• SETI Scientists Call for Permanent Monitoring of Signal from Deep Space
    91 replies, posted
[QUOTE=Kylel999;50972503]I was just about to say this. I'm sure if we discovered another civilization they would be just as excited to discover us. I don't know where all the movies get this stupid idea they're going to destroy us on contact[/QUOTE] Try to find a single event in human history where one civ makes contact with another of vastly inferior technology that did not go catastrophically for the underdogs. Not saying it will always go that way, or that it will be likely to go that way with space aliens since there is unlimited real estate and resources up there, and we would have nothing to offer them other then a different perspective on life, the universe and everything. but there is a case to be had.
[QUOTE=Blizzerd;50972987]Try to find a single event in human history where one civ makes contact with another of vastly inferior technology that did not go catastrophically for the underdogs.[/QUOTE] Not exactly history but in Star Trek... At least if there were an alien attack we might get over our pretty struggles and unify against a common foe... or we could go the way of the african kingdoms/trade confederations during slavery and participate in the atrocities against ourselves.
[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;50972990]Not exactly history but in Star Trek... At least if there were an alien attack we might get over our pretty struggles and unify against a common foe... or we could go the way of the african kingdoms/trade confederations during slavery and participate in the atrocities against ourselves.[/QUOTE] Hey, spacealiens, you are not allowed to hate on us, k? cus star trek...
[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;50972990]Not exactly history but in Star Trek... At least if there were an alien attack we might get over our pretty struggles and unify against a common foe... or we could go the way of the african kingdoms/trade confederations during slavery and participate in the atrocities against ourselves.[/QUOTE] Humanity having an idealized view of interstellar relations inspired by Star Trek is exactly what worries me the most about potential contact with an alien civilization. They might very well have no qualms about subjugating our asses to the benefit of their own goals, given the opportunity.
Chill [URL="https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=80193"]https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=80193[/URL] [QUOTE]SETI@home: "Baffling" "signal" "from HD 164595" is probably none of the above. I'm sure that many of you have seen the news reports of a "SETI signal" detected from the star HD 164595 I was one of the many people who received the the email with the subject "Candidate SETI SIGNAL DETECTED by Russians from star HD 164595 by virtue of RATAN-600 radio telescope." Since the email did come from known SETI researchers, I looked over the presentation. I was unimpressed. In one out of 39 scans that passed over star showed a signal at about 4.5 times the mean noise power with a profile somewhat like the beam profile. Of course SETI@home has seen millions of potential signals with similar characteristics, but it takes more than that to make a good candidate. Multiple detections are a minimum criterion. Because the receivers used were making broad band measurements, there's really nothing about this "signal" that would distinguish it from a natural radio transient (stellar flare, active galactic nucleus, microlensing of a background source, etc.) There's also nothing that could distinguish it from a satellite passing through the telescope field of view. All in all, it's relatively uninteresting from a SETI standpoint. But, of course, it's been announced to the media. Reporters won't have the background to know it's not interesting. Because the media has it, and since this business runs on media, everyone will look at it. ATA is looking at it. I assume Breakthrough will look at it. Someone will look at it with Arecibo, and we'll be along for the ride. And I'll check the SETI@home database around that position. And we'll all find nothing. It's not our first time at this rodeo, so we know how it works.[/QUOTE] Link is dead for some reason, but I got this from BOINC notices because I run SETI@Home.
