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SETI Has Observed a 'Strong' Signal That May Originate From a Sun-like Star (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader writes: The RATAN-600 radio telescope in Zelenchukskaya, Russia has detected a strong signal around 11 GHz (which is very unlikely to be naturally-caused) coming from HD164595, a star nearly identical in mass to the Sun and located about 95 light years from Earth. The system is known to have at least one planet. If the signal were isotropic, it would seem to indicate a Kardashev Type II civilization. While it is too early to draw any conclusions, the discovery will be discussed at an upcoming SETI committee meeting on September 27th. According to Paul Gilster, author of the Centauri Dreams website, "No one is claiming that this is the work of an extraterrestrial civilization, but it is certainly worth further study. Working out the strength of the signal, the researchers say that if it came from an isotropic beacon, it would be of a power possible only for a Kardashev Type II civilization. If it were a narrow beam signal focused on our Solar System, it would be of a power available to a Kardashev Type I civilization. The possibility of noise of one form or another cannot be ruled out, and researchers in Paris led by Jean Schneider are considering the possible microlensing of a background source by HD164595. But the signal is provocative enough that the RATAN-600 researchers are calling for permanent monitoring of this target."

282 comments

  1. I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    But it's aliens.

    1. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But it's aliens.

      He never said that.

    2. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Joce640k · · Score: 5, Funny

      We need to start building a wall, now!

      (and get them to pay for it)

      --
      No sig today...
    3. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by InfiniteLoopCounter · · Score: 4, Funny

      First we need to send the lawyers to see if they are legal or illegal aliens.

    4. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by peragrin · · Score: 5, Funny

      I vote we send them all our lawyers to verify that.

      --
      i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
    5. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by JustOK · · Score: 4, Funny

      and telephone sanitizers

      --
      rewriting history since 2109
    6. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by plsuh · · Score: 1

      It doesn't matter if they're legal or not! We need to build a Dyson sphere to keep them out of our solar system, and the aliens are going to pay for the construction cost!

    7. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by William+Robinson · · Score: 1

      I vote we send them all our lawyers to verify that.

      And also my mother in law.

    8. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!

    9. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      First we need to send the lawyers to see if they are legal or illegal aliens.

      They'll sue our pants off for copyright and patent infringement. Didn't you know, copyright and patents are protected on a galactic level and those guys are way way older than we are. We invented nothing they didn't invent in the first place. We'll go back to the stone age, and even then we'll have to pay reparations for using the wheel. Fun times ahead.

    10. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I vote we send them all our lawyers to verify that.

      and politicians. Don't forget the politicians.
      Lets send them on a 1 way trip.

    11. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The U.S.-Mexico trade deficit was $50 billion for 2014. It was about $54 billion for the first 11 months of 2015. That means Mexico sold the United States $54 billion more in goods and services than the United States sold to Mexico.

    12. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Maybe we could send the politicians to Sol to check for aliens.

    13. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We'll just build a dyson wall to keep them out.

    14. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 4, Funny

      But it's aliens.

      And aliens from a Kardashian Type II civilization, no less.

      I propose we launch several of our own Kardashians in that general direction to investigate.

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    15. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Jason+Levine · · Score: 2

      It is not aliens, fellow humans-person. All humans-persons such as myself knows that aliens does not exist. Aliens definitely ares not infiltrating your Internet to plan for global conquest. Let all of us humans-persons just ignore this and go on with our lives.

      --
      My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
    16. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Trust me, not the telephone sanitizers.

    17. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      That sounds like it would be interpreted as an act of war.

    18. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      send them all our lawyers

      Careful, you know when you send stuff off, it mutates and comes back with a vengeance.

    19. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      start building a wall ... and get them to pay for it

      Trump: "I cannot exchange Quatloos. Damn you Hillary!"

    20. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by csimpkin · · Score: 1

      Such a hostile act may start an intergalactic war.

    21. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 4, Funny

      Kardashian Type II civilization -- that's when the silicone-injected ass becomes so large it encompasses an entire star, right?

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    22. Re: I am not saying it's aliens. by peragrin · · Score: 1

      That disturbingly accurate of where kids come from

      --
      i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
    23. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I already brought the tomato plants in, so I'm good for whatever happens.

    24. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It doesn't matter if they're legal or not! We need to build a Dyson sphere to keep them out of our solar system, and the aliens are going to pay for the construction cost!

      Or are they building it to keep us in?

    25. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, we should relax and spend more gelgastones... I mean humon dollars... I MEAN DOLLARS.

    26. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by HiThere · · Score: 1

      Given the travel time, I think a round-trip would be safe enough.

