Does Active SETI Put Earth in Danger?

Ponca City, We Love You writes "There is an interesting story in Seed Magazine on active SETI — sending out signals to try to contact other civilizations in nearby star systems. Alexander Zaitsev, Chief Scientist at the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Radio Engineering and Electronics, has access to one of the most powerful radio transmitters on Earth and has already sent several messages to nearby, sun-like stars. But some scientists think that Zaitsev is not only acting out of turn by independently speaking for everyone on the entire planet but believe there are possible dangers we may unleash by announcing ourselves to the unknown darkness. This ground has been explored before in countless works of science fiction most notably "The Killing Star," a 1995 novel that paints a frightening picture of interstellar civilizations exterminating their neighbors with relativistic bombardments, not from malice, but simply because it is the most logical action."

The Enemy is Us

[Doc Ruby]

Yes it does.

We should conquer and colonize another planet first, then send active SETI signals from there instead.

Brace yourselves: where's the kaboom?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, it is very dangerous. The signals have been causing a certain alien's garage door to open and close relentlessly ever since they started, making him very angry and he's up to Illudium Q-35 now.

Re:Brace yourselves: where's the kaboom?

[kahrytan]

  But all we want to tell him is we can save him 15% on his spaceship insurance.

Re:The Enemy is Us

[Anne_Nonymous]

Don't think of it as active SETI,think of it as a survey marker for the new hyper-space bypass.

Re:

[lonesome_coder]

I'll drink a few pints to that.

Re:

[Max Littlemore]

Hyper-space bypasses are planning matters. They have nothing to do with whether or not we send signals into space.

I'd be more concerned about what we're sending being interpreted as an insult, except that the subsequent invasion force would probably be eaten by a small dog.

Re:The Enemy is Us

[Flibz]

They, for one, should welcome their human overlords...

Re:The Enemy is Us

[trolltalk.com]

We're in bigger shit than you can imagine - they've already seen our "I Love Lucy" repeats ... and now that they've seen Aliens and Terminator, the *know* we're dangerous, and need to be exterminated. They are a bit worried about our ability to travel through time, as demonstrated by our having received technology from our future from something called "The Federation", so they'll just nuke us from orbit. After all, its the safest option.

Re:The Enemy is Us

[Mr. Bad Example]

> [...] so they'll just nuke us from orbit. After all, it's the only way to be sure.

Fixed that for you.

Thus pacifist aliens

[DrYak]

The Enemy is Us

Which probably could explain why aliens might be more pacific than us.

What I'm basically saying, is that "peace" is a prerequisite for achieving "space age",
because "space age" comes only far later after "big weapons" in the technological development,
and without "peace", a civilisation may blow it's entire planet at the "big weapons" stage, long before being able to achieve "space age".

Just look at our history :
As you said, our own worst enemy has always been ourself : the other humans against which we engage war.

Specially in recent history, we've reached the point where some population have enough warfar technology and power that they might oblitared the whole planet if weapon escalation runs out of control.
Nuclear stockpiling and M.A.D. programs are the epitome of this situation.
MAD fundamental premise is that nobody will attack because everyone dies in the process of retaliation that follows (except maybe a bunch of politician hiding into caves with lots of young pretty nubile girls, isn't it, Dr Strangelove ?)
MAD seeks to make atomic war an unaffordable option because of too high cost.
The implicit consequence is that if someone played fool anyway, we WILL all definitely stop existing.

And at the same time, we haven't even reached true space travel yet, and we're very far from being able to do it on a large scale. We can only plant a couple of flags on our moon, and send two motorized webcams to the directly neighbouring planet.

An alien race that is able to detect us AND come toward earth to meet us, must necessarily be extremely advance, far beyond the point at which we are now. Which would possibly mean also having gone through a long story of dangerous technology (military and such).
If that alien race wasn't deeply motivated to be peaceful, they'll have had a lot of opportunity of blowing themselves up with all discovery they had the time to make before achieving space exploration.
Only a race that repress its tendency to kill everything can survive technology.

Even we as human have a small tendency to try to refrain of causing too much destruction.
In antiquity, pillaging and burning down to grounds enemy cities has been standard military practice, even told in classical literature.
In the middle ages, having a lot of deaths during wars was considered pretty normal.
As history progressed more dangerous technology has become available, people start being reluctant using it. Moral value change.
MAD was a pissing context without (hopefully) any real intent to engage all those nukes.
Even if atrocities are comited during modern conflict, those are much more criticized by the public (see current opinion about Irak or the various massacres and ethnic cleansing happening under dictatorship).
Slowly we are discovering that hurting each other may not be the best procedure.