[QUOTE=Blizzerd;50972987]Try to find a single event in human history where one civ makes contact with another of vastly inferior technology that did not go catastrophically for the underdogs. Not saying it will always go that way, or that it will be likely to go that way with space aliens since there is unlimited real estate and resources up there, and we would have nothing to offer them other then a different perspective on life, the universe and everything. but there is a case to be had.[/QUOTE] Well if we take back time to the 1400s and the 1500s. The Europeans that explored the Americas and other parts of the world were of course vastly superior in comparison to the natives. But, in reality, the Europeans that were advanced during that time, weren't really the brightest of mind sets. The Exploreres were either bible thumping Catholics who wanted to convert the rest of the world into Christianity, or they were men wanting to exploit the land for gold and other resources but had no idea the planet was even round at that point. People take parallels of alien contact with the Europeans and the Natives. But like what i said before earlier in the thread on how the aliens advanced similarly to our race, its pretty possible the countless alien civilizations that exist out there have experienced the same shit with their own race. So it would be obvious that aliens are more careful and more thoughtful in contacting other alien civilizations instead of going all Conquistador. But there is the possibility that maybe some aliens are advance enough to gain maybe hypothetical FTL drives, but are still dick heads or warlike in a certain way. Basically the Orks from 40k, which would be terrifying.
[QUOTE=Blizzerd;50972995]Hey, spacealiens, you are not allowed to hate on us, k? cus star trek...[/QUOTE] We turn the aliens into nerds then bond with them over 1000s of hours of tv series. They won't have any free time in which to subjugate us.
[QUOTE=Deathtrooper2;50973035]But there is the possibility that maybe some aliens are advance enough to gain maybe hypothetical FTL drives, but are still dick heads or warlike in a certain way. Basically the Orks from 40k, which would be terrifying.[/QUOTE] Or the Space Pirates from Metroid. They're pretty nasty, even if they're popcorn chicken in the face of the big time cosmic horrors like Phaaze, the Ing, the X Parasites, and of course the Metroids themselves.
[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;50973050]We turn the aliens into nerds then bond with them over 1000s of hours of tv series. They won't have any free time in which to subjugate us.[/QUOTE] Or they will subjugate us to make moar startrek
[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;50973050]We turn the aliens into nerds then bond with them over 1000s of hours of tv series. They won't have any free time in which to subjugate us.[/QUOTE] If they're pootling around their ships while they travel between systems, rather than staying in hyperstasis, I imagine that between system management and the occasional spacewalk to repair equipment on the outside, they'd mostly be binging on the programming (games, movies, TV shows, books, etc) loaded onto the ship before they left their planet behind. With so much time on their hands during an interstellar voyage, even with the effects of time dilation, I have a feeling that they'd have a lot of recreational facilities to keep the crew entertained and stave off cabin fever. And hey, if they arrive at a planet with a strong entertainment industry, I imagine they'd be eager to "Netflix and chill" as the kids say nowadays, trying to binge on human television. Though it'd be a little tricky, since it's most likely that they won't initially understand human languages. Unless they've been able to glean a few words from tuning in to any transmissions that've been bleeding out of our system.
[QUOTE=Joazzz;50972978]reading stuff like this always makes me think back to the large city (New York?) central park analogy: it's a dangerous place at night, you really don't want to be there at that time - there's muggers, rapists, organ harvesters etc. the best way to handle the situation if you find yourself there after dark is to hide and wait until morning, sneak out, or find a cop to escort you out of there. better to assume that all strangers are hostile to not make contact with anyone because they could be the aforementioned murderer. the universe is sort of like that, except there's no cop, there's no way out and the night never ends contact between species could turn into dog-eat-dog real quick[/QUOTE] Actually, this is a highly unlikely scenario imo. I mean, not the part that aliens may potentially be hostile, but rather that hiding is a useful thing. Radio waves are so slow and primitive, especially considering how huge the distances in space are, its almost like a guy sitting in a lighthouse on an uninhabited island sending light signals into the ocean surrounding him and trying to find the answer with a spyglass. He can be found either by sheer luck, or by another guy in a similar lighthouse on a similar island nearby. Don't have to mention that both possibilities are not very probable. By the way, this is also exactly what makes interstellar wars not really plausible too, exactly because meeting a civilization with approximately the same level of technology is an almost impossible thing to happen. The odds are one side would be so much weaker than another it would not be a war, but rather a simple obliteration.
