3 ms·

Only if you hit the transmit button.

by bkeyes 9mo ago

CamperBob2 9mo ago
And that's why they won't find anything, IMHO. Anyone who spends five minutes thinking about the consequences of deliberately transmitting interstellar beacon signals will conclude that the only safe, sane thing to do is STFU. At the same time, no advanced civilizations will be using coherent RF communications that stand out from the noise floor, because it makes little sense to keep doing that once your civilization understands information theory. Still, SETI was an undeniably cool thing to try, and I'm glad they did. Lots of other cooperative-computing tasks grew out of the same idea as the article mentions.
- pavel_lishin 9mo ago
  Anyone who spends five minutes thinking about the consequences of deliberately leaving your house will conclude that the only safe, sane thing to do is stay the fuck inside.
  - traviswingo 9mo ago
    This reads like a Douglas Adams quote
  - dylan604 9mo ago
    We tried that in 2020. It didn't really work out that well as most people were physically unable to stay the fuck inside.
    - Sabinus 9mo ago
      Beyond ability to follow government direction, the amount of genuinely damaging social isolation experienced by many people during COVID indicates we shouldn't be doing it without good reason. People need people, in proximity, at length. We're a social species.
  - bulbar 9mo ago
    Having it safe to go outside is the very point of a society. Outside of this safety Bubble there's a strong tendency for conflict and war. Only after two cruel world wars and a prolonged cold war, the western world got their shit together and decided 'enough of that'. And even that doesn't seem to hold much longer, so it seems we will only have managed to live peaceful among each other without an immediate conflict with somebody (cold war) for roughly 30 years. If aliens are remotely like us, they shouldn't know about us.
    - TheFuzzball 9mo ago
      We're like a paranoid child terrified that anyone that enters our room is going to steal our Lego, so we must be left alone! Nobody wants our Lego.
      - subscribed 9mo ago
        You know, if aliens are like Americans and we have oil.... I'm only half-joking.
        TheFuzzball 9mo ago
        But this is my point — it would take hundreds, or even thousands of years for aliens to get here. To do that they'd need some sort of abundant fuel source. Let's say they have had thousands of years of Nuclear Fusion, for example, it wouldn't surprise me if they could produce any elements they need by fusing hydrogen. But let's say they didn't, and they do in fact see Earth as a rare jewel full of precious materials... the logistics of taking our natural resources just seems like a joke. Surely the juice isn't worth the hundreds of years of planning and logistics squeeze. I used to buy this dark forest idea, because it's scary and exciting, but I think the biggest mistake is projecting our behaviours onto extra-terrestrials. If they wanted to destroy Earth they'd just slightly nudge a big asteroid in our direction and be done with it. / sorry for the ADHD rant
  - CamperBob2 9mo ago
    Heck, no. We need to go invade the systems that broadcast their presence. Where there's biology, there's probably oil!
- abtinf 9mo ago
  Why not just credit the dark forest for this idea?
  - detritus 9mo ago
    Perhaps because the concept's been knocking around for decades before it was published?
  - CamperBob2 9mo ago
    The idea wasn't Cixin's. E.g., https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alan-Penny/publication/235358985_The_SETI_Episode_in_the_1967_Discovery_of_Pulsars/links/00b7d536a2475d414d000000/The-SETI-Episode-in-the-1967-Discovery-of-Pulsars.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alan-Penny/publication/... refers to speculation as early as 1967 that it might not be a good idea to answer that particular phone. Here's a later article from 2010: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0094576510000779 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00945...
- zardo 9mo ago
  > Anyone who spends five minutes thinking about the consequences of deliberately transmitting interstellar beacon signals will conclude that the only safe, sane thing to do is STFU. Even if we credit the idea that it's unsafe to transmit, there are reasons to do it anyway, e.g. you have a holy text and a mission to share it with the universe.
  - CamperBob2 9mo ago
    Even if we credit the idea that it's unsafe to transmit, there are reasons to do it anyway, e.g. you have a holy text and a mission to share it with the universe. Sounds like a great sci-fi premise. "Hey, there aren't enough knock-down, drag-out religious wars on Earth. Let's start beef with the nuclear-armed, FTL-capable sky wizard cult on Epsilon Eridani 4."