A lot of the "modern" forms of conflict have moved to much more political and commercial ground. Emerging country don't long anymore to conquest foreign land, only to capture their markets.

Thus maybe, we ourselves will be able to survive until space age without blowing ourselves up with all military technology we may invent in the process.

But probably, the first alien race that will meet us will probably be peaceful because other wise, by then, they won't exist anymore.

Re:Thus pacifist aliens

[_Sharp'r_]

Only a race that repress its tendency to kill everything can survive technology.

Here, let me fix that for you:

Only a race that repress its tendency to kill itself can survive technology.

What eliminates a race that focuses all of its agression against others not of their race? It makes a great external enemy that allows the race itself to work together with a common bond, at peace with itself.

It's just too bad that we turn out to be one of those "others", huh?

Oppresive regimes to this all the time on earth, using an "external" enemy to create peace at home in furtherance of opposing the "greater enemy".

Re:Thus pacifist aliens

[Pharmboy]

I also find it ironic that people make these broad claims "if it wasn't for war, just think how far we could be with space", when in fact, the opposite is likely true. Not trying to be rude, but war brings us many neet things, some of them faster than without war, some are only a result of war. Sick, but true:

Jet engines, radar, rockets, encryption, and thousands of other inventions exist solely because we were looking for better ways to kill people. We got to the moon in the 60s because of a space race /cold war. How many others have gone since then? Exactly none, we won, no one else was interested enough to spend the money.

As you point out, there is nothing quite like the bond of like minded people when you have a common enemy, be it across the ocean or on another planet. Half the planet uses the U.S. as the common enemy, we use terrorists (used to be communists), etc. If someone would just land here and shoot off a few rounds with a 'ray gun', maybe we could all get along, but we need enemies. We must, since the dawn of time we have always had them.

War is destruction, not creation

[CarpetShark]

if it wasn't for war, just think how far we could be with space", when in fact, the opposite is likely true. Not trying to be rude, but war brings us many neet things, some of them faster than without war, some are only a result of war

This is pure fallacy, although I appreciate that you used the word "likely" rather than speaking in absolutes. Generally, good education comes in peace time. Sharing of ideas comes from openness and trade with other tribes/cultures. Rockets are probably based on fireworks (and aerodynamics), which are based on so-called gunpowder -- something that was not used destructively for for many years after its creation. Radar came about in war, yes, but all of the technology leading up to it was developed in peacetime. That the first need to make the next leap came about because of war is irrelevant; the technology was there, the progress was ready to be made, and if the technique was needed, someone would have made that leap.

As someone once said, "the tradegy of war is that it uses man's best to do man's worst". War is destructive, not creative. Those involved in war often claim credit for things either through delusion, or power. That does not mean that the warlike people, warlike ideals, or even warlike circumstances are the reasons such things exist. I'm sure da vinci would've preferred to work on less lethal things, if less lethal people had held the money and power.

Re:Thus pacifist aliens

[gnuman99]

Sorry, but bullshit.

Most efficient jet engines are for commercial planes. Everything else you mention was advanced because of stability where it was invented, not destruction. Just look at how much positive science is coming out of Palestine or Iraq or Afghanistan. The last one should be the pinnacle of human knowledge - they had was for almost 30 years now!

Military is waste. Period. Anything positive that comes out of it is not by design, it is purely as a side-effect.

It wasn't the military that got us to the moon. It wasn't the military building ISS. If it was up to military, we would not even have something like Hubble because it is useless.

Anything positive comes out of the military it is only a side-effect of its intended purpose. And that purpose is to kill and control.

Re:

[Lijemo]

What eliminates a[n alien] race that focuses all of its aggression against others not of their [species]?

Ecological destruction?

Actually, a big part of the process of civilization and enlightement is expanding the idea of "we". From "we" being just our family, just our clan-- to hey, the people in the next village are human to-- then realization that someone who doesn't look like you is human, too-- then the realization that if all we worry about is humans at the expense of other life-forms on the planet, we end up destroying ourselves anyway, therefore for our civilization to survive, we need to expand "w

Re:Thus pacifist aliens

[Toonol]

Every technological advancement that we have ever seen has been created by a warlike species. If you want to extrapolate from a sample of one, space-faring aliens to be just as warlike.

Re:Thus pacifist aliens

[Pad-Lok]

What I'm basically saying, is that "peace" is a prerequisite for achieving "space age"

No, that would be "rocketry" followed by building the "Apollo Programme".

Re:

[Jarjarthejedi]

Don't forget satellites, you need that to build the crew center, otherwise your ship will never launch.

