From: Damien Broderick (thespike@earthlink.net)
Date: Sat Feb 22 2003 - 13:20:44 MST
Serafino wrote:
> I suppose, many authors already performed similar experiments in their
> s.f. books!
He and I have recalled that I suggested something like this in a discussion
some time back, and Serafino then elaborated on the idea much as he did just
now in his extropian post.
> A highly collimated laser radiating into the outer space, with
> a very very small angle, could show some effect. Because if waves were
> beamed, at various directions in the outer space, and some power
> fluctuations in the transmitter were observed, it could mean that the
> outer space is not uniform. That is to say that sometimes there are,
> or there are not, out there, "targets" receiving retarded waves and
> emitting advanced waves.
My suggestion had been that by using this fact (if it is one!) you could
establish a code with your future self (or descendents/later collaborators)
permitting a message to be sent back to the present, depending on the
absence or presence of absorbers at various locations. I still think it's a
rather nifty idea. But I wonder if I might have lifted it from a Greg Egan
determinism short story. (I don't have his collections handy, alas.)
Damien Broderick
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