Only if you hit the transmit button.

by bkeyes 9mo ago

Only if you hit the transmit button.

And that's why they won't find anything, IMHO. Anyone who spends five minutes thinking about the consequences of deliberately transmitting interstellar beacon signals will conclude that the only safe, sane thing to do is STFU. At the same time, no advanced civilizations will be using coherent RF communications that stand out from the noise floor, because it makes little sense to keep doing that once your civilization understands information theory. Still, SETI was an undeniably cool thing to try, and I'm glad they did. Lots of other cooperative-computing tasks grew out of the same idea as the article mentions.

pavel_lishin 9mo ago
Anyone who spends five minutes thinking about the consequences of deliberately leaving your house will conclude that the only safe, sane thing to do is stay the fuck inside.
- traviswingo 9mo ago
  This reads like a Douglas Adams quote
- dylan604 9mo ago
  We tried that in 2020. It didn't really work out that well as most people were physically unable to stay the fuck inside.
  - Sabinus 9mo ago
    Beyond ability to follow government direction, the amount of genuinely damaging social isolation experienced by many people during COVID indicates we shouldn't be doing it without good reason. People need people, in proximity, at length. We're a social species.
- bulbar 9mo ago
  Having it safe to go outside is the very point of a society. Outside of this safety Bubble there's a strong tendency for conflict and war. Only after two cruel world wars and a prolonged cold war, the western world got their shit together and decided 'enough of that'. And even that doesn't seem to hold much longer, so it seems we will only have managed to live peaceful among each other without an immediate conflict with somebody (cold war) for roughly 30 years. If aliens are remotely like us, they shouldn't know about us.
  - TheFuzzball 9mo ago
    We're like a paranoid child terrified that anyone that enters our room is going to steal our Lego, so we must be left alone! Nobody wants our Lego.
    - subscribed 9mo ago
      You know, if aliens are like Americans and we have oil.... I'm only half-joking.
      - TheFuzzball 9mo ago
        But this is my point — it would take hundreds, or even thousands of years for aliens to get here. To do that they'd need some sort of abundant fuel source. Let's say they have had thousands of years of Nuclear Fusion, for example, it wouldn't surprise me if they could produce any elements they need by fusing hydrogen. But let's say they didn't, and they do in fact see Earth as a rare jewel full of precious materials... the logistics of taking our natural resources just seems like a joke. Surely the juice isn't worth the hundreds of years of planning and logistics squeeze. I used to buy this dark forest idea, because it's scary and exciting, but I think the biggest mistake is projecting our behaviours onto extra-terrestrials. If they wanted to destroy Earth they'd just slightly nudge a big asteroid in our direction and be done with it. / sorry for the ADHD rant
- CamperBob2 9mo ago
  Heck, no. We need to go invade the systems that broadcast their presence. Where there's biology, there's probably oil!
abtinf 9mo ago
Why not just credit the dark forest for this idea?
- detritus 9mo ago
  Perhaps because the concept's been knocking around for decades before it was published?
- CamperBob2 9mo ago
  The idea wasn't Cixin's. E.g., https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alan-Penny/publication/235358985_The_SETI_Episode_in_the_1967_Discovery_of_Pulsars/links/00b7d536a2475d414d000000/The-SETI-Episode-in-the-1967-Discovery-of-Pulsars.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alan-Penny/publication/... refers to speculation as early as 1967 that it might not be a good idea to answer that particular phone. Here's a later article from 2010: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0094576510000779 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00945...
zardo 9mo ago
> Anyone who spends five minutes thinking about the consequences of deliberately transmitting interstellar beacon signals will conclude that the only safe, sane thing to do is STFU. Even if we credit the idea that it's unsafe to transmit, there are reasons to do it anyway, e.g. you have a holy text and a mission to share it with the universe.
- CamperBob2 9mo ago
  Even if we credit the idea that it's unsafe to transmit, there are reasons to do it anyway, e.g. you have a holy text and a mission to share it with the universe. Sounds like a great sci-fi premise. "Hey, there aren't enough knock-down, drag-out religious wars on Earth. Let's start beef with the nuclear-armed, FTL-capable sky wizard cult on Epsilon Eridani 4."