Re:

[Blakey Rat]

What I'm basically saying, is that "peace" is a prerequisite for achieving "space age",

I've always thought this was BS.

because "space age" comes only far later after "big weapons" in the technological development,
and without "peace", a civilisation may blow it's entire planet at the "big weapons" stage, long before being able to achieve "space age".

To quote Brain Guy in MST3K: "Our race is pacifist. We kill only out of personal spite."

Not using big weapons doesn't imply peaceful, it only implies not using b

Re:The Enemy is Us

[0xABADC0DA]

We should conquer and colonize another planet first, then send active SETI signals from there instead.

Send out signals from a planet -- lol.

Build a partial dyson sphere around a somewhat nearby star, even just a vast network of satellites, and use them to turn the light of the star on and off to send an unmistakable binary message. Occasionally this binary message can contain the encrypted 'log' of visitors, so that we can find out about them from any vantage point in the universe (but they ostensibly can't locate us like with some directional signal, unless they can trace our 'subspace signature' somehow).

This would over time 'draw' aliens to the star while giving some protection against hostile civilizations. We should be looking for something grand like this, not some 'hydrogen times pi' nonsense.

How is this different from Radio, TV Signals?

[Anonymous Coward]

Has this man figured out a way to send signals faster than radio frequency or light? Surely, evidence of our noisy bickering between each other will be interpreted long before his signals anyways. And what about the satellites we have cruising away from our solar system?

I don't think what Active SETI does is really going to matter at this point in time.

Re:How is this different from Radio, TV Signals?

[eln]

It doesn't matter how many radio or TV or any other kind of signals we pollute space with. Everybody knows that we aren't going to be contacted by any alien races until we build a warp drive so they can detect the warp signature.

Re:

[TheRaven64]

You got moderated funny, but I wouldn't be surprised if you are correct. In order to maintain a civilisation over even a small number of star systems you need either faster-than-light communication, or much slower-than-human life cycles. Having two or three generations between sending a message and getting a reply simply would not work. You might send out your latest technological developments, and receive others, but there would be little personal communication.

If there are aliens with a spacefaring

In one acronym: EIRP

[mangu]

Radio and TV are broadcast to people here on earth. Those signals are broadcast in a way to propagate over the earth surface, not to outer space. They are sent in a way to maximize their intensity here [wikipedia.org].

Radio and TV signals will not be propagated very far into space because they aren't directed there. Sending signals to other stars, OTOH, would direct the transmitted power to outer space, not to the earth surface.

Re:In one acronym: EIRP

[cowscows]

There's no doubt that plenty of signal leaks out into space, but it's important to realize how big space is, and how quickly the power of radio signals drop off. Imagine radio waves expanding in a sphere from an antenna. A certain amount of energy is used to create that signal. Right at that antenna, the signal takes up a small amount of space, all that energy is crammed into a small area, the signal strength is strong. That sphere of the broadcast expands out from the antenna at the speed of light. Assuming that nothing absorbs or reflects or otherwise interrupts any of the signal, that sphere of radio waves continues to grow but overall only has the same amount of energy as when it was first released. You can see how very quickly the amount of energy available at any one point on that sphere drops as the sphere expands. Now imagine a sphere with a radius of light-years. That's a whole lot of area to be spreading a set amount of energy over. It's certainly possible to focus radio signals and the like. You don't have to spread all your energy out in all directions, you can aim it somewhat. But you're not going to get a perfectly tight beam, there's going to be some spread, and over interstellar differences, what seems like a minor loss of energy will really start to become significant. And don't forget that focusing your energy into a tight beam means that it will pass by far fewer planets than a signal sent in all directions, and the chances of anyone being there to listen get much smaller.

But wait, it gets worse. There's a lot of electromagnetic noise floating out there in the universe. There's even a big source of it close nearby, we call it the sun. With all that static going on, a weak signal can get very hard to find, especially if you aren't exactly sure what sort of signal you're looking for.

Basically, it's not very realistic to expect people on other planets to be listening in on our TV broadcasts. Even if enough time has passed for the signals to reach them, they're not likely to get enough of a signal to be able to work with, even if they happen to be looking for exactly the right thing at exactly the right time.

Radio and TV power problems

[xPsi]

Time scales are a problem, but so is power. Although we have been broadcasting radio and TV signals from earth for a while, the signal power at any meaningful distance scale is really, really small. From wikipedia [wikipedia.org] (in turn summarized from the SETI FAQ [setifaq.org]): "SETI estimates, for instance, that with a radio telescope as sensitive as the Arecibo Observatory, Earth's television and radio broadcasts would only be detectable at distances up to 0.3 light years. Clearly detecting an Earth type civilization at great d

Re:How is this different from Radio, TV Signals?

[jamstar7]

A "There goes the neighborhood" signal?