[QUOTE=matt000024;50969924]Relevant to the whole "they must be more advanced than us" posts: [URL]https://eyeofmidas.com/scifi/Turtledove_RoadNotTaken.pdf[/URL][/QUOTE] I swear I used this for another space related thread on FP once. Great alternate tech tree story. [QUOTE=Alice3173;50970358]Interesting read but they [I]really[/I] need to learn to clearly delineate the changes in perspective. The first shift from the Roxolani to the humans took me like 2-3 paragraphs to finally grasp because it just went straight from one paragraph into another without any indication that the perspective had changed.[/QUOTE] Whoever made the PDF probably destroyed the original formatting. I have it in a science fiction anthology and there are only breaks when they change sides.
[QUOTE=Zang-Pog;50973505]If aliens attack us, humanity will be quick to unite under one banner and cram the collective fist of all us mighty standing apes up the rear orifice of any slimeball who threatens our livelyhood on Earth.[/QUOTE]if they have the means to get here i'm quite certain they have the means to blow us to ash unless we deal with a "The Road Not Taken" sort of scenario of course
[QUOTE=Matthew0505;50972049]At the time the signal was made, the light of 1820s Earth (End of the First Industrial Revolution) would be visible at the source, so if aliens were looking for a CO2 spectrum change over time over a few decades, they would notice something, but I don't really know much about the methods of determining atmosphere in astronomy. :johnnymo1:[/QUOTE] If the orbit of the earth around the sun is aligned such that from their point of view the earth passes in front of the sun, they can do a spectral analysis of the earths atmosphere to determine its composition.
To be fair, I always imagined as us being the ones to find a new species. Because you know as soon as space travel becomes an actual thing that a blue collar guy can do, you just know someone is going to go all star trek and point their ship at the nearest star and punch it full throttle. Or the other hand, where space travel just becomes airplane 2.0.
I wonder if they will be made of silicon instead of carbon.
[QUOTE=Deathtrooper2;50973035]Well if we take back time to the 1400s and the 1500s. The Europeans that explored the Americas and other parts of the world were of course vastly superior in comparison to the natives. But, in reality, the Europeans that were advanced during that time, weren't really the brightest of mind sets. The Exploreres were either bible thumping Catholics who wanted to convert the rest of the world into Christianity, or they were men wanting to exploit the land for gold and other resources but had no idea the planet was even round at that point. People take parallels of alien contact with the Europeans and the Natives. But like what i said before earlier in the thread on how the aliens advanced similarly to our race, its pretty possible the countless alien civilizations that exist out there have experienced the same shit with their own race. So it would be obvious that aliens are more careful and more thoughtful in contacting other alien civilizations instead of going all Conquistador. But there is the possibility that maybe some aliens are advance enough to gain maybe hypothetical FTL drives, but are still dick heads or warlike in a certain way. Basically the Orks from 40k, which would be terrifying.[/QUOTE] You are assuming things as obvious on a topic literally described as 'alien'. I think you are probably right, but are you willing to bet earth and the people on it to that? Are you willing to make that call, knowing what we used to do to others in the past under similar circomstances? For all we know, the spacealiens are a benevolent dictator society that feels that we should also be a benevolent dictator society since its clearly the best form of government... and since they have more experience with being benevolent dictatorships they strongly suggest Lord Xenu of the moons of xuaqilapeolqz II, or viceroy Applx of the sandplains of Karrah III as our dictatorial overlord. Playing by our current rules as a curtisy, they will host a democratic election of course, but there are no human candidates since they are clearly not qualified for ruling an entire planet. I'm trying to say they could very well fuck us over with the best of intentions and their culture...
[QUOTE=false prophet;50977344]I wonder if they will be made of silicon instead of carbon.[/QUOTE] The chemistry of silicon just isn't rich enough to support life the way we know it so I highly doubt it.
