Scientists plan to send a second letter to aliens? Hawking once warned: Don’t answer

There is a piece of news released recently that may cause some people to madly complain, because scientists are preparing to send signals to the target space to indicate our coordinates and related information, and to say hello to possible aliens. .

The best time to launch this set of information is October 4, 2022. At this time, the earth’s night is facing the direction of the galactic center, and the target selected by the scientists is concentric 13,000 light-years away from the galactic center. ring. This will be the second letter sent by humans to aliens, and the first letter was sent by the Arecibo radio telescope in 1974.

The information sent this time is based on the first binary information. Scientists have re-encoded and improved it. It is more advanced than the past, with a larger and more detailed information.

Astronomers hope that to send this crucial letter, they can use the world's largest and most advanced radio telescope - the "China Sky Eye" located in Guizhou and the SETI located in northern California, USA. Allen Telescope Array to perform.

The late famous scientist Stephen Hawking repeatedly appealed during his lifetime: Don’t answer! That is to say, do not answer messages sent by aliens to avoid exposing the coordinates of the earth and being destroyed by aliens. And now scientists are repeatedly taking the initiative to expose their own goals. Isn’t this looking for trouble? Many people have been filled with indignation over past attempts to send messages to extraterrestrials. How can they not be furious this time?

Is humanity really in danger? Let's analyze it together.

For hundreds of years, human beings have been trying to find a soulmate in the universe. It is a pity that so far, modern science has exhausted all means and has not found a single alien hair. Man-made probes have flown to all the planets in the solar system, as well as some dwarf planets, satellites, asteroids, and even comets. Not only have they not discovered extraterrestrial civilizations, they have not discovered even a microorganism like a cell.

The farthest galaxy observed by the Hubble Telescope is 13 billion light-years away from us. There are more than 4,000 extraterrestrial planets discovered by various methods, and many of them are Earth-like habitable planets. Even on planets like the Earth that are not far or near from stars, there may be liquid water, but even the hair of life has not been found.

Of course, human beings’ current observation and exploration methods are still very rudimentary. Even the nearest star, Proxima Centauri, which is 4 light-years away, cannot be clearly seen. Therefore, it is not certain whether these observed planets have life. . But at least it proves one truth, that is, life is very rare in the universe, and civilization is even rarer.

The most optimistic estimate is that there may be 100,000 planets with civilization in the Milky Way, while the less optimistic estimate is that there is only one civilization in each galaxy. Of course, some people think that it is possible that there is only one civilization on Earth in the universe.

Even according to the most optimistic estimate, there are 100,000 civilized planets in the Milky Way. What is the average distance between these civilizations? Current observations suggest that the Milky Way is about 200,000 light-years in diameter. It is a flat spiral galaxy, a bit like a discus, with a center thickness of about 13,000 light-years and containing 400 billion stars.

Research believes that the thickness of the center of the Milky Way is only the thickness of the Milky Way bulge. In fact, the Milky Way is very thin, with an average length of only about 2,000 light years. Calculated based on a thickness of 2,000 light years, the volume of the entire Milky Way is 62831853071795 cubic light years. Each of the 100,000 civilized planets occupies an average volume of 628318530 light years. Based on this cube, the average distance between each civilization is 856 light years. .

The distance of 856 light years means that if you send a telegram to your neighbor, it will take 856 years before the neighbor receives it. If you want to receive a reply from the neighbor, it will have to be at least 1700 years later. . This is the most optimistic estimate. If there is only one civilization on earth in the Milky Way, and there may be a civilization in other galaxies, it will take at least hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years to wait for this telegram.

To reach the civilized planet at the most optimistic distance of 856 light-years, based on the speed of 17 kilometers per second of Voyager 1, the farthest unmanned probe currently flown by mankind, it will take more than 15 million years. This shows that even if there is a civilization of human level in this interval, it will take more than 23 million years from receiving the message to sending an expeditionary force to the earth.

So, are there civilizations more advanced than humans around us? Read on.

Human beings are too lonely. They always want to see friends from outside the earth, which gives rise to many fantasies and even hallucinations. UFOs are flying all over the sky. Many people say they have seen aliens or extraterrestrials. aircraft. However, after scientific investigation, there is no clear evidence to prove that aliens have really visited the earth.

