Other than radio (or EM), what sort of communication medium would be ideal to reach prospective new planets? I’m thinking those that are doing the calling, will send out the message formatted in all sorts of signals, from radio to microwave to laser light, to something else we haven’t thought of yet, or even discovered. But, you have to keep the denominator as low as possible, when fishing for new contacts.
The questionI would have, which is really my original question, is even if we knew a specific planet to focus on, would we be able to pick up any artificial transmission? It seems like it would need an unimaginably huge power source.
And getting back to the other part of my question, it seems like the whole idea of aliens picking up our signals is a lot of bunk, unless they happen to be within a lightyear or two. Which is what bothered me in the first place.
It’s kind of disturbing really. It seems like astronomers have been feeding me a load of crap for as long as I can remember. First thing tommorow, I’m firing all my astronomers.
A huge power source, or equally huge or sensitive antenna.
Overall, the chances aren’t very good. At all. For all intents and purposes, we can really only focus on our own stellar neighborhood. The possibility of advanced intelligent life being within a 20 light-year radius is very, very small. Also, the round-trip time for messages will take dozens of years, if not decades. Even if these beings are really out there, and even if they are actively trying to reach us, establishing first contact will be tremendously difficult. They’d have to be very certain we were here to begin with, and would have to use technology we could decipher to even pick them up, or else we could completely miss their call. Also, chances are they’re the more advanced species, and have tried to call us a million years ago. When we didn’t pick up, they moved on (and evolved). And if they’re not more advanced, then chances are they’re still monkeying around in their trees, banging rocks together.
On the other side, establishing communication with an extra terrestrial intelligence would be the single most important thing to happen to our species since we slid out of the primordial ooze. Let’s hope they aren’t hostile.
Q.E.D., you do know that was more of a proof of concept test rather than an actual attempt at contact? We’re not exactly expecting any R.S.V.P.s on that one.
In practice? We havn’t done it. And there’s FAR more stars than we even have time to look at to see if they’re potential to even do anything more than a rough shot in the dark. Even if only 1 in however many hundred are potential for a zone that might have life as we know it we’re still sleep walking blindfolded drunk with a squirt gun trying to kill a crook in a bank ten miles away (I’m proud of that metaphor).
There’s always the possibility that the’ve built super massive uber crazy telescopes zapping their “HEY! I’M HERE!” message in as many directions at once… But then again… When I move into a new town I don’t knock on a door 20 blocks away to see if there’s anyone home or if the house is vacant if I know there are people in town. Really, it comes down to why would they even if they could? We’re probably below what they’d give a damn about unless they’re feeling super kind to the kid who eats paint chips… or, on a mental scale for them, the worm that they walk past on the street.
How could I not know that? The article I linked to says as much.
Yeah, but unlike some people, :rolleyes: you actually read the articles. 
Reminds me of a story…
This elderly, wealthy property owner was telling her gardener to plant some oak seedlings so her family could enjoy a yard with large, spreading shade trees. Her gardener said, “But oaks grow very slowly, and it’ll take a very long time before they mature.”
She replied, “Then we have no time to waste. Start planting today!”
Supposedly, the EM pulse from a nuke could be detected from fairly far off. If you set off a bunch in a specially timed manner, you could send information. The bandwidth would be a little on the low side.
I know, I read it as well, but if you were to read it as a link in context with your post people would think that it was not and that we were beaming HELLO every which way with the direct intention of getting a return message.
And I thought text messaging was expensive
Astronomers are attempting to resolve extra-solar planets (that they suspect are there due to the wobble they induce in their own sun-stars), but they seem to have trouble seperating out the planet out of the “background glare” of the star they orbit.
Wouldn’t nuke explosions (either on the ground, or in orbit) suffer from the same problems?
Planets are hard to pick out in the same frequencies of light that their stars emit. But nukes emit at pretty much all frequencies, including many which aren’t naturally produced in any significant amount by stars.
All joking aside… . Okay I got nothing in that case.
But continuing in the same vein as my previous post. Any advanced enough tech civilization seriously considering doing this could set up their “broadcast station” a bit away from the local star. Maybe a light-month would be enough?
But focusing the beam would be a problem. Perhaps a nice size iron-nickel asteroid on one side.
Anyhoo, I was thinking from Earth’s perspective. IIRC there have been SF stories based on the premise that faroff space travellers detect the EM signatures of nukes on Earth and pay a visit to deal with Earthlings now that we were advanced enough to become a concern.
I remember reading a science fiction novel that had humanity using a large laser pushing a multigenerational ship to a nearby star.
Unknown to humanity, that star already had inhabitants. They noticed the color (green colored, if I recall correctly) change in our sun’s output, from their point of view. They had a while to tried to figure out what the color shift meant…
They didn’t have the technology (at first) to know that a ship was on the way to them.