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US Navy Was Ordered To Listen For Martian Broadcast

Posted by samzenpus on from the roaring-extraterrestrial-20's dept.

MarkWhittington writes "It seems that a SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) experiment happened decades before the Project Ozma occurred in 1960. The historians at the blog Letters of Note have uncovered a telegram sent in 1924 by then Chief of Naval Operations Edward W. Eberle instructing the United States Navy to listen for radio transmissions from the planet Mars."

34 of 154 comments (clear)

  1. Transmission was heard... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    They did catch a radio transmission, which said "Yvan eht nioj".

    1. Re:Transmission was heard... by Tablizer · · Score: 4, Funny

      They received a radio commercial: "Get your Human Ant Farm now! Watch humans toil away in your very own transparent human farm! They're so cheap that you can just throw them away and start over rather than clean the cage. We all know how smelly earthlings can get, zboys and zgirls. Your zmom will be so proud!"

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    2. Re:Transmission was heard... by the_arrow · · Score: 2, Funny

      Ah, but "a million to one" chance always succeeds! But it needs to exactly a million to one... A million and one to one chance, or a 999999 to one chance will fail.

      --
      / The Arrow
      "How lovely you are. So lovely in my straightjacket..." - Nny
    3. Re:Transmission was heard... by b4upoo · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Short wave operators have used moon bounce to reflect signals back to Earth. I suspect that the military might have had an interest in trying to use Mars as a reflector for radio messages. The idea being that it would take a very sensitive and specific antenna to recover a reflected message from such a distance. I don't know if it can be done but I'll bet they were trying to do it.

  2. Underfunded? by sanosuke001 · · Score: 2, Funny

    So is that why SETI doesn't get more funding? The Navy knows there aren't any signals out there because they're getting their allies to block any new incoming transmissions...

    It all makes sense now!

    --
    -SaNo
    1. Re:Underfunded? by gtall · · Score: 4, Funny

      Actually, they've stopped because a more interesting problem arose. They are spending all their resources on attempting to detect intelligent signals from the U. S. Congress. So far, the noise has completely overridden any underlying signal but they still hope for success with ever more sensitive equipment. It was thought that when Biden left, this would raise the signal to noise ratio, and it did for awhile. At least the noise decreased. But now it appears that the vice-president's office is acting like a radio black hole even able to suck intelligent brainwaves from escaping. The proof is apparently in the speeches the vice president has given since becoming vice-president. Alien abduction and replacement cannot be ruled out. Anyhow, a radio black hole has never before been seen in the natural universe and so close scrutiny by Navy scientists is called for.

      There are two parts thought to be present in any Congressional signal if there be any all. The Republican part, it is theorized, is very attenuated but appears to vacillate between sanity and insanity. The phase of the moon figures in here. The Democrat part is chaotic in a strange way, the chaos appears to wrap back on itself. This has the effect of entirely isolating them in an electronic brain trap, no new ideas come in or go out. The Navy feels the key to unlocking this trap is frontal and backtal lobotomy leaving only the lower base parts of the Democrat brain intact. To catch the Republican signal, should it indeed be there, trained dolphins with lasers on their heads will be required. In the meantime, tin foil hats are being distributed throughout the government in the hopes of preventing any dangerous emissions, which might be present but at undetectable levels, from impacting the nation.

      The Navy, in an interim report, says that apart from a mysterious exponential rise in the national debt, no active Congressional signal is present. Said Admiral Wavey-Gravy, "Some of us believe Congress doesn't really exist given they seem to have no discernible effect on the surrounding political environment; it is as though 1000 Klieg lights turned on and no Congress-critter materialized to bask in their warm glow." When it was pointed out to Adm. Wave that news conferences were being held daily by Congress-critters, his response was, "You mean alleged Congress-critters, it isn't like anyone actually caught them doing anything intelligent, is it?"