[QUOTE=LoneWolf_Recon;50972611]I know, I was mainly joking there considering I was using the speed of light approximation of 3*10^8m/s instead of 2.998*10^8. I'm just really hoping there'll be some signal like Hydrogen Times Pi.[/QUOTE] It's also worth noting that the meter is defined by the size of the Earth and our scale of time is intrinsically even more local. All of our common units of measure are completely arbitrary when compared against an interstellar-capable alien intelligence. We'll need to use universal physical constants like pi and the properties of hydrogen to communicate anything at all. And then understanding is once again entirely different; even if their math is binary and they measure distances in atomic widths or other fundamental units of the cosmos, getting past "Hello World" will be the most significant achievement of sentient life in this region of space. [QUOTE=Deathtrooper2;50973035]The Exploreres were either bible thumping Catholics who wanted to convert the rest of the world into Christianity, or they were men wanting to exploit the land for gold and other resources [B]but had no idea the planet was even round at that point.[/B][/QUOTE] This is straight false and is a myth perpetuated much later, primarily with the rise of Flat Earthism, which was promoted by an [I]American[/I] in the 19th century. The ancient Greeks knew the world was round. Columbus knew the world was round (actually he thought it was pear-shaped, but never mind). Old Europe knew the world was round. As soon as ancient civilizations discovered how to make boats and experienced things falling over the horizon, they knew the world was round. The average illiterate peasant, they may have thought the world was flat or even shaped like Jesus's taint, but anyone with sea navigation experience or scientific education knew or could have figured out that the world was round. They didn't know how the world was laid out (witness Columbus thinking he'd sailed clear across the Pacific/Atlantic to hit the far eastern shore of the Orient), but the belief that ancient peoples believed the world was flat and that Columbus feared he'd sail off the edge is a self-serving modern myth. This doesn't mean we're somehow magically equipped to deal with hyperadvanced aliens who show up and decide to terraform Earth to their liking, but the ancient world was a lot smarter than the modern mindset thinks. Cheesemaking was going on 9,000 years ago in Europe, for example, which automatically means they possessed both animal husbandry and the knowledge of how to transform dairy. A five-legged animal in a cave painting in one of those well-preserved caves in Europe from like 8-10,000 years ago baffled anthropologists until they realized that flickering firelight in the cave would throw shadow and light over the painting's legs, creating a rudimentary "animation". We started wearing clothing to cover our bodies roughly 40,000 years ago because that's when the human flea evolved, and the flea does not live on skin but next to skin in clothing. The ancient Greeks discovered steam engines, they just didn't think to do anything useful with it other than make a little party toy that pinwheels from steam. The Antikythera Mechanism baffles modern science because, as far as we understand the civilizations in the area at the time, [I]none[/I] of them are known to be capable of making such a precise and accurate instrument and we have never encountered artifacts of that advanced level of technology that far back in time or for a significant period moving forward in the historical record. And Stonehenge and the Pyramids were constructed using simple machines (in the physics sense) and the smartest minds of the age. We in the contemporary period have a muddled and self-centered view of the ancients as technological backwaters based on our own limited observation. If we ever make contact with an alien civilization before we go extinct, it's practically automatic that we will fuck it up because, as a civilization, we're barely out of toddler maturity. Imagine putting a five-year-old in charge of WW3 peace talks with Exalted President for Life VladAImir Putinborg (or Putin as we know him now, either); the bombs would be back to flying at full speed by the next day because the negotiation table ran out of cookies.
