The Arecibo message reply

[bemanos]

The Arecibo message :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message

the reply?:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbLYL7JIj8U

you think its possible ? its f@cking exciting if its real!

 

[Niocan]

We'll find out in the next few years I believe it's real.

 

[nasher168]

you think its possible ?

In short, no. If there was any credibility to it whatsoever, it would have been explosive news. We would have heard already. I can say with reasonable certainty that it's a hoax. I could go into a full dissection of it if you wish, but I'm going to bed now, so gute nacht.

No offence to you personally of course, but I'm almost absolutely certain you've been duped.

 

[Niocan]

In short, no. If there was any credibility to it whatsoever, it would have been explosive news. We would have heard already.

The by-product of attaching your reality check to the heard.

I can say with reasonable certainty that it's a hoax. I could go into a full dissection of it if you wish, but I'm going to bed now, so gute nacht. No offence to you personally of course, but I'm almost absolutely certain you've been duped.

Denial.

Let me guess, you're going to comment on the fact that the message was sent digitally but was responded to via a message in the crops? Let me counter this with the very real fact that there's been a cover-up of anything to do with aliens or the technology that goes with them; As such, it's natural to display your message in an open setting.

 

[MRaverz]

To be honest, if I received this message I'd regain it as junk.

 

[MRaverz]

In short, no. If there was any credibility to it whatsoever, it would have been explosive news. We would have heard already.

The by-product of attaching your reality check to the heard.

I can say with reasonable certainty that it's a hoax. I could go into a full dissection of it if you wish, but I'm going to bed now, so gute nacht. No offence to you personally of course, but I'm almost absolutely certain you've been duped.

Denial.

Let me guess, you're going to comment on the fact that the message was sent digitally but was responded to via a message in the crops? Let me counter this with the very real fact that there's been a cover-up of anything to do with aliens or the technology that goes with them; As such, it's natural to display your message in an open setting.

Rational, not denial. tbh

 

[Master_Ghost_Knight]

:facepalm:

 

[e2iPi]

We'll find out in the next few years I believe it's real.

Has there ever been anything that you didn't believe? (Other than rational explanations, of course.)

 

[nasher168]

Let me guess, you're going to comment on the fact that the message was sent digitally but was responded to via a message in the crops?

Not at all, I am well aware that it could be countered by something similar to what you said.
I am more referring to the fact that it is shown to have a body like a primate. That it would have a face at all is really pushing it, but looking like a human just with a large head? Think about it. Of all the possible different body structure it could have, the likelihood of it being so un-alien has to be pretty slim. Of course there is the slim possibility, but I disregard it as I disregard the possibility of the various gods' existence.
Then there is the top bit. Whilst the one we sent out represents counting from 1 to 10 in order to demonstrate intelligence, this one appears to be saying something totally different. I'll try and translate later it if you wish.
Finally, in an attempt to make it appear convincing, they have put the bit showing the population and height the wrong way round. As a result, they are saying there are 1764 of them, and that they are 4.3 billion mm tall.

 

[MRaverz]

Seems like a hoax to me, why would an alien civilization communicate through a method commonly associated with hoaxes.

Yet the farmer's comment at the end is pretty wise, if stretching facts to fit the conclusion he desires.

 

[5810Singer]

Let me guess, you're going to comment on the fact that the message was sent digitally but was responded to via a message in the crops?

Not at all, I am well aware that it could be countered by something similar to what you said.
I am more referring to the fact that it is shown to have a body like a primate. That it would have a face at all is really pushing it, but looking like a human just with a large head? Think about it. Of all the possible different body structure it could have, the likelihood of it being so un-alien has to be pretty slim.

Nasher you need to talk to some evolutionary biologists, and xeno-biologists about this.

TBH from their point of view finding anything really alien-looking is probably more unlikely than finding something familiar.

All the building blocks that create life will be roughly the same, all the forces that a putative lifeform will experience will be the roughly same, so there's no imperative to make putative lifeforms significantly weirder than anything we've discovered on earth.

BTW, look at the life on earth, some of it's reallly weird. IMO it's impossible for alien life to be any weirder than slime mold,....that stuff's freaky.

I can remember a xeno-biologist talking about what intelligent life might look like, and he described the way in which our physical structure affected our mental development, our ability to manipulate our environment, and the manner in which we perceive it.
He then pointed out that the physique of an alien lifeform would have to tick most of the same structural boxes as humanity in order to be viable for intelligent life.

If I remember the name of the xeno-biologist in question I'll PM it to you, he's a brilliant guy.

 

[borrofburi]

Nasher you need to talk to some evolutionary biologists, and xeno-biologists about this.

There are actual professional xeno-biologists who get paid by reputable places? Seems a bit premature to me if true.

All the building blocks that create life will be roughly the same, all the forces that a putative lifeform will experience will be the roughly same, so there's no imperative to make putative lifeforms significantly weirder than anything we've discovered on earth.

(1) All the building blocks to create life as we know it will be roughly the same, it is really quite simply foolish to presume that all life is organic in the way we know it; evolution only needs self replicating molecules, while that really only occurs on earth with organic ones, our planet as a certain pressure and temperature, change those things around and we don't have a great concept of what else might be self replicating. (2) We have discovered some extremely weird things on this earth, that primates happened to develop intelligence at the level we did is half coincidence (though we did have a few advantages in that respect); to find an intelligent species that's a primate (or at least has a primate body structure) is still highly unlikely.