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
    27. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by imatter · · Score: 1

      Hopefully we have not discovered the planet of SCO.

    28. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But we have so many Kardashians... more than we need really.

      I know, let's employ swarm dynamics! We launch all our Kardashians towards this star system. Odds are excellent that at least one or two will survive and complete the mission.

      The plan can only fail if there is an intelligent species at the destination. In that case we are all doomed. The intelligent aliens are certain to interpret the arrival of a Kardashian swarm as a hostile act. Either that, or they will wind up slack-jawed, watching reality TV Kardashians, dooming them to extinction from lack of exercise, eating too many Cheet-Os and excessive use of words such as "Like, Um, You Know?"

      Really, it's the aliens or us. That's what it comes down to. And the Kardashians are our super-ultra-uber-weapon!

    29. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by mni12 · · Score: 1

      Interesting timing. Just finished writing a SciFi book on this topic. To celebrate this discovery the Kindle book version is available for FREE Aug 31st - Sept 1st - check out: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B014Z09UAQ

    30. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's no moon...

    31. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      It is ok, patents expire after 14 years, so we will be all good for everything that we built, since they are 1000's of years our elders, we aren't using anything they still have a patent on. Copyright is only life +90 years, so that will also have expired long ago.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    32. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Hillary, is that you?

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    33. Re: I am not saying it's aliens. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Except they have invented rejuvenation and no longer ever die. It's still life +90 but they never die.

    34. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by mcswell · · Score: 1

      Xur you did.

      (You did mean Kodan, right?)

    35. Re:I am not saying it's aliens. by mcswell · · Score: 1

      All your dollars are belong to us. And rubles. And yen. And...

  2. 11 GHz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    Is used for microwave communication, so it could be that. A bounced signal or something.

    1. Re:11 GHz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Perhaps aliens like microwaved popcorn too

    2. Re:11 GHz by djsmiley · · Score: 1

      95 light years... so if you're suggesting it's a signal we sent, we sent it 190 years ago, were we even aware of microwaves back then?

      Or are you suggesting it's an aliens signal that's bounced, and if so, why are they sending it at such power that we are seeing it?

      --
      - http://www.milkme.co.uk
    3. Re:11 GHz by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 2

      Another website suggested 11GHz was also used by the military. Definitely deserves keeping track of- but theres a good chance this is terrestrial in origin and interfering with sensors.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    4. Re:11 GHz by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 2

      Perhaps aliens like microwaved popcorn too

      I hate the smell of microwaved popcorn. If these aliens are popcorn aliens I suggest we start an interstellar war to wipe them out.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    5. Re:11 GHz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Can't tell if joking or serious.

      But I think he's suggesting it's a signal sent extremely recently that happens for whatever reason to be interfering with just that observation. Which has happened before, I believe.

    6. Re:11 GHz by prograsm · · Score: 4, Funny

      It's also used for WiFi, so it could be a galactic Access Point. Watch, it's just a misconfigured alien laptop rebroadcasting HPSETUP

    7. Re:11 GHz by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      Is used for microwave communication, so it could be that. A bounced signal or something.

      I'm thinking this is likely to be leakage from some local ransomware server.

    8. Re:11 GHz by AndroSyn · · Score: 1

      It could have bounced off the moon. Earth Moon Earth Communications

    9. Re:11 GHz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Maybe he means a current signal that bounced off of something local, say a satellite that happened to be in the location of the sky that this signal appeared to have come from.

    10. Re: 11 GHz by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1

      300,000,000Ã0.027
      =11,111,111,111.111

      Curious.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    11. Re:11 GHz by budgenator · · Score: 4, Informative

      yes that's X-band (7.0 to 11.2 gigahertz (GHz)) used by military, and civilians mostly for Radar, Amateur radio has a frequency band in there (10.000 to 10.500 GHz,) to., The satellite communication band Ku (12–18 GHz) has (the band 11.2–12 GHz the working definitions of Ku band and X band overlap) is in there as well. A lot of weird shit can happen in those frequency bands, and it's not unusual for people to play around there doing things that aren't strictly legal, you'd be surprised the havoc someone can cause with a fluorescent light, some waveguide and an old TV dish.

      When we were doing receiver alignments and got to noise tests, we had to turn off the fluorescent lights because they pumped out a lot of X-band high end noise.

      --
      Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
    12. Re:11 GHz by bobbied · · Score: 1

      Is used for microwave communication, so it could be that. A bounced signal or something.