[QUOTE=elixwhitetail;50978493]It's also worth noting that the meter is defined by the size of the Earth and our scale of time is intrinsically even more local. All of our common units of measure are completely arbitrary when compared against an interstellar-capable alien intelligence. We'll need to use universal physical constants like pi and the properties of hydrogen to communicate anything at all. And then understanding is once again entirely different; even if their math is binary and they measure distances in atomic widths or other fundamental units of the cosmos, getting past "Hello World" will be the most significant achievement of sentient life in this region of space. This is straight false and is a myth perpetuated much later, primarily with the rise of Flat Earthism, which was promoted by an [I]American[/I] in the 19th century. The ancient Greeks knew the world was round. Columbus knew the world was round (actually he thought it was pear-shaped, but never mind). Old Europe knew the world was round. As soon as ancient civilizations discovered how to make boats and experienced things falling over the horizon, they knew the world was round. The average illiterate peasant, they may have thought the world was flat or even shaped like Jesus's taint, but anyone with sea navigation experience or scientific education knew or could have figured out that the world was round. They didn't know how the world was laid out (witness Columbus thinking he'd sailed clear across the Pacific/Atlantic to hit the far eastern shore of the Orient), but the belief that ancient peoples believed the world was flat and that Columbus feared he'd sail off the edge is a self-serving modern myth. This doesn't mean we're somehow magically equipped to deal with hyperadvanced aliens who show up and decide to terraform Earth to their liking, but the ancient world was a lot smarter than the modern mindset thinks. Cheesemaking was going on 9,000 years ago in Europe, for example, which automatically means they possessed both animal husbandry and the knowledge of how to transform dairy. A five-legged animal in a cave painting in one of those well-preserved caves in Europe from like 8-10,000 years ago baffled anthropologists until they realized that flickering firelight in the cave would throw shadow and light over the painting's legs, creating a rudimentary "animation". We started wearing clothing to cover our bodies roughly 40,000 years ago because that's when the human flea evolved, and the flea does not live on skin but next to skin in clothing. The ancient Greeks discovered steam engines, they just didn't think to do anything useful with it other than make a little party toy that pinwheels from steam. The Antikythera Mechanism baffles modern science because, as far as we understand the civilizations in the area at the time, [I]none[/I] of them are known to be capable of making such a precise and accurate instrument and we have never encountered artifacts of that advanced level of technology that far back in time or for a significant period moving forward in the historical record. And Stonehenge and the Pyramids were constructed using simple machines (in the physics sense) and the smartest minds of the age. We in the contemporary period have a muddled and self-centered view of the ancients as technological backwaters based on our own limited observation. If we ever make contact with an alien civilization before we go extinct, it's practically automatic that we will fuck it up because, as a civilization, we're barely out of toddler maturity. Imagine putting a five-year-old in charge of WW3 peace talks with Exalted President for Life VladAImir Putinborg (or Putin as we know him now, either); the bombs would be back to flying at full speed by the next day because the negotiation table ran out of cookies.[/QUOTE] First off i just typed that as a way of saying we weren't really smart back then.
[B]Alien signal detected by Russian astrophysicists turns out to be terrestrial disturbance[/B] [URL="http://tass.com/science/896683"]http://tass.com/science/896683[/URL] [QUOTE]ST. PETERSBURG, August 30. /TASS/. An unusual signal registered by the Ratan-600 radio telescope at the Zelenchukskaya observatory in the North Caucasus Republic of Karachay-Cherkessia is a terrestrial disturbance rather than a sound from an unearthly civilization, telescope researcher Yulia Sotnikova told TASS on Tuesday. "We, indeed, discovered an unusual signal. However, an additional check showed that it was emanating from a Soviet military satellite, which had not been entered into any of the catalogs of celestial bodies," Ipatov said. [/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=cartman300;50970129]Yeah, and that would be [B]why[/B] exactly? You don't go around and stab people that say "hi" to you on the street, do you?[/QUOTE] I don't know, what do you know about alien morals?
[QUOTE=Deathtrooper2;50980383]First off i just typed that as a way of saying we weren't really smart back then.[/QUOTE] we were as smart then as we are now, we just have a greater accumulation of knowledge now.
[QUOTE=Svinnik;50980408][B]Alien signal detected by Russian astrophysicists turns out to be terrestrial disturbance[/B] [URL="http://tass.com/science/896683"]http://tass.com/science/896683[/URL][/QUOTE] [quote]which had not been entered into any of the catalogs of celestial bodies," Ipatov said.[/quote] Wonder how many of those things (whether Soviet or US or any other country) we have floating up there undocumented.
