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TIL 50yrs ago the Arecibo Message was sent into space to communicate
human existence to potential extraterrestrial life.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message
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|u/snoogans235 - 10 hours
|
|> 74. It was meant as a demonstration of human technological
|achievement, rather than a real attempt to enter into a conversation
|with extraterrestrials.  Y’all it’s the second sentence. This was a
|“check out this cool graphic we can broadcast”.


  |u/Esc777 - 10 hours
  |
  |Yeah it’s more of a math toy than anything else. 


    |u/snoogans235 - 10 hours
    |
    |You read the bit about the prime components?  Definitely a fun math
    |toy.


      |u/lo_fi_ho - 5 hours
      |
      |Can it be used as a sex toy too?


        |u/MonkeysOnMyBottom - 2 hours
        |
        |anything is a sex toy if you're bad enough at math


|u/silly_walks_ - 11 hours
|
|We are bugs.


  |u/pm_me_old_maps - 3 hours
  |
  |why?


    |u/Much-Mud9615 - 3 hours
    |
    |Three body problem reference, the aliens in that book get off on
    |calling humanity bugs cause they're projecting as they literally are
    |bugs.


|u/jointheredditarmy - 10 hours
|
|Back in our innocence before the dark forest theory.


|u/almo2001 - 8 hours
|
|That was a bad move. If they are out there and can get here, I'm pretty
|sure we don't want them to know about us yet.


  |u/chumble182 - 3 hours
  |
  |I'd argue that if they are out there and can get here, they almost
  |certainly know about us regardless of what we send out. If we can
  |detect planets potentially suitable for bearing life at our current
  |development rate, what makes you think another civilisation that could
  |feasibly check *in person* couldn't?


|u/BolivianDancer - 12 hours
|
|It's seems a terrible idea.  Complex life is improbable. Complex life
|that may respond makes our continued existence even more improbable.
|Best case scenario is the message wasted electricity.


  |u/kamensenshi - 11 hours
  |
  |Right.    Would be interesting to get a message back that just somehow
  |said "Your advertisement worked.".


    |u/GraciaEtScientia - 11 hours
    |
    |"We've been trying to reach you about your planet's extended
    |warranty."


    |u/thisisredlitre - 9 hours
    |
    |"Be sure to drink your Ovaltine"


  |u/Kiyan1159 - 7 hours
  |
  |Worst case, we get an answer.   "Be quiet, or they'll hear you."


    |u/TheProfessionalEjit - 7 hours
    |
    |I read that short story too. [For other's reference](https://www.red
    |dit.com/r/nosleep/comments/2j3nxz/radio_silence/).


  |u/gza_liquidswords - 10 hours
  |
  |"Best case scenario is the message wasted electricity."  Yes
  |definitely a prime example of not thinking things through to their
  |logical conclusion.


    |u/Kiyan1159 - 7 hours
    |
    |Definitely a lackluster display of multi ordered thinking


  |u/jus4in027 - 9 hours
  |
  |Hopefully they’ll never understand the message or its origin


|u/eyeronik1 - 11 hours
|
|Why oh why?


  |u/Ionazano - 11 hours
  |
  |Tremendous optimism about intelligent extraterrestrial life in our
  |galaxy, based on assumptions and conjecture. People in favour of
  |actively trying to contact extraterrestrials often use the supporting
  |argument "If we manage to contact extraterrestrials and they're at our
  |technological level, then they can't travel to us yet and couldn't
  |pose any harm. But if they are much more technologically advanced than
  |us, then surely their morals must also be more advanced and must
  |therefore be benevolent."


  |u/choco_mallows - 9 hours
  |
  |The argument of a Dark Forest is not prevalent back then. It was borne
  |on paranoid societies and is why a Chinese author thought about it.
  |Reading the novel you can see how deeply tied the fear was to the Red
  |State at the time on how other than the self, no one can be trusted.
  |Fifty years ago people in a Capitalist system were more optimistic
  |about reaching out to extraterrestrials. We were confident that even
  |though some may do as harm, the fight would always be humans against
  |the aliens. The idea that some transhumanist groups will work against
  |humanity was unimaginable.