Main problem I'm seeing with the 'Oh, no, we're all gonna be FOOD' crowd saying we should hide from any possible extraterrestrial contact is that yes, our radio signals are out there. At the current distance, the 'radio shell' is extremely weak. It's that pesky inverse square law. To get an idea, it'd be on the order of detecting a gnat's fart during a heavy metal rock concert. In New York City. From Buenos Aires.

Do I advocate Active SETI? You bet. Who knows what ET can teach us til we make contact? Of course, with our history we're liable to be declared a slum & placed offlimits til we get our heads on straight...

It's too late

[KillerCow]

If you read the second link

...the television broadcasts we have so rashly been transmitting to the stars for the last 50 years..

Stopping people from deliberately sending signals is not going to make us invisible. We've been sending signals for decades.

Re:

[iluvcapra]

Stopping people from deliberately sending signals is not going to make us invisible. We've been sending signals for decades.

It might be worth it, in that case, to try send out some signal explaining that the really powerful signals they get are just television. I'd rather the Vulcan survey ship not see American Idol, but if we've got no choice about it, we might as well try to assert with a different broadcast that, despite all the other evidence, we are in fact 'intelligent' beings.

Or maybe I speak too soon.

Re:It's too late

[had3l]

Yeah, and we all know that we shouldn't send mixed signals to our enemies. That's why I propose we nuke the moon to prove we mean business.

Re:It's too late

[cmacb]

Not too late...

If these alien civilizations support the MS Outlook protocol we can simply send out a retract message and clean it all up before they notice.

Re:

[zoomshorts]

Yes we have been sending crap into the known universe for 50
or so years.

This timeframe is but a fly fart in a hurricane, galactically speaking.
What makes anyone think that intelligent beings will be looking for
old 'I Love Lucy' episodes, freely radiated into the cosmos?

Not to worry. Please tell Al Gore also.

UFOs of the 20th century

[michaelmalak]

The UFO theorists (I try to keep an open mind, but I find the existence of UFOs less than probable due to lack of evidence) say that UFOs started visiting (or started visiting heavily) in the middle of the 20th century in response to the nuclear bombs going off. Perhaps someone more versed in science could tell us whether that or Hitler's speech at the 1936 Olympics is easier to detect from space.

Re:

[nine-times]

That's pretty silly. First, on a cosmic scale, nuclear bombs are *tiny*. I don't see why they would be noticeable. At this point, we can't even figure out how to detect a planet as small as Earth orbiting even the closest star, and nuclear explosions are tiny compared to the size of the Earth.

Second, even if you detected them, it doesn't seem like there'd be anything particular to flag them as a sign of intelligent life. They aren't a continuing pattern or signal-- they're just explosions. Explosions

Re:

[Just Some Guy]

Do massive fission explosions happen in nature?

Massive? Possibly not.

If so, where?

If you set your threshold a little lower, Africa [wikipedia.org].

Re:UFOs of the 20th century

[Just Some Guy]

Perhaps someone more versed in science could tell us whether that or Hitler's speech at the 1936 Olympics is easier to detect from space.

I've heard that mentioned a lot, that maybe they'll see our Hitler broadcasts and immediately loathe us.

Why?

We think he was horrible, but why would we believe for an instant that an alien might think the same? Maybe some of the powers-that-be up there are scratching their chitinous chins thoughtfully, impressed that we have such men.

reminds me of a twilight zone episode

[taxman_10m]

One from the 80s...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Small_Talent_for_War_(The_Twilight_Zone) [wikipedia.org]

Re:UFOs of the 20th century

[cowscows]

At an even more basic level, even if an alien race was able to read the radio signal and construct it into an audio/video feed, would they really be able to understand it enough to form a useful opinion on what it meant? The idea of a universal translator is nice for sci-fi shows, but it doesn't seem very likely that a short speech meant for native speakers would enable someone(particularly someone with no previous knowledge of any human language)unfamiliar with the language to make any real sense of it. There just wouldn't be enough context to figure out the meanings of all those sounds. It's probably not even reasonable to expect an alien race to be able to make assumptions based on the speaker's tone and attitude like a human could.

Re:UFOs of the 20th century

[Just Some Guy]

Very true. But even if they did, would it sound inherently bad to someone who had no idea of our morality and values?

Hitler: We must exterminate the Jews! They are destroying our society!
Kodos: Wow. Whatever Jews are, they sure are causing that guy a lot of grief. Wonder if he gets it under control?

Since only a small fraction of news on both sides of the issue was televised, ET might not have enough context even to know that we thought it was bad (although they'd know that at least some other factions didn't like him and his plans, even if they didn't really understand all the reasons).

