored, puzzled over, or deciphered.
Too many languages sent back would be more confusing than anything. How would they know we sent 20 languages and not some super complex single language barrier they're supposed to decypher?
It doesn't even have to be English.
But, having seen the diverse lifeforms on our own planet, I think it'd be extremely unlikely that they would vocalize the way we do with similar voice box and tongue/lip structure. They could use sign language, smells, or animal like noises for all we know. Anyone smart enough to build a receiver for radio signals probably could figure out simple math or chemistry messages though.
Well, gosh, let's just send a greeting in Klingon. Any alien culture should know that lanquage.
Too little information, and they won't be able to decode any meaning. Too much information, and the "signal" gets lost in the clutter. Sending in multiple human languages would just make things confusing and much more difficult to decode.
>> It should be mathematical, and as simple as possible
For example, the sequence of prime numbers in increasing order?
Perhaps the simplest way to establish intelligent contact would be to transmit a fibonacci sequence, which would be detectable regardless of numeric base.
0 _1 _1 — _2 — — _3 — — — — _5 — — — — — — — _8 — — — — — — — — — — — — _13 , etc.
NOT SO FAST
We should not take this matter lightly. There is a vague UN-sponsored protocol that even the UN won’t take it seriously. I have no doubt that there should be well written internationally- legally binding protocol that is able to reflect on all vital technical, security, legal, ethical, and human aspects.
Practically speaking, the UN despite its ineffectiveness is the only World Body of our primitive planet, and English is the only international language widely used especially in science and technology. Therefore, if a natural language is going to be used, let it be English which is universal for our planet.
But, the UN should not be bypassed. The best is to organize the international expert committees on science, law, ethics, security (military), and citizens’ affairs, and ask them to cooperate perhaps under an umbrella organization or institute.
This is because contact with the aliens is beyond any doubt. But, we aren’t internationally-speaking organized. So how can we handle the contact? In any such contact “security” aspects are essential even if we don’t like it.
There is a totally false assumption that all the alien civilizations in the universe will be “friendly” and god/angel-like! I am confident that this is not so. This will depend on the techno-scientific complexity level of an alien civilization. Perhaps, the types “Two” and “Three” alien Civilizations (Kaku, watch the video) can be friendly towards us. Perhaps because we are entirely insignificant for them. But, this may not be so with the Types “Zero” (similar to us on Earth) and “one.” So, not so fast!
Different countries have their own covert organizations and protocols in place. We don’t hear about them because we are not supposed to.
Kaku on Alien technology:
Disclosure Project:
Dr. Kazem Zarrabi,
Copenhagen, Denmark
D fence! D Fence!!
I'm still trippin on what exactly we'd be roughed up for? I mean our planet is insignifigant outside of it's ability to sustain OUR life...
What would Aliens want with us?
food? bbq kittens maybe?
our techno advancements? they're aliens though!
Art? um...
Music?
What would aliens want with us other than to poke and prod us, and maybe.... talk to us.
I'd asume that they'd have the ability to mop the floor with us in any case.
Sooooo Dr. just what are you getting at?
There are aliens and our Goverments are positioning themselves for better favor via clandestine ops?
I wouldn't undervalue the fact that Earth can support life...
We don't know how rare that may or may not be in the galaxy...
Statistically, Earth's ability to support life is almost definitely NOT unique, but it may be very rare....
Well... the Earth is essentially... Real Estate...
And what are the three most important factors in Real Estate?
Location... Location... Location...
Maybe we just happen to be in a good location that suits their interstellar travels perfectly...
Maybe we're close to all the good shopping planets, and best school planets...
In a very quiet, and safe, up and coming part of the Galaxy...
The value of the Earth as "real estate" is dependant upon the life form in question. If we're someday visited by an alien species that's silicon based, loves it when the temperature is 500 degrees or more and drinks sulfuric acid for fun, I doubt they'd be interested in Earth, but "Hey folks, if you step down the block, we've got this other planet called Venus and we've just reduced the price. Welcome to the neighborhood!"
I agree with you totally and have said the same thing several times. To put it in layman's terms, we don't know if we're communicating with the Vulcans or the Klingons. They could be highly intelligent and enlightened or they could be looking for planet to conquer/ravage.
I'm with Stephen Hawking on this one. Not all the ET's out there are going to be peaceful gardeners who love Reeces pieces.
And we really do need to speak with one voice when ET shows up and makes contact. The last thing we'd want would be their first impression of us to be that of carnival barkers trying to lure them over to their stand and away from the competition.
the aliens are already here. near the north pole there's an entrance to the center of the earth. that is where the alient reptilian race lives. ufo's are their spacecraft. from what i've heard, they are having a bitch of a time with the current weather. cold blooded, you know.....
look for them in the bahamas right now.
I think it's fair to assume we have an abnormally large quantity of water and that most life would require it or have some really good uses for it. Even most animals bathe.
