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One thing that I think always confuses me about any science fiction work that deals with Humans meeting Aliens for the first time is that it seems to assume it'

One thing that I think always confuses me about any science fiction work that deals with Humans meeting Aliens for the first time is that it seems to assume it's all on us to figure out a common language. I have to admit, my assumption if that if some species is sufficiently advanced to figure out interstellar travel they'd likely be able to decypher our language and find a way for us to communicate.

shas3 10y ago
The story sorts this out. Absent an interpreter, you necessarily need to be able to talk to someone who knows the other language so that you can query them, etc. Realistically, there's no way to intercept or interpret communications as the protocols are almost impossible to figure out (that is another layer of 'language'). Let say an alien intercepts a TV signal, can they convert it back to video? It is almost impossible that they will be able to infer the entire set of protocols: signal -> video, aligning video, etc. Especially given that aliens may be so different from us that their technologies may have developed in an orthogonal direction to our own.
- petters 10y ago
  I and I think many others would disagree that it would be almost impossible to decode a TV signal.
  - eric_the_read 10y ago
    This is what drives me nuts about Star Trek shows where they encounter completely new aliens and they all seem to have compatible video-chat protocols.
  - shas3 10y ago
    I think you forget that you have to completely set aside human assumptions. How will the aliens even know they are looking at signals encoding video and audio? Do aliens have technology and knowhow in the RF regime? Will they even be able to receive, store, or analyze the TV waveforms? Do they have the notion of amplitude and frequency modulation? Also, how will they know that the signal encodes video? Absent ground truth, low entropy (or equivalent measures like bigrams, Markov models, etc.) is the only way one can determine that a sequence is a language. Even if they are able to convert the RF signal to some low-entropy sequence of symbols, there is a very real possibility of them going off on a tangent: mapping the information to a completely different language. A real world example is the symbols of Indus valley civilization. Several decades into the information age, and about a century since the seals were discovered, researchers haven't even conclusively established that the symbols encode a language.
- bcherny 10y ago
  If I recall, this was a core idea in Godel Escher Bach. Is meaning inherent to information, or do you always need a compatible interpreter (eg. a human mind)? Messages don't exist by themselves, but are layered. Eg. To understand that a radio signal is a video I need to also understand video protocols, RF communication, etc.
  - s_kilk 10y ago
    [I have my copy of GEB beside me] In GEB, Hofstadter talks about the Three Layers of Any Message: 1 - The Frame Message 2 - The Outer Message 3 - The Inner Message He uses the example of a "message in a bottle" washed up on the beach. The "Frame" is the recognition that the bottle is sealed and contains a dry piece of paper. The "Outer Message" would be the fact that the writing on the paper is in French, and the "Inner Message" would be the actual contents of the French writing. At each stage, the reader needs to have some set of concepts or language with which to grapple with the nested messages, if they have any hope of finally decoding the Inner Message. For example, a wild boar wouldn't recognise the Frame Message in the first place, while a German person might recognise the Frame Message, and recognise the Outer Message ("This text is definitely French"), but be stymied by an in-ability to actually read French.
artimaeis 10y ago
By your comment it seems like you didn't watch Arrival. Maybe I'm misinterpreting that, if so please ignore. The whole point of Arrival was that we had to learn the alien language. The purpose of their arrival was to teach us their language so we could help them in the future. Had the purpose of the aliens been to spread the knowledge of their culture then it may have made sense for them to analyze and learn our language, but since that wasn't their goal it wouldn't have made much sense.
- stickfigure 10y ago
  I think the OP's point still stands. If aliens are traveling the universe teaching their language, you'd think they would have developed a curriculum, no? In pretty much every alien encounter movie it's the humans working out a plan for communication from scratch. You'd think the aliens would put a little more effort into it, especially if they've been spacefaring for years. And if they haven't, wouldn't they be a lot more curious about us? I would love to see a cinematization of Robert Forward's Dragon's Egg, which I think gets this right.
  - bane 10y ago
    The best part of the story is that the Aliens already know that humans will learn their language. There's no need to try to optimize when they already know the outcome and that outcome is the one they desire.
- remarkEon 10y ago
  No no I've seen it (twice...second time was even better). I'm merely noting that it's, imo, likely that the aliens would have the ability to decipher our language and communicate with us. Should they choose not to, then they must have a reason, which like you noted was the point of the story in Arrival.
jinfiesto 10y ago
The movie addresses this. Since the entire point of the heptapods visit is to force humans to learn their language, it makes sense that they would force humanity to "work it out."
- Jare 10y ago
  Why would it make sense? There's nothing supporting the idea that if we "work it out" we will understand better, faster, or some other kind of -er. It's certainly an easy way out, but I at least find it unsatisfying.
  - jinfiesto 10y ago
    That's a fair criticism, though I would assume that since the heptapods can see the future, there's some rationale for specifically wanting "Louise" to learn the language first instead of just distributing a copy of "Heptapod for dummies."
    - Jare 10y ago
      Yeah I tried to go that route but acting upon knowledge of the future is a narrative slippery slope. It's valid for a story setup I think, but not for explaining details. The movie acts like memories of the future are not fully under one's control and, with that imperfect knowledge, you can't expect humans or aliens to make perfect plans or optimal choices. But when memories come right when needed to solve situations like Chang's ultimatum, well, no more suspension of disbelief for me.
      - jinfiesto 10y ago
        I got the sense that the memories of the future being beyond Louise's control was due to her novice level command of heptapod. The heptapods seem to know events 3000 years in advance, so it seems they can plan well. Also, they seemed undisturbed by Abbot's death which leads me to believe they were also aware that would happen. Which is also something interesting to consider. Death is probably less bothersome if your perception of time is non-linear.
wmeredith 10y ago
Contact is a nice break from this, if you're so inclined. [Spoiler alert] The "aliens" speak perfect english and go so far as to present themselves as a human form in an Earth-like environment so as to keep our little human brains from exploding.
- remarkEon 10y ago
  Love Contact. In some ways, it's also a really interesting commentary on religion in modern life.