Re:

[meringuoid]

It's far more likely that they bomb the bejeezus out of us for our nutzoid obsession with cars and Britney Spears than it is that the triggering act will be Hitler - a problem we pretty publicly dealt with. Hell, we have satellites broadcasting the History channel doing nothing but trumpeting our defeat over that guy.

The Worst Guy In History invaded Poland. We went to war to stop him. We won. HURRAH! Then we went home and left Poland to the tender mercies of The Second Worst Guy In History. I'm not sure t

Re:UFOs of the 20th century

[Trespass]

People started seeing UFOs about the time they stopped seeing angels. Line noise.

obvious

[Lord Ender]

Inter-stellar communication would almost certainly be perceived as representing the entire planet. No attempt at doing so should be made until some sort of world government has the authority to represent the entire planet.

Re:obvious

[planckscale]

Yeah I mean if I was going to send a message to outer space it would be of a sexual nature like: "We are looking for the ultimate orgasm." or "Send us your women with the big jugs." Forget this "we come in peace" crap.

Forget the Extra-Terrestrial Hypothesis

[Anonymous Coward]

How many of you have considered the possibility of Crypto-terrestrials? We keep looking amongst the stars for other intelligent life while ignoring the evidence that it has been here on earth all along.

Consider this - what if the intelligence behind UFO events, both modern and pre-1940's UFO events like Fatima or Lourdes - is the same intelligence that appears in stories of Fey folk (elves, dwarves, sylphs, succubi, etc)?

What if we've been looking to the stars when in fact they've been here all along, just

Re:

[bofkentucky]

Chariots of the Gods [wikipedia.org], read it, get a good laugh, it pretty much covers that topic.

Re:Forget the Extra-Terrestrial Hypothesis

[Sciros]

Oh well in that case our magic will work against them so we're fine. Magic doesn't work against extraterrestrials, that's the issue here. When dealing with aliens you can't just wave a wand or plant some beans or pull some sword out of a rock, no sir. You need to either use a gigantor gun with like twelve barrels and a 200-lb magazine that doesn't ever run out of ammo, or cybernetic implants in your body that give you superhuman strength and agility. And while we're not quite far enough on cybernetic implants and gigantor guns that non-Shaq people can even lift, magic's been around for years [lasvegas-nv.com].

Re:

[meringuoid]

Areas like the Bermuda and Dragon's triangles sit on top of very deep sections of the ocean, and the same lines of longitude. What if all the strange incidents have to do with something extra-terrestrial sitting on the ocean floor? And the disappearances occur when you see something that you shouldn't.

The most merciful thing in the Universe, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate its contents.

For the love of all that is good and decent, and for the sake of your own sanity, and for the

LOLZ what are you?

[kaoshin]

Chickened of aliens? Bwak Bwak Bwak!!!

Most notably?

[blincoln]

Saberhagen's Berserker series? Bear's The Forge of God and Anvil of Stars? What is this The Killing Star that you speak of?

Re:Most notably?

[ScrewMaster]

Even more notably, L. Ron (schmientologist) Hubbard's "Battlefield Earth", where a Psychlo reconnaissance probe picked up one of the Voyagers (in its own way a feeble attempt at communication) and backtracked the machine's course to Earth and ... that was that. After wiping us out with an invulnerable gas drone they simply moved in and began exploiting Earth's mineral resources. Conquest is easy if genocide is on the table.

By broadcasting the way we are, we're making a couple of assumptions: a. that there are no alien civilizations out there to worry about or b. if there are, they're not actively hostile and capable of making something of it. Neither is a safe assumption. Granted, interstellar distances are a perfect defense against anyone near technological parity with us, but why would we assume that an alien civilization has advanced no further than that?

Furthermore, some people maintain the (preposterous) belief that any race that is substantially more technically advanced than us would, somehow, have to be peaceful and beneficient. However, if they followed a developmental path anything at all like ours, they got that advanced by being anything but peaceable! Where did many of the historical discontinuities in our scientific and technical knowledge come from? Why, from the tremendous R&D investment the world's militaries command in times of war. I see no reason to assume that an alien race would necessarily be any different in that regard.

Consider this: how many times in our own history has a culture been damaged or destroyed after encountering a more advanced one? Take our Native American friends, for example. The more capable society doesn't even have to be warlike either.

No danger -

[no-body]

by the time the signals sent out will arrive anywhere of significance, the disease "humans" will have been defeated by the planet's own immune system.

Human beings...

[stox]

the other white meat!

Re:

[Surt]

Funny but wrong, anyone who has ever eaten a human knows they are pretty much 100% dark meat (and not very tasty).