    |u/lepus_fatalis - 4 hours
    |
    |If you think about this, it could also be out of desperation - the
    |nuclear war was thought as imminent, with unrecoverable
    |consequences, the cold war was raging. I think the mentality behind
    |it was "it can t get any worse than this" - an alien response would
    |have fostered unity against a common threat, if malign or would have
    |ushered us into space age properly, if benevolent. (And in so,
    |ending the one-planet issue)  Sure they could come in and destroy
    |us, but that was almost a given we d do it ourselves.   People who
    |havent lived those times can't comprehend the constant possibility
    |of nuclear holocaust that we had to.live in. I think if we had
    |current day s social media and fake news services, we probably would
    |have had a nuclear war somewhere mid 80s simply by people pressure
    |:)


  |u/Bokbreath - 11 hours
  |
  |Because the dumb fucks in charge thought it impossible for aliens to
  |be technically advanced and antagonistic - and bet the entire planet
  |on that premise.


    |u/DaGoodSauce - 11 hours
    |
    |Luckily we have at least 50k years to level the playing field in
    |case something hears it and decides to pop by for a visit. If we're
    |still around in 50k years we will be thing lurking in the dark
    |forest. I wouldn't worry too much about it.


      |u/Bokbreath - 10 hours
      |
      |Oh I don't worry. There is most likely nothing out there. It's the
      |stupidity of thinking there is, and deciding to start yelling
      |'here we are' that gets me.


        |u/Ionazano - 8 hours
        |
        |There's an organization called [Messaging Extraterrestrial
        |Intelligence
        |International](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/METI_International)
        |that purposely sent out messages intended for extraterrestrials
        |much more recently.


      |u/MolybdenumIsMoney - 8 hours
      |
      |The signal won't get that far- it has probably already dissipated
      |beneath the level of detectability by now.


    |u/Esc777 - 10 hours
    |
    |You think this message is the only electromagnetic radiation we’ve
    |shot out into space?  If people are afraid of aliens discovering us
    |it’s too late and impossible. This message doesn’t add to that. 


      |u/Bokbreath - 10 hours
      |
      |It's the only one (apart from voyager) that doesn't require
      |triangulation to figure out where we are.


    |u/Merlins_Bread - 11 hours
    |
    |We can presume that any respondents would have similar dumb fucks
    |among their numbers. So maybe it will work out okay.


      |u/Bokbreath - 11 hours
      |
      |We can't presume anything.


        |u/eyeronik1 - 11 hours
        |
        |We can hope…


          |u/Bokbreath - 10 hours
          |
          |Yes we can hope. A wonderful basis for planetary survival.


|u/ClassicManLA - 11 hours
|
|According to the Why Files a message came back. I can't say I believe
|it, but it's fun and interesting.   About 10 min mark.
|https://youtu.be/x2BQyZorSQc?si=zBHrkLCCJFpuC7x3


  |u/ycr007 - 10 hours
  |
  |There was also the Arecibo Answer crop circle, which appeared in a
  |farmland next to the Chilbolton radio telescope in Hampshire, UK, on
  |19 August 2001.  It was rebuffed as a Hoax
  |https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Arecibo_answer


    |u/Black_Label_36 - 7 hours
    |
    |If we take all assumptions aside, I don't see this leaning towards
    |either side of hoax or real.   For starters, we've never really been
    |able to replicate complex crop circles with the exact same details
    |and accuracy.   They can call it a hoax officially, but I'm still
    |not convinced. It needs strong evidence for me to make up my mind
    |and right now I don't think we have it.


|u/Leicester68 - 9 hours
|
|Can we send a second message? "Never mind."


  |u/Black_Label_36 - 7 hours
  |
  |Lol "sorry, butt dial"


  |u/MonkeysOnMyBottom - 2 hours
  |
  |If we just send a bunch of unsolicited dick picks and they'll block
  |our number.


|u/ChicagoAuPair - 6 hours
|
|Arecibo was so fucking cool.


|u/gordonjames62 - 2 hours
|
|the weird part to me is that our message gas traveled 50 light years.
|this is still a weak voice in a small, local,  area


|u/sdorph - 3 hours
|
|I wonder if they got the idea from James E Gunn's novel The listeners,
|in the novel aliens send us a message in a similar format.