  3. Not Mars by Max+Littlemore · · Score: 5, Funny

    Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope
    Earth.
    Yip yip yip yip yip yip.
    Huh! Look. Aaaawwwwww. Radio.
    Radio.
    Yip yip yip yip yip.
    Radio
    Uhuh, uhuh, Radio. Yipyipyipyipyip.

    --
    I don't therefore I'm not.
    1. Re:Not Mars by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Informative

      For your viewing pleasure: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qxWGr8VhzQ

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    2. Re:Not Mars by elrous0 · · Score: 4, Funny

      Speak for yourself. That show turned me into a multi-cultural hippie with a overly-romanticized view of people who live in garbage cans. How am I supposed to pursue a career in politics after they made me so accepting and open-minded?

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  4. Man, by Tablizer · · Score: 4, Funny

    what I wouldn't give to be able to put a transmitter on Mars and fuck with them. "Bring me all your pretty girls and best beers or face destruction, puny Earthlings! And spell out 'Earth is Stupid' with your battleships so we can spot it from space."

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
  5. tone, tone, tone by Tablizer · · Score: 2, Funny

    "We're sorry, this is a long-distance call. Please hang up and deposit 8 million gold bars."

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
    1. Re:tone, tone, tone by istartedi · · Score: 2, Informative

      That works out to $3.52 trillion in today's dollars, if you use London Good Delivery bars (400 oz./bar * $1100/oz * 8 million).

      --
      For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
  6. This is good science by JoshuaZ · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is good science. In 1924 we didn't have any strong reasons to think that there wasn't intelligent life on Mars. If anything, the evidence seemed to favor the other direction. Moreover, simply having ships listen in wouldn't have cost that much money. So this was an experiment with potentially very high pay-off compared to the resources it took. This does lead to some interesting ideas for a scifi story in which they do find signals. NaNoWriMo anyone?

    1. Re:This is good science by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      This is good science. In 1924 we didn't have any strong reasons to think that there wasn't intelligent life on Mars. If anything, the evidence seemed to favor the other direction. Moreover, simply having ships listen in wouldn't have cost that much money. So this was an experiment with potentially very high pay-off compared to the resources it took. This does lead to some interesting ideas for a scifi story in which they do find signals. NaNoWriMo anyone?

      Sadly this coincided with the great Martian radio strike of '24. All martian DJs were marching picket lines at the time.

    2. Re:This is good science by retchdog · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Vernor Vinge does a lot of this. My favorite, where the "aliens" are two rival bands of humans visiting another planet and competing to establish first contact, is A Deepness in the Sky. I wish I could say more, but even describing the overall structure of the story would involve a spoiler. :-/ It's loosely a sequel to A Fire Upon the Deep, but they can be read interchangably.

      I would have sniffed at this kind of stuff before, but having read Deepness... I think it's worth spending some resources to keep an eye open.

      (Yeah, I know; most likely, they could wipe us out without blinking an eye. But that wouldn't be very interesting. ;-)

      --
      "They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
    3. Re:This is good science by tverbeek · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's easy to forget just how new most of our knowledge about the universe beyond Earth's atmosphere is. A mere fifty years ago, just throwing a dog or chimp into orbit was tricky business, and all we knew of other celestial bodies was seen through a glass darkly, from the murkey depths of our atmosphere. So... damn right there coulda been people on Mars in 1924. Just like in the 1960s we "knew" that it was utterly barren... but now aren't quite so sure. I can certainly see why some members of our society might find this rapid evolution of "what we know" unsettling, so they cling to a system of belief that promises not to change. But I think the roller coaster ride of Science is great.

      --
      http://alternatives.rzero.com/
    4. Re:This is good science by Idiomatick · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "A mere fifty years ago, just throwing a dog or chimp into orbit was tricky business"

      Now we can't at all. Huzzah~!

    5. Re:This is good science by argStyopa · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "A mere fifty years ago, just throwing a dog or chimp into orbit was tricky business..."