Let's just hope the communique is not written by attorneys and politicians. I doubt the aliens would be able to translate it for some centuries, if at all.
Oooooooo. Our first version of interlac/inguacode (Star Trek/Babylon 5 universal written language code). The initial code should definitely be mathematical, since it is the easiest to translate. But it should also attempt to convey our basic language, probably a simple visual icons (tree, rock, water, fire, chair, etc) with the words below them, much like flash cards for children, maybe with icons along one side to indicate what the item is for. Though there would likely be thousands, maybe tens of thousands of them, to completely describe our environment. The thing I'm not quite sure how we would convey is sentence structure, how do you explain "is", "what", "beauty", "fear", etc.
People tend to forget that even these "pictures" would be transmitted via radio/electronic waves and still need to be translated to be translated.
How about this ?
http://www.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://www.jimbo.info/weblog/archives/MrYuk.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.jimbo.info/weblog/2008/02/&h=400&w=400&sz=13&tbnid=A52nJFBRrK5ZRM:&tbnh=124&tbnw=124&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dmr%2Byuk&zoom=1&q=mr+yuk&usg=__sqtaeHMKWj3MAnacW0Os-0PwPG0=&sa=X&ei=I0pTTbX1MJCUtwf095iJCg&ved=0CCYQ9QEwAg
mmm.. ... I'm going to be the arrogant ignorant guy here and sugest that We are the most advanced species in the galaxy and we will only be communicating to the equivilant of a bug....
hi bug how are you..... no response.... mm.... 2+2=4? .... no response...
We're really going to expect anything to understand us?
Personally I would focus on saying a few phrases in as many ways possible....starting with "Please Do No Probe Me"
See if this works with the TSA first!
hahahahahaha :d
or instead....'probe me slowly...then quickly...now slowly...now quickly.'
Algebraic geometry.
"An effective message to extraterrestrials should at least be understandable by humans," Dimitra Atri of the University of Kansas, Julia DeMarines of the International Space University, and Jacob Haqq-Misra of Penn State University write in their paper.
Wow, exactly what I was thinking when I tried to remember what the H*** the geniuses who created this obscure disk were trying to tell anyone, much less aliens
Just transmit "ET phone hooommmmeee" in every earth language we have.They will understand and call.
Space aliens merely HOVER and do NOT land on this planet. No intelligent life on this rock. We needn't worry about communication.
Worrying about how to properly communicate with an alien is about the biggest waste of time and resources you could subject your mind to. There are no aliens to communicate with period. They are just not out there. I'm just as sure as the SETI observers that there is other intelligent life in the universe. I'm also convinced that there's nothing to communicate with within a communicable distance. You might as well have a directive regulating the communications between the living and ghosts.
yup... at least none that want to talk to us that don't already know about us. although I'm still on the fence as you can see :D but I hear you.
Use the same language as you would use with Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny- either way you get the same result: Nothing. Waste of time and money!!
We are like the Indians standing on the shore Waiting For Columbus (I love Little Feat). Maybe we should just run and hide and not draw any attention to ourselves. Those undiscovered aliens might not be so nice! It is better for us to remain undiscovered to them.
lol that's so messed up:D
I know, right? Historically speaking, look whats happened to the places we always visited for the first time.
Art,
You are more correct than you know. Read FATAL IMPACT. It's about what happened to indigenous people when the more advanced white european civilization arrived. This is probably a good model for us to consider even if the visitors are benign.
New germs, new diversions, new religions and philosophies. All disasterous to the indigenous people.
I just feel really sorry about everything surrounding this article. Various folks on Earth (and not the UN unfortunately) have been communicating with ETs for years (CSETI.ORG) and guess what, it doesn’t matter what language you use.
The previous poster who said that ETs may not be benevolent is incorrect. Civilizations that have evolved to the point where they can go beyond the speed of light also have evolved ethically (or they would not have survived). Being newcomers to the galactic neighborhood that we live in and having only recently become “atomic” (1940’s), trust me, they are much more concerned about us than we should ever be concerned about them.
If you read anywhere or are told that SETI has yet to receive any ET communication then you are being misinformed. It has happened and it is being hushed up.
Wilie,
The closest thing to a recognizable message ever detected in the history of SETI is the so-called "Wow!" signal. It was a connection of several sensible numbers in a row, separate from the usual vast net of static, it's never happened again and was likely the result of an electronics glitch at our end.
If you know of any other info, post a link. Ah, but's being "hushed up" so there are no links, Yeah, I get it...