In a related story

[twifosp]

In a related story in Caveman Weekly, Torg, The Cheif Smartguy, for clan *Grunt* asks: OOGA BOOGA Should we go outside the cave or stay inside? OOGA OOGA!

Why would aliens care?

[iago-vL]

Even if aliens are out there listening, would they really care? I mean, we've all seen Independence Day and Signs and all the other movies where they do. But, when it comes right down to it, we probably aren't special enough to matter.

Aliens powerful enough to matter would probably think of us like harmless bugs or small animals: sure, they take up some space, but they aren't worth the effort.

On the other hand, if the aliens want a hyperspace bypass and Earth is in the way, we might all be screwed. :)

Re:

[davmoo]

I'm not sure it would really be a good thing if the aliens looked at us that way. After all, look what *we* do to harmless insects and small animals.

Re:

[Critical Facilities]

Or the Vogons [wikipedia.org] might care if our radio blasts are screwing up their satellite reception of the latest Pay Per View special of some poetry reading.

Re:

[stmfreak]

Even if aliens are out there listening, would they really care?

You're kidding, right?

Assuming we progress to the point of cheap and common interstellar travel, if we suddenly heard of a primitive culture "over there" do you think it is more likely we would:

a. shrug

b. watch in horror as scores of independent missionaries from our own species descended on the helpless planet to bring them the word of <insert deity>.

c. enslave them.

d. set up trade negotiations for their resources.

Looking to our own histo

Speaking for everyone?

[Frosty Piss]

But some scientists think that Zaitsev is not only acting out of turn by independently speaking for everyone on the entire planet but believe there are possible dangers we may unleash by announcing ourselves to the unknown darkness.

"Speaking for everyone"? He has a radio, and he's using it. This is speaking for everyone? When I toss a message in a bottle of the deck of a fraighter in the middle of the Pacific and it washes up on some tropical shore, I'm speaking for "everyone"?

This idea is a stretch. Zaitsev is more or less free to "speak" to anyone he chooses.

Add it to the list

[Hoi Polloi]

Oh my god! I'll have to add it to my list, let's see...

1. Fatal accident while driving
2. Caught in fire at night while sleeping
3. Heart attack
4. Aliens attacking earth after sending out signals
5. Cancer

I had to bump "Terrorists attack Starbucks #528" off the list to make room

Re:

[east coast]

I had to bump "Terrorists attack Starbucks #528" off the list to make room

I thought Starbucks was the terrorists?

Oh, sorry, they're thieves. Wrong criminal. My bad.

Hilarious

[ZeroExistenZ]

So there are billions spend in both manhours and cold hard cash to find extraterrestrial life, unsuccessfully. Now suddendly there's a guy who thinks "hey, why passively listen. Lets actively send out some signals straight to some specific starsystems!"
And suddenly the scientific community is freaking; "OMG! Lets not do that! What if they exterminate us!"

What do those "some scientists" know more then we do?

No

[Mr. Underbridge]

If the basis of your 'article' is speculation whose sole citation is science fiction, send it to /dev/null next time.

Limited disclosure

[Empiric]

I think we're okay as long as it's just sending scientific data that doesn't reveal much about our cultural predispositions.

"You couldn't possibly have had anything to do with Designing us" should work.

of course it does

[hurfy]

They will come and discover that we develop lots of technology and then disable half of it ourselves with something called DRM. We would be looked at as about the level of a dog chasing its tail...

On the other hand, hopefully they would figure we are too stupid to get near them and we are in a ghetto system anyways :(

"Sorry we are unable to verify the license on your hyperdrive's software...please try again later or follow this link to purchase a new license"

damage already done?

[xPsi]

We've already violated the prime directive by sending porn and rock music into space with the Voyager [wikipedia.org] and Pioneer [wikipedia.org] messages respectively. Should an advanced alien civilization find and decode the Pioneer golden record, their biggest worry would be to be sued by the RIAA for illegally downloading Johnny B. Goode.

Lem made works of art about it

[toby]

Definitive novels dealing with intergalactic contact are Stanislaw Lem's Fiasco [abebooks.com] and Eden. [abebooks.com] I cannot recommend these books highly enough as explorations of human psychology and what-could-possibly-go-wrong!

Glagnar's Human Rinds

[demon]

Muncha-Buncha-Cruncha-Humans!

I think we can all agree...

[deft]

I think we can all agree... that if the american indians had sent out regular "message in a bottle" type items across the ocean, describing their society, level of technology, etc, the Europeans would have been much friendlier when they arrived.

Or the europeans would have showed up alot quicker and did exactly what they did. I imagine they would have brought more guns though on that first trip.