People only see science fiction movies, and many people believe in science fiction and even the conspiracy theories contained in it.

Scientists have long abandoned all kinds of legends and turned to the most modern means to tirelessly detect extraterrestrial signals. The most common method is to use the best optical or radio telescopes to scan space and observe Listen for any unusual signals in space.

Some important plans for the scientific search for aliens

In the 1970s, astronomers conducted an infrared survey of 250,000 celestial objects in the sky and discovered 17 Objects with characteristics similar to Dyson spheres, but after further observation and screening, one by one was ruled out; NASA's Kepler mission scanned more than 100,000 stars and found a star called KIC 8462852 with strange brightness changes. It was also suspected It was a Dyson sphere structure, which was also later ruled out.

The Murchison Wide Field Array Radio Telescope located in Australia is an array system composed of spider web antennas. It has searched more than 10.3 million star systems and has found no trace of alien civilization so far.

The Breakthrough Listen Project, launched personally by Hawking during his lifetime and fully funded by Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, used radio and optical technology to search for 100 objects including the Milky Way and its surroundings over a 10-year period. galaxy, a project to search for traces of aliens. This project will cost US$100 million and use world-famous telescopes including Green Bank in the United States and Parkes in Australia to capture and collect radio waves, laser and other signals from stars in these galaxies. So far, no results have been obtained.

Human-launched spacecraft have reached every planet, some dwarf planets, asteroids, and comets, and have retrieved materials from the moon and some asteroids.

All explorations and searches have so far not found any extraterrestrial life, let alone extraterrestrial civilization.

Of course, this cannot deny the existence of extraterrestrial life and civilization. In fact, up to now, these search efforts are still ongoing. But to say the least, the probability of life appearing is extremely slim. Planets with life in the universe are extremely rare, and civilizations are even rarer.

Since we have not seen or heard the call of extraterrestrial civilization, why can't humans take the initiative to call for extraterrestrial civilization? In fact, humans have long started calling aliens, but they have not received any answers.

The only method of interstellar contact is radio communication, because the propagation speed of radio waves is the same as the speed of light, which is the fastest speed in the universe. It was only over 100 years ago that humans invented radio. In 1895, Marconi of Italy and Popov of Russia invented radio almost at the same time, but it was Marconi who obtained the international patent first.

Subsequently, radio developed rapidly like wildfire, and in the following decades, radio telescopes were gradually developed. In 1974, scientists used the Arecibo radio telescope in the United States, the largest in the world at the time, to transmit a set of signals for 3 minutes to the Hercules globular star cluster M13, which is 22,200 light-years away from us.

This is the first letter of greetings sent by humans to extraterrestrial civilizations that may exist in space. The signal includes 1679 binary digits, forming an array of 73 rows and 23 columns. The number of rows and columns are both Prime numbers, this is to remind aliens: this is not a natural signal, but an artificial signal.

If the technological level of the aliens who receive this set of signals is similar to that of humans, they can decode this set of information:

The position of the sun in the Milky Way, the position of the Earth in the solar system Position, humans are intelligent beings on the earth, the relationship between humans and the surrounding environment, human mathematics uses decimal calculation, the chemical elements that make up humans, the shape and basic structure of human genes and DNA, what the telescope that emits this set of signals looks like, etc.

Radio signals travel at the speed of light. When they were sent out 48 years ago, they traveled a distance of 48 light years. It would take more than 22,000 years to reach their destination. If there really is civilization and intelligence there, and this set of signals is received If the decoding is successful, it will take more than 44,000 years to send a set of answers and wait for us to receive them.

In the 1970s, four unmanned probes were launched, namely Pioneer 10 and 11, and Voyager 1 and 2. These four probes completed their solar system exploration missions. It flies out of the solar system in four directions. Voyager 1, which has flown the farthest, is already 23.3 billion kilometers away from us. At a speed of 17 kilometers per second, it still needs to fly out of the sun's gravitational circle with a radius of 1 light-year. It takes more than 17,000 years to fly to Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to us, and it will take more than 70,000 years to fly.

Why do scientists send them outside the solar system? The biggest hope is to encounter aliens, capture them, and know where they come from and who launched them. Because they all carry a set of cards or CDs engraved with information about the solar system, the earth and earth creatures, including human beings, which contain rich information about human civilization such as earth coordinates.