      More importantly, we were trying.

      Now, it seems, we can hardly be bothered. We've got all these darn poor people to take care of, and WoW to play, not necessarily in that order.

      --
      -Styopa
    6. Re:This is good science by ergean · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Offtopic:
      "A Fire Upon the Deep" how should I say this... I hate this kind of books. Few good ideas... and a fucking big chunk of pages in between them. I've read it hoping against hope that it would have a good ending to save it.

      Sorry had to say it, some of you could go and read it and bang their heads to the wall asking themselves: Why did I read this damn book to the end?

  7. LHC by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Funny

    Message received: "This is the Large Hadron Collider from the future. Do not attempt to [static.......] last warning."

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
    1. Re:LHC by Ukab+the+Great · · Score: 3, Funny

      "...use the LHC to distill vodka. It makes terrible vodka...."

  8. Well, sure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    We want to know if they're talking about stealing our precious bodily fluids.

  9. Specifically... by tjstork · · Score: 5, Informative

    It wasn't until the 1950s, I believe, that scientists began to realize that Venus and Mars were both utterly inhospitable. Indeed, the first Mariner photographs of Mars, that showed it to be almost moonlike, blasted with craters and seemingly ancient and dead, came as something of a shock to the academic community.

    --
    This is my sig.
    1. Re:Specifically... by ChromeAeonium · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It is kind of disappointing to think about how our society would have evolved from that point on had it turned out that Venus, Mars, and/or the moon were habitable and had their own native flora and fauna, even if they weren't sentient.

    2. Re:Specifically... by Kagura · · Score: 3, Funny

      Have you met a hospitable woman?

  10. Re:And... by Ihmhi · · Score: 3, Funny

    Yes. The Jonas Brothers pay a yearly licensing fee to High Overlord Ykkkkkkdrzkl.

    --
    Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
  11. Acronym mistake? by Tablizer · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Maybe "MARS" is really an acronym for something like Marine Atmospheric Reflection Survey", but some dolt forgot it and did Mars instead.

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
  12. Re:Missed opportunity by jamstar7 · · Score: 3, Funny

    They should have slapped a portable radio on the rovers. Then again cell phones might have been a better move. If AT&T is providing service on Mars there's no way the signal would reach Earth. It's crappy enough when you are standing under a tower.

    I wouldn't wanna have to pay the roaming charges for a cell fone on Mars.

    --
    Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
  13. How to receive martian broadcasts by digitalhermit · · Score: 2, Funny

    The process of creating a martian broadcast is actually quite simple. The technology is decidely low tech and can be put together in a short afternoon using some wire and a bit of electronic ingenuity. With a Linux PC, a CAT5 ethernet cable, a scissors, a few twists of some SEND/RECV pairs and you can soon detect Martian broadcasts. It's possibly to do it entirely in software also, perhaps with some creative use of the BOND0 adapter, the bonding module, and some misplaced balance-alb statements, but it's hardly worth mentioning.

  14. Are you mad? Joke would be on you!!! by syousef · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Bring me all your pretty girls and best beers or face destruction, puny Earthlings!

    Are you MAD, man? If they took you seriously they'd launch all the pretty girls into space! Noooooooo!

    --
    These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
  15. Re:Syfy (please no) by cblack · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Please no, The Sci-fi Channel changing their name to SyFy was bad enough. Please do not further this abomination of an abbreviation/rebranding. Call it Sci-Fi or SF, never SyFy.

  16. Re:Syfy (please no) by jandoedel · · Score: 2, Funny

    SyFy must be written by syentists.

  17. Re:Evidence of artificial structures on Mars? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Wow, scientists have found evidence of macroblocking caused by a discrete cosine transform-based compression algorithm in pictures of Mars! Shocking news!

    --
    I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  18. Re:Bah! They heard nothing! by elrous0 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Yeah, but with those odds the big Martian cities have to have at least a few people in them.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.