#1 Life Outside Earth / Space Aliens Thread

[Ray Allan]

Originally Posted by Crowe

Anything out there smarter than humans is probably using something like this, Ray. Or something inconceivable.

https://phys.org/news/2020-06-techni...e-phonons.html



I don't see any wisdom in seeking out other species, and I agree with Stephen Hawking that we should keep our heads low, and not make ourselves "interesting". We got too many fucking problems of our own to sort out. I certainly wouldn't trust (((current powers))) to faithfully negotiate with visitors.

That is entirely possible any aliens out there are using something like this, or some faster-than-light communications, like Star Trek's "subspace radio." I've speculated for decades about exactly this. For humans with our present level of technology, trying to detect something like this would be like Benjamin Franklin with his kite and lightning experiment in the 18th century trying to build a working radio transmitter and receiver with his level of scientific knowledge--it's just not possible. Also, ETs could be well aware of our existence and have been for a very long time, but may have some kind of "Prime Directive" of non-interference with primitive species--some scientists call this the Zoo Hypothesis. Which probably is a good idea at the moment given the state of (((current powers))) on this planet. Nonetheless, I still hope I live long enough to see some sort of concrete evidence of intelligent life elsewhere in space.

[Ray Allan]

IMO, any directed alien message would be so fricking obvious we would not need to debate it. If aliens have built multi GW transmitters to broadcast to the other civs, they are not going to waste it with cryptic messages.

Any accidental emission of RF would be likely to be low power and therefore only detectable at very close range, and indistinguishable from noise.

An advanced civ would probably not use RF anyway, I think the only reason we are looking for RF is because that is about all we can do with our current level of tech. The chances are that another civ is either millions of years behind, in which case there are no signals to detect, or millions of years ahead, in which case their presence would be obvious - if they want it to be.

https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/in...156#msg2173156

[Ray Allan]

New telescope to look for laser pulses from life around other planets

https://news.berkeley.edu/story_jump...other-planets/

[Ray Allan]

Originally Posted by Ray Allan

Sun-like Star Identified As the Potential Source of the Wow! Signal

https://www.discovermagazine.com/the...the-wow-signal

I hope astronomers can use the upcoming James Webb Space Telescope or similar instrument to search this star, called 2MASS19281982-2640123 (long name, can we just call it the 'Wow! Star' or something?) for any exoplanets that might be orbiting it? It would certainly be interesting if an Earth-sized planet was discovered orbiting in this star's habitable zone, too.