The New Horizons unmanned probe launched in 2006, after inspecting Pluto and the asteroids in the Kuiper belt, also completed the solar system inspection mission and flew out of the solar system. It also carried an inscription on its body. The information-rich disc also features 434,000 human names, as well as a bit of the ashes of Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh, a quarter and a small piece of the SpaceShipOne spacecraft.

These practices have long caused panic among some people. They believe in Hawking's warning and the dark forest's statement, and believe that those who do these things are traitors to mankind and expose mankind to danger. As a result, some people called for a quick recall of Voyager 1 and other detectors or to allow them to self-destruct, and to block all signals sent to space in the future.

But more scientists only regard these as jokes, and they do not believe that any dark forests really exist. From the above introduction, we can see that civilizations in the universe are too rare. It is very rare that each civilization will be destroyed and it will be difficult to encounter another civilization. So what if aliens know the coordinates of the earth and will come to plunder and kill humans?

1. The chance of civilization meeting is too small. I have said this many times before, so I won’t repeat it.

2. Even if there is indeed an extraterrestrial civilization at the closest distance to us, which is about 856 light years, the information we sent has only traveled 48 years, and it will take more than 800 years to reach them. If they discover it, The coordinates of the earth really have the intention of occupying and killing them. It depends on how high the level of civilization is.

If they were similar to or just a little higher than human civilization, would they have the ability to invade the earth? At present, our fastest unmanned probe is the Parker Solar Probe. When it reaches the closest distance to the sun, it will reach about 200 kilometers per second under the influence of the sun's gravity. Assuming that this civilization's manned spacecraft can reach 200 kilometers per second, It also took more than 1.28 million years to come to Earth.

Therefore, even if they have thief intentions, they do not have the thief ability. What would humans look like if they came to Earth 1.28 million years later? Is it extinct or has it become a god? Afraid of them?

3. Why do aliens come to plunder and kill the earth? For resources? What resources does the earth have? Water, atmosphere? There are many planets with these resources. It can be said that there are countless planets in the universe. In the solar system, there are seven or eight known planets with more water resources than the earth. There are also many planets with atmospheres, just a few, a few. The gaseous planets are all giant planets, much larger than the earth.

Different planets in the universe have vastly different environments, and the conditions for life and civilization to thrive are also vastly different. It is impossible for all of them to require resources like the Earth. For example, scientists believe that life may exist on Titan. If it does exist, it will be a kind of alkyl life that relies on compounds such as methane to survive and needs to survive in an environment of minus 179 degrees Celsius.

When this kind of life comes to the earth, all water, atmosphere, and earth temperature are extremely poisonous to them. They will die as soon as they encounter it. What are they here to do?

As for high-level civilizations, their demand for resources is becoming more and more monotonous. For example, the future of human beings is likely to only require pure energy, that is, stellar energy. With energy and elements, we can create Everything needed. The human body itself may eventually disappear and survive in the form of consciousness.

So what are these high-level civilizations doing on earth?

4. If there are really high-level civilizations around us, do we still need to expose ourselves? People have long known that such a low-level civilization exists. If they were to come, what ability do we have to hide and deal with it? Isn’t this unfounded worry?

The so-called Hawking’s “Don’t Answer” and the Dark Forest Conjecture are both an ideology of the low-level civilization that humans are currently in. As the level of civilization improves, the spiritual consciousness of any civilization cannot stay in the current state of consciousness of human beings. Therefore, I think the so-called "Don't Answer" and the dark forest's statement are meaningless.

Although Hawking is a scientist I respect, I disagree with his understanding in this regard. In fact, the vast majority of those who rant and oppose the exposure of targets are people who believe that flying saucers often appear on the earth, and that aliens have long been hiding on the earth, the moon, and Area 51 in the United States. Since there are aliens everywhere and aliens have been to the earth a long time ago, why are they still afraid of exposing their targets? Isn't this a self-deceiving joke? Why should one be filled with indignation over a cold joke?

Therefore, I very much agree with using the "Chinese Sky Eye" to send greeting messages to the universe, hoping that aliens can hear it. I hope that humans can find a close friend as soon as possible and get rid of loneliness. What do you think? Discussions welcome, thanks for reading.