RE: Alien Communication Re: Ethics of being a Creator
ChuckKuecker (ckuecker@mcs.net)
Wed, 29 Apr 1998 16:18:06 -0500 (CDT)
At 09:30 4/29/98 -0700, you wrote:
>
> 1) That they have electromagnetic vision similar to ours.
>
>granted. but practically all complex lifeforms on this planet have evolved
>such a system.
>it is inherently useful in nearly all imaginable environments.
>
> 2) That their vision is at the same frequency as our - highly
>improbable.
>
> i agree: their vision would most likely be a different spectrum. but it
>wouldnt need to
> be the same spectrum as ours for a black and white image to be informative
>to them.
>
> 3) That they would have the same spatial awareness to put something
>into a 2-d
> grid.
>
>we should explore what is the simplest possible "grid". is that a 2-d
>rectangular
>matrix? even if et has a different system as you suggest, it would occur to
>them to
>try the simplest possible grid.
>
> As a test it would be fun to take an x-ray photograph of a jellyfish
>and then
> digitize it into 0's and 1's and then send this binary coded message
>to SETI to
> see if they can interpret it. Depending on how clever they are, it
>could take
> them years to figure out what it is.
>
>something like this has been tested. seti scientists sent a bunch of bits
>to a number
>of smart people. the number of bits was the product of two prime numbers.
>they
>reported that every test subject figured out to put the bits in a m by n
>matrix and color
>in the 1s (or 0s) to form a picture.
>
>it would be a cool challenge to try to design a number of b/w pictures to
>send to
>et that would encourage technology exchange, mutual understanding etc.
>thanks for the input! spike
>
The bit about challenging other humans to decode a signal misses the basic
fact that whoever send us a signal will almost certainly NOT be even vaguely
human..What if they communicate via odor, or some other strange medium? An
image as such might not even be concievable to them..
Chuck Kuecker