Re:

[NotQuiteReal]

Statistically speaking, guns hardly killed anyone.

You'd just better hope those aliens don't sneeze on you!

Re:

[Arcturax]

This is an amusing thought... if they pick up any of our TV shows and record them and show them to their whole planet to prove life is out there, aren't they then guilty of piracy?

I don't think we have to worry about attack anyway. We have the most powerful weapon in the universe...Lawyers.

We'll be sending lots of them as soon as they finish rebroadcasting our work without paying our starving actors or their starving descendants and then they will pay... oh they will pay.

Self fulfilled prophecy

[TrixX]

From TOA: Brin included a more disturbing possibility: Nobody is on the air because something seeks and destroys everyone who broadcasts.

I have another alternative theory to explain why we have not received any signal: Every planet inhabited by intelligent life has considered the same possibility of the previous paragraph, so they are avoiding any kind of transmission just in case, to avoid potential detection.

wasn't this covered in the movie "contact"?

[circletimessquare]

or rather, in carl sagan's "contact"?

the first visual broadcast transmissions we've sent to the stars was bloody farking hitler himself, addressing the 1936 berlin games

THAT's our announcement to the galaxy

could we have possibly done worse as a species?

we stood up, we cleared our throat, and the first utterance out of our technological mouths and we go and godwin the whole of human civilization

fark us

Re:wasn't this covered in the movie "contact"?

[hansamurai]

Well hopefully if some evil aliens start heading for Earth due to Hitler's speeches, they'll be intercepted by our modern day reality TV programming and their super intelligent minds will be reduced to something more manageable.

No.

[Orange Crush]

Space is very big and it takes lots and lots of energy and resources to build a craft--even just a weapons delivery system--to cross the vast distances between stars. It would have to actually be worth it to attack us. Our planet and Solar System contain no resources that aren't readily available and easier to obtain much closer to just about any other star system.

Re:

[cephyn]

Except maybe for xenobiological slaves or test subjects. Or for the intergalactic zoo.

If aliens saw E! coming from a planet . . .

[PeeAitchPee]

. . . they'd probably have to hold a lottery to determine who would get to push the button.

Oblig

[PPH]

In Soviet Russia, overlords welcome you!

(+1 mod point for a double meme reply)

Very Astute

[hackus]

If we are to believe that natural systems, such as the earth really are quite common, then "prey" and "predator" relationships must exist at all levels in the Universe.

So it is logical to assume that there are technologically advanced civilizations that prey on other civilizations for resources or food.

After all, we do it in our own backyard, so why can't other civilizations?

There is nothing in the rule book that I know of that says just because a civilization has conquered space travel must not be aggressive.

We continue to advance, yet we are still very warlike.

-Hack

Re:You can't protect yourself against the nonexist

[rumith]

The problem is, we don't want to have one iota of a chance that the aforementioned evidence arrives to us in the form of an interstellar bombardment.

Re:

[s20451]

So are you proposing that we should confiscate all private radio transmitters? This whole argument is kind of like the worries that particle accelerators will destroy the Earth, when high-energy cosmic rays bombard the Earth daily.

Re:You can't protect yourself against the nonexist

[Anonymous Coward]

There is not one iota of evidence that there exists one other intelligent form of life in the universe.

As sublimely demonstrated by the parents' post, there's certainly little evidence of intelligence on this world, why should we expect to find any elsewhere?

Re:You can't protect yourself against the nonexist

[jgarra23]

There is not one iota of evidence that there exists one other intelligent form of life in the universe. Go google for Fermi's paradox, I won't even give you the obligatory wikipedia link.


Fermi's paradox relies on too many assumptions to even be considered a valid argument. I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with you but let's at least use more quantifiable arguments than Fermi's tired assumption...

Re:

[trolltalk.com]

"As far as I'm aware it only relies on the conflict between two assumptions: first, that intelligent life is common in the universe; and second, that intelligent life would be interested in exploration and communication, as we are. Neither of these assumptions is controversial."

There are other assumptions that you've ignored, as did Fermi. Just off the top of my head, here's 5 large assumptions that are left out.

1. That intelligent life must arise only on high-iron-content planets (ever try making an elec

Re:

[Hatta]

Ah, there's another assumption, that a galactic civilization would use radio waves. Radio is pretty useless for communication on a galactic scale. It takes too long for a message to get across the galaxy, and the inverse square law means that any non-directional radio would need one hell of a powerful transmitter.

Re:You can't protect yourself against the nonexist

[domatic]

Absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence. I agree with you that we have no evidence of other intelligent life and that anything we say about other intelligence in the universe is pure speculation. What you haven't done is demonstrate "nonexistence" which the reference to Fermi's paradox doesn't do.

