Life As We Don't Know It (Part 1)
how we might meet our first little green man.
When we look for E.T., we do so by pointing radio telescopes at the sky and listening. We don't send out messages, we just listen. There would be little point in transmitting if we didn't know where to send the greeting. So it is only natural to think that aliens would do the same.
As you know, we have been leaking radio emissions into space for more than half a century now. And these broadcasts just keep traveling and traveling. Eventually, in Contact, the broadcast of the first Olympics of the modern era—featuring Adolf Hitler—reaches a listening post set up by super-advanced aliens near the star Vega. They receive it and then beam it right back so we'll know they heard us. Buried beneath the broadcast is an enormous message coded in the binary language of computers that instructs us on how to build a ship that will take us to meet them.
To get our attention, they preempt the message with a series of prime numbers. By doing so, they let us know that the signal is of intelligent origin. No naturally occurring phenomenon could produce prime numbers in sequence.
This is important because there are naturally occurring phenomenon that send out strong radio waves. The emissions from pulsars, for example, were originally thought to be a call from another world.
So the aliens do a little something special to let us know that we should pay attention to this one. The wait is over. E.T. has phoned home.
Now that we've received our first message from the great beyond, what shall we do next? We could go to Disneyland, but may I instead recommend taking a break? Join us in just two days for the second part of "Life As We Don't Know It." We'll continue our discussion of Contact and then look forward to our next film, Independence Day.
In the meantime, feel free to check out some of the other articles and book reviews here at Science Fiction and Society, or hop on over to the Summer Sci-Fi Siesta where you'll find articles by other sci-fi, fantasy, science, and culture editors here at Suite101.
See you next time!
If you'd like to read more articles at Science Fiction & Society, please make use of our index system to locate the information you're looking for:
|
The copyright of the article Life As We Don't Know It (Part 1) in Science Fiction & Society is owned by Christopher B. Jones. Permission to republish Life As We Don't Know It (Part 1) in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
Articles in this Topic
Discussions in this Topic
|
Latest Articles