shas3 10y ago

The story sorts this out. Absent an interpreter, you necessarily need to be able to talk to someone who knows the other language so that you can query them, etc. Realistically, there's no way to intercept or interpret communications as the protocols are almost impossible to figure out (that is another layer of 'language'). Let say an alien intercepts a TV signal, can they convert it back to video? It is almost impossible that they will be able to infer the entire set of protocols: signal -> video, aligning video, etc. Especially given that aliens may be so different from us that their technologies may have developed in an orthogonal direction to our own.

petters 10y ago
I and I think many others would disagree that it would be almost impossible to decode a TV signal.
- eric_the_read 10y ago
  This is what drives me nuts about Star Trek shows where they encounter completely new aliens and they all seem to have compatible video-chat protocols.
- shas3 10y ago
  I think you forget that you have to completely set aside human assumptions. How will the aliens even know they are looking at signals encoding video and audio? Do aliens have technology and knowhow in the RF regime? Will they even be able to receive, store, or analyze the TV waveforms? Do they have the notion of amplitude and frequency modulation? Also, how will they know that the signal encodes video? Absent ground truth, low entropy (or equivalent measures like bigrams, Markov models, etc.) is the only way one can determine that a sequence is a language. Even if they are able to convert the RF signal to some low-entropy sequence of symbols, there is a very real possibility of them going off on a tangent: mapping the information to a completely different language. A real world example is the symbols of Indus valley civilization. Several decades into the information age, and about a century since the seals were discovered, researchers haven't even conclusively established that the symbols encode a language.
bcherny 10y ago
If I recall, this was a core idea in Godel Escher Bach. Is meaning inherent to information, or do you always need a compatible interpreter (eg. a human mind)? Messages don't exist by themselves, but are layered. Eg. To understand that a radio signal is a video I need to also understand video protocols, RF communication, etc.
- s_kilk 10y ago
  [I have my copy of GEB beside me] In GEB, Hofstadter talks about the Three Layers of Any Message: 1 - The Frame Message 2 - The Outer Message 3 - The Inner Message He uses the example of a "message in a bottle" washed up on the beach. The "Frame" is the recognition that the bottle is sealed and contains a dry piece of paper. The "Outer Message" would be the fact that the writing on the paper is in French, and the "Inner Message" would be the actual contents of the French writing. At each stage, the reader needs to have some set of concepts or language with which to grapple with the nested messages, if they have any hope of finally decoding the Inner Message. For example, a wild boar wouldn't recognise the Frame Message in the first place, while a German person might recognise the Frame Message, and recognise the Outer Message ("This text is definitely French"), but be stymied by an in-ability to actually read French.