I agree with your statement of beings who can travel ftl would have made it past their ignorances & bs & evolved sensibility. They would've never made it past their nuclear threshhold of complete destruction of their world(s). Star Wars & Star Trek, although I'm a fan of both, are simply reflections of ourselves. Other world inhabitants who finally became space-faring wouldn't be war-like and their politics, religions, etc would've become worthless, unnecessary. We should step back a moment, look at that view & accept ourselves before we don't make it past our bs ourselves & blow this world into oblivion. When they finally do arrive, they will be saddened by our lack of compassion & fortitude to keep our world alive & vibrant. They will shake their heads at what we've done & move on. Our world would then be considered as just another dead rock floating around a star. Do we really wanna do that to ourselves and not just in case ET visits? As for a universal language- I'm in agreement with other posters, pictograms/pictures. Visual aspects of our world would probably be the best bet instead of some puzzling means of a written/spoken form. That should be reserved for actual contact on Earth.
We use English....geez. ALL pilots already use it. Why should aliens be treated any different?
Yeah, all the alien races on Star Trek speak English.
I suggest that this effort is a waste of time as we will be surprised someday to learn that the "they" understand our own languages better than we do.
First off, if we are using radio waves to send messages, if the aliens are receiving it, they are at least intelligent enough to create a radio receiver. This means they have technical know-how. So we need to start out by letting them realize our counting system using base 10 before we can start sending math equations. That would be as simple as sending a dot, with a 1 after it, then 2 dots, with a 2 after it, and progressively count upwards so they can get the rhythm of what we are communicating. If we could then communicate the common structure of matter, starting with the hydrogen atom and progressing along the periodic table. Then we could send them our DNA structure so that they can better understand who we are. Then we would build on top of that with what they send back. This could take centuries to accomplish with the time lag between our two worlds. But just knowing that there is someone else out there to talk to might encourage them, or us, to find a faster way to communicate, or a faster way to actually go there and visit.
Now, if they are more advanced than we are, and we were to gain access to some advanced technology that every person in the world had access to; would we be able to keep ourselves from destroying our world? If every person in the world had a button that would launch all our ICBM’s, don’t you think that someone would be crazy enough to do it? It’s sad, but we are not ready for them to get in touch with us yet. I love this world we live in, but there are just too many stupid crazies out there to let have any power.
Personally I agree with Stephen Hawlkings, we may not want E.T to visit Earth. We don't know what they want or why they would want it.
They might be looking for another food source, US. They could be looking for slaves, US.
If they exist leave them alone and hope they don't come here. And stay the hell away from their world. We have screwed up our world enough without spreading it around.
We probably would not be a food source, more likely we would be a delicacy, and very expensive.
I can see a small group of aliens protesting the eating of humans, or Earth life in general, and advocating that you have your pet Earthling spayed or neutered to prevent overpopulation.
One other point if I may. Lets say that we do find another livable planet and it is uninhabited, We send several ships there to try to live. In a few generations the supplies we send there is used up, if not sooner. We can not send factories or food processing plants or even glass jars to put food in, then what. The planet would turn into another caveman place to survive.
We could not keep sending things to that planet and the people sent there would have to completely start over. In a period of time, for arguments sake lets say 500 years, They would not know where they came from or how they got there. They would not be Earthlings, they would be Planet-Xlings. 5000 years they could be coming back to VISIT us as E.T.
"You will be assimilated. Sign up for your Facebook account now, or face the consequences. Resistance is futile."
We can't communicate with other species on our own planet, yet we try to figure a way to effectively communicate with life from another planet? Chances are that any life out there would be so vastly different from anything we know that it would be as impossible to communicate with them as it is to communicate with a bird or a whale or any other animal. We've trained dogs, dolphins, killer whales to perform simple tricks in echange for a reward, but that is hardly communication.
Believe it or not, math is an invention of man, and not even all men can understand basic math priciples. Who here understands algebra? Calculus? Statistics?
The evolution of life on another planet with days possibly longer than an Earth year, seasons that don't change, or possibly forever engulfed in darkness and able to study the stars continuously without the interruption of daylight.....the possibilities are vast.....and man is but an infant in this Universe. We BARELY have an understanding of it's functions. And our ability to even communicate with each other is de-evolving what with a generation of text-messagers and abbreviators...LOL...heck people can barely look another person in the face!
Earthlings no phone E.T.'s home. :(
Let's say that there is another type of life form out there based on silicon, for instance. Maybe their liquid substance is liquid methane like ours is water. In that case, their core temperature is far colder than ours, and their perception of a second may be years for us. In that case, they would never find our radio frequency (being that frequency is a function of time), it would simply be way too fast for them to comprehend, just like we won't find their radio frequency because it's too slow for us to comprehend. So, with that logic, if any alien life can decipher our radio frequency, they must have a time frame similar to our own, and will probably be big carbon sack of water just like we are.
So, silicone life forms could be implanted in women to enhance them?
Hmmm, kind of like the Trill in Star Trek, only different.
OMG! What if E.T. comes here and says,"Take me to your real leader, Glen Beck. He is the most feared person on Earth, so he must be your leader!" ROFLMAO
Any visitor from outer space capable of FTL travel will recognize Glen Beck and Rush Limbaugh for what they are. I'm sure they have over-inflated gas bags on their planets as well.
Yeah they probably have an Obama and Nancy Polske too so just let them stay away.