I kind of wish that they would start waiting a bit longer to announce these things... or just don't tell us when they find out it is the car alarm going off in the parking lot or whatever.
[QUOTE=elixwhitetail;50978493]It's also worth noting that the meter is defined by the size of the Earth and our scale of time is intrinsically even more local. All of our common units of measure are completely arbitrary when compared against an interstellar-capable alien intelligence. We'll need to use universal physical constants like pi and the properties of hydrogen to communicate anything at all. And then understanding is once again entirely different; even if their math is binary and they measure distances in atomic widths or other fundamental units of the cosmos, getting past "Hello World" will be the most significant achievement of sentient life in this region of space. This is straight false and is a myth perpetuated much later, primarily with the rise of Flat Earthism, which was promoted by an [I]American[/I] in the 19th century. The ancient Greeks knew the world was round. Columbus knew the world was round (actually he thought it was pear-shaped, but never mind). Old Europe knew the world was round. As soon as ancient civilizations discovered how to make boats and experienced things falling over the horizon, they knew the world was round. The average illiterate peasant, they may have thought the world was flat or even shaped like Jesus's taint, but anyone with sea navigation experience or scientific education knew or could have figured out that the world was round. They didn't know how the world was laid out (witness Columbus thinking he'd sailed clear across the Pacific/Atlantic to hit the far eastern shore of the Orient), but the belief that ancient peoples believed the world was flat and that Columbus feared he'd sail off the edge is a self-serving modern myth. This doesn't mean we're somehow magically equipped to deal with hyperadvanced aliens who show up and decide to terraform Earth to their liking, but the ancient world was a lot smarter than the modern mindset thinks. Cheesemaking was going on 9,000 years ago in Europe, for example, which automatically means they possessed both animal husbandry and the knowledge of how to transform dairy. A five-legged animal in a cave painting in one of those well-preserved caves in Europe from like 8-10,000 years ago baffled anthropologists until they realized that flickering firelight in the cave would throw shadow and light over the painting's legs, creating a rudimentary "animation". We started wearing clothing to cover our bodies roughly 40,000 years ago because that's when the human flea evolved, and the flea does not live on skin but next to skin in clothing. The ancient Greeks discovered steam engines, they just didn't think to do anything useful with it other than make a little party toy that pinwheels from steam. The Antikythera Mechanism baffles modern science because, as far as we understand the civilizations in the area at the time, [I]none[/I] of them are known to be capable of making such a precise and accurate instrument and we have never encountered artifacts of that advanced level of technology that far back in time or for a significant period moving forward in the historical record. And Stonehenge and the Pyramids were constructed using simple machines (in the physics sense) and the smartest minds of the age. We in the contemporary period have a muddled and self-centered view of the ancients as technological backwaters based on our own limited observation. If we ever make contact with an alien civilization before we go extinct, it's practically automatic that we will fuck it up because, as a civilization, we're barely out of toddler maturity. Imagine putting a five-year-old in charge of WW3 peace talks with Exalted President for Life VladAImir Putinborg (or Putin as we know him now, either); the bombs would be back to flying at full speed by the next day because the negotiation table ran out of cookies.[/QUOTE] Love this guy!! Nice post!
[QUOTE=Ninja Gnome;50980510]we were as smart then as we are now, we just have a greater accumulation of knowledge now.[/QUOTE] Well, maybe as individuals, but now we can use supercomputers to crunch out billions more operations per second than any human could hope to achieve on his or her own; effectively, we've extended our brains.
[QUOTE=phygon;50987482]Well, maybe as individuals, but now we can use supercomputers to crunch out billions more operations per second than any human could hope to achieve on his or her own; effectively, we've extended our brains.[/QUOTE] while raw processing power is obviously a valuable metric by which to judge the advancement of humanity, human ingenuity, creativity and general intelligence have remained (largely) constant over the years.
[QUOTE=pointyface;50969515]Please be alien porn, please be alien porn[/QUOTE] you mean asari,.
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