Re:

[2names]

Further, we have absolutely no contacts with any other civilization after millennia of recorded history...

That should read we have absolutely no PROVEN contacts...

There are many very old writings, pictures, tablets, etc. that could be interpreted as showing contact with alien races. Perhaps aliens did come here years ago and decided either a) we aren't worth keeping in touch with or 2) they would wait a few ages to see if we blow ourselves up. Who knows? I certainly would never profess to have any kn

Re:

[lgw]

The thing is, we haven't really looked. There are no blatantly obvious signs - no cities on Mars or the like, but that's all we can really say. Other than the Earth, the Moon, and Mars, there could be a great many alien artifacts scattered around the Solar System: we wouldn't know unless they were highly visible. We really haven't explored much.

Similary, we know that nearby stars aren't sending out radio signals directed at us. That doesn't tell us much at all. The galaxy is a big place, and we don't k

Re:

[insertwackynamehere]

I'm still waiting for the Mars Rover to find mysterious floating cubes and tablets depicting demons and humanoid creatures migrating to Earth amidst a mortal vs demon war millenia ago.

Re:

[sumdumass]

Theological? outside pointing to figures of religion that just don't exist in modern life, I don't know of any religion that actually think those were aliens not of this world in the context we are talking about.

As for a bolt, well, you know that would be almost impossible. Metal degrades over time because of exposure. Rust, corrosion and so on limits the life of a recognizable piece. And seriously think about this, if we cannot get away from earth isn't nuts and bolts sufficiently heavy enough to last cent

Dont kill the baby just cause it doesn't dance yet

[Bananatree3]

Astronomers first directly discovered an exosolar planet in 1995. Sure we've been listening for ET via radio for decades, but really do you you think just over a few decades we'd happen upon the right channel frequency at the right star system?

If we ever find ET directly, it would probably be in a few hundred years. Our radio technology is antiquated probably to whatever ET has used. They may not even use radio to communicate long distance. They may use laser pulses, or god knows. My point is, our technolog

Re:Dont kill the baby just cause it doesn't dance

[bkr1_2k]

Why do you make the assumption that we are behind other possible lifeforms technologically? What's to say that we aren't the most advanced in the universe? Maybe we're the ones expected to bombard other worlds with our technologies to teach them how to proceed. I know, ridiculously scary thought considering we can't even get our own shit straight, but why does everyone assume all the ETs are more advanced than we are?

Re:You can't protect yourself against the nonexist

[Stanislav_J]

There is not one iota of evidence that there exists one other intelligent form of life in the universe.

"Other?"

Easy proof other intelligent life forms exist ...

[trolltalk.com]

"There is not one iota of evidence that there exists one other intelligent form of life in the universe"

1. Whales
2. Dolphins
3. Porpoises
4. Dogs
5. Chimpanzees
6. Cats
7. Crows
8. Ravens
9. Apes
10. Rats

These are all intelligent life forms - they can learn, some of them make and use tools, and even know how to make their own home-made hooch.

Now if you had said "There is not one iota of evidence that there exists ANY intelligent form of life in Washington", you might have been more right.

Re:

[lgw]

That's a key point. Other intelligent life seems almost certian - the universe is a big place. But other intelligent life that is alive during the same few thousand years that we are would be a heck of a coincidence. And of course we lack even a single example of a technological race lasting more than a few thousand years.

Re:

[trolltalk.com]

"No proof (how could that ever be proven?) but lots of evidence... we haven't found any yet!"

And for most of mankinds' existence, there was no proof that oxygen existed. Or that atoms existed. Or bacteria. Or radio waves (we didn't "invent" them - Jupiter was emitting radio waves long before we existed) or X-rays, or gamma radiation, ...

There are other, more intelligent, ways to answer the question - the "we haven't found any yet!" isn't really all that good argument.

Re:

[Ajehals]

I can't help with the evidence of extra terrestrial life, but you will be glad to know that I can provide limited proof of black seagulls.

The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, at this point in time all we can conclusively say about the existence of other life in space is that we don't know (and might never know)one way or the other.

Re:

[Free_Meson]

What are the chances of finding another intelligent species?

Given enough time, approximately 100%.
The impending heat death of the universe may prevent us from having enough time, however.

Re:

[evanbd]

There may be other obstacles [gmu.edu] to us finding another civilization, you know. The heat death of the universe isn't the one I'd worry about.

Re:Perhaps they can't hear us any more than we can

[faedle]

Isn't Voyager I sending us signals from inside the termination shock?

The signals received by amateur radio operators in 2006 indicate that radio, at least at the frequencies Voyager is using, is capable of crossing the heliosphere.