artimaeis 10y ago

By your comment it seems like you didn't watch Arrival. Maybe I'm misinterpreting that, if so please ignore. The whole point of Arrival was that we had to learn the alien language. The purpose of their arrival was to teach us their language so we could help them in the future. Had the purpose of the aliens been to spread the knowledge of their culture then it may have made sense for them to analyze and learn our language, but since that wasn't their goal it wouldn't have made much sense.

stickfigure 10y ago
I think the OP's point still stands. If aliens are traveling the universe teaching their language, you'd think they would have developed a curriculum, no? In pretty much every alien encounter movie it's the humans working out a plan for communication from scratch. You'd think the aliens would put a little more effort into it, especially if they've been spacefaring for years. And if they haven't, wouldn't they be a lot more curious about us? I would love to see a cinematization of Robert Forward's Dragon's Egg, which I think gets this right.
- bane 10y ago
  The best part of the story is that the Aliens already know that humans will learn their language. There's no need to try to optimize when they already know the outcome and that outcome is the one they desire.
remarkEon 10y ago
No no I've seen it (twice...second time was even better). I'm merely noting that it's, imo, likely that the aliens would have the ability to decipher our language and communicate with us. Should they choose not to, then they must have a reason, which like you noted was the point of the story in Arrival.

jinfiesto 10y ago

The movie addresses this. Since the entire point of the heptapods visit is to force humans to learn their language, it makes sense that they would force humanity to "work it out."

Jare 10y ago
Why would it make sense? There's nothing supporting the idea that if we "work it out" we will understand better, faster, or some other kind of -er. It's certainly an easy way out, but I at least find it unsatisfying.
- jinfiesto 10y ago
  That's a fair criticism, though I would assume that since the heptapods can see the future, there's some rationale for specifically wanting "Louise" to learn the language first instead of just distributing a copy of "Heptapod for dummies."
  - Jare 10y ago
    Yeah I tried to go that route but acting upon knowledge of the future is a narrative slippery slope. It's valid for a story setup I think, but not for explaining details. The movie acts like memories of the future are not fully under one's control and, with that imperfect knowledge, you can't expect humans or aliens to make perfect plans or optimal choices. But when memories come right when needed to solve situations like Chang's ultimatum, well, no more suspension of disbelief for me.
    - jinfiesto 10y ago
      I got the sense that the memories of the future being beyond Louise's control was due to her novice level command of heptapod. The heptapods seem to know events 3000 years in advance, so it seems they can plan well. Also, they seemed undisturbed by Abbot's death which leads me to believe they were also aware that would happen. Which is also something interesting to consider. Death is probably less bothersome if your perception of time is non-linear.

wmeredith 10y ago

Contact is a nice break from this, if you're so inclined. [Spoiler alert] The "aliens" speak perfect english and go so far as to present themselves as a human form in an Earth-like environment so as to keep our little human brains from exploding.

remarkEon 10y ago
Love Contact. In some ways, it's also a really interesting commentary on religion in modern life.