He then pointed out that the physique of an alien lifeform would have to tick most of the same structural boxes as humanity in order to be viable for intelligent life.

So far as I recall, there are only a few: the ability to grasp things (to use tools), the ability to see things well (to use tools), and *maybe* existing on "land" and not under a "sea" (due to buoyancy). There are a LOT of body structures that could theoretically learn to use tools and thus develop our level of intelligence (e.g. elephants, cephalopods, primates, anything like those three but with different numbers of limbs or in different places).

 

[5810Singer]

@borrofburi

Good points, and well taken.

I'm arguing outside my discipline here, so I'll get back to you when I've tracked down some of the work by the guy I referred to earlier.

BTW, he's not some "fly-by-night" pseudo-scientist. In relation to xeno-biology I think the actual term used was "theoretical xeno-biologist", he's actually a botanist and evolutionary biologist (similar to RDawkins), and I believe he currently holds a professorship at Cambridge.

He's presented the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures at least once, so I might be able to track down some video of him talking on the subject.

 

[5810Singer]

Wow!

That was easier than I thought it would be, BTW my mistake, he's a paleontologist and biologist:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Conway_Morris

I think Prof Morris' view is discussed in his book "Life's Solution: Inevitable Humans in a Lonely Universe".
Here's a review of the book:

http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:jmuqaN3tIKwJalaeo-electronica.org/2004_1/books/life.pdf+Life%E2%80%99s+Solution:+Inevitable+Humans+in+a+Lonely+Universe&hl=en&gl=uk&sig=AHIEtbQWSncmR9tlEL_6a6xxLYWVoy0lgw

 

[Gnug215]

In short, no. If there was any credibility to it whatsoever, it would have been explosive news. We would have heard already.

The by-product of attaching your reality check to the heard.

I can say with reasonable certainty that it's a hoax. I could go into a full dissection of it if you wish, but I'm going to bed now, so gute nacht. No offence to you personally of course, but I'm almost absolutely certain you've been duped.

Denial.

Let me guess, you're going to comment on the fact that the message was sent digitally but was responded to via a message in the crops? Let me counter this with the very real fact that there's been a cover-up of anything to do with aliens or the technology that goes with them; As such, it's natural to display your message in an open setting.

Healthy skepticism (based on track record of events and on the lack of evidence) is denial?

Real cover up of alien technology? Where is the evidence for this very real cover up?

And so... these aliens, who must be hanging around, what with making crop circles frequently, want to display a message for everyone to see, supposedly to gain believers, using a method that circumvents the power that be who are always covering up their supposed other attempts to communicate, but choose as their method crop circles?
Considering how advanced their technology must be to even have been able to travel here in the first place, crop circles is the best they could come up with? How about, oh, say, showing up, visibly? Like, flying around for everyone to see? Especially the media and public at large? They could do a few flybys of all the planet's big cities, and I'm sure we'd have some "converts".

There are so many logical flaws in this, and the responses to the objections are so incredibly similar to "God moves in mysterious ways!" that it's eerie.

Having said that, it comes off as being downright arrogant and insulting that you just dismiss nasher's objections with "Denial."

It's funny how strange beliefs tend to come in packages.

 

[nasher168]

Nasher you need to talk to some evolutionary biologists, and xeno-biologists about this.

Granted, that was a rather weak argument of mine, but I feel the point still stands that it seems highly unlikely for the very first aliens we meet to just happen to be almost identical to primates. Of all the myriad imaginable (and unimaginable) possible forms for an alien species to take, that of a large-headed human implies nothing more than simply a hoax.

On another note, I've translated the numbers at the top and I have to retract what I said earlier. The numbers do make sense. They are counting down from ten like so: 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
HOWEVER, the hoaxers made quite a glaring mistake. The first and third numbers are actually backwards. If you try to read them properly, you get those two numbers making no sense at all. As such, the sequence actually reads: ? 9 8 ? 6 5 4 3 2 1 . Rather a big mistake for such an advanced civilisation that can cross interstellar space to reach us, wouldn't you say?


EDIT: I might as well add that the video is being deliberately misleading. At about 2 minutes, it goes down the two messages, comparing them to one another. The real message sent out by humans is actually displayed wrongly, with the back-to-front numbers put in there and the sequence going backwards instead of forwards. Obviously the intention is to make them seem more similar. Thankfully, the wikipedia article has a more accurate version displayed.

 

[PatrickTheScienceGuy]

yeah i think it is a hoax after all the star cluster is 25000 years away at 299792458 m/s

 

[MRaverz]

yeah i think it is a hoax after all the star cluster is 25000 years away at 299792458 m/s

Saying 'at the speed of light' is much easier. :lol:

 

[Doc.]

We'll find out in the next few years I believe it's real.

Has there ever been anything that you didn't believe?

:lol:

 

[australopithecus]

Let me guess, you're going to comment on the fact that the message was sent digitally but was responded to via a message in the crops?

Well it is a valid point regardless of your derision.