Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

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."

13 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. 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.
  3. 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.
  4. 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 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/
  5. 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.
  6. 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.

  7. 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?"