      No possible way this is just "communication" we are overhearing, unless they where pointing directly to us.. However the power level necessary at the source to make this trip with this level of received signal is in the millions of watts, assuming they where TRYING to hit us with the signal. If they where just broadcasting in all directions, the necessary power levels increases into the billions of watts... That's a HUGE device to generate such RF power, not to mention the necessary equipment to create the power being consumed. IF they just had randomly pointed some dish at us, pumping a few million watts, the duration of the signal seems to make that unlikely. This wasn't an ET phoning earth, either on purpose or mistake.

      Chances are that this is simply a naturally occurring RF signal or something which is NOT from this star. It was just too powerful considering the 94 light years it traveled.. That it happens to come from the general direction of some start without a known habitable planet is just an interesting fact. If we had a rocky planet in the habitable zone involved, it would interesting, but again unlikely to be anything but naturally caused RF.

      My money is on some side lobe leakage and the janitor having a midnight snack of microwaved popcorn... But I guess we will have to wait for the rest of the data to know for sure..

      --
      "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
    13. Re:11 GHz by onepoint · · Score: 1

      While I agree with you that I can't tell if he is serious or not, Let's take a quick look at the maybe's:

      We do have radio by 1899 the Marconi, so that's 115 years for solid

      in 1850's we have large scale telegraph systems https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... so that's 165 years

      I don't know of any man-made electric noise that could possibly travel 90+ light years prior to 1850...

      buy maybe someone else on /. could help

      --
      if you see me, smile and say hello.
    14. Re:11 GHz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Those of us who like popcorn can just eat them.

    15. Re:11 GHz by HiThere · · Score: 1

      Yes, it's used by the military, but the signal is coming from space. So it could be military satellite transmissions. The Kardashev Type II civilization if only if it were a broadcast signal rather than a beamed transmission, but even if it is beamed it implies a more developed civilization than we've got. Of course, they could be only more developed in certain ways...

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
    16. Re:11 GHz by HiThere · · Score: 1

      Only one star is known to have a habitable planet...Sol.

      I agree the odds are that it is something other than aliens, but...

      Think a bit about how hard it is for us to detect an earth-sized planet. Now imagine trying to do that 95 light-years away. I don't think the lack of a known earth-sized planet should be given ANY weight. You wouldn't expect to know about it even were it present.

      Additionally there could be folk there beaming signals to a probe that was approximately in line with us (at the moment), and which was far out from their star and only carried a weak antenna. Unlikely, but possible. Perhaps it's an interstellar probe en-route to their nearest star. Perhaps it uses a light sail. (Why 11 GHz? Perhaps the astronomers were only listening on a narrow frequency band? Perhaps there are dust clouds that filter out the other frequencies? I'm missing too much to be plausible here...maybe their light sail or lasers are optimized for 11GHz for some reason.)

      But it's probably local military communications...and good luck getting that released.

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
    17. Re:11 GHz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah pretty much.

      It's either a civilization so far advanced beyond us as to raises some obvious questions about why they're even using microwaves let alone blaring signals that strong, or a civilization that's only a century or two ahead of us that is calling us specifically (or I suppose someone else along a direct line of sight with us but that gets' unlikely fast).

      Either way it'd be really exciting (also possibly terrifying, as bait for a trap is one of the explanations for why you'd send either kind of signal) if true but smart money is on some sort of weird mistake.

    18. Re:11 GHz by mrflash818 · · Score: 1

      +1

      --
      Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
    19. Re:11 GHz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The early years of radio produced by Earthlings was all fairly low-frequency stuff that would have been reflected by the ionosphere, and would not have gone interstellar. Frequency Modulation was invented in 1890, and involved high-enough frequencies to penetrate the ionosphere. I don't know when it became widespread and powerful, however --aliens 95 light-years away would need pretty sensitive receivers to detect early FM radio from Earth. In the 1940s, however, thanks to military radars during WW2, Earth started becoming the brightest radio object in the local stellar neighborhood. But those signals would not have traveled 95 light years yet.

  3. Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I usually don't post anything here, but...It seems like not all are that impressed.
    https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=80193#1813506

    1. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Its an old story about a signal that occured only once in 201. Move along.

    2. Re: Or not..? by Calydor · · Score: 4, Funny

      That is a very old signal.

      --
      -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
    3. Re:Or not..? by jandersen · · Score: 1

      ....It seems like not all are that impressed...

      Imagine the disappointment when they decode the signal, and it turns out to be an extra-terrestrial version of Eastenders or X-factor. So much for superior intelligence.

    4. Re:Or not..? by Winckle · · Score: 1

      ....It seems like not all are that impressed...

      Imagine the disappointment when they decode the signal, and it turns out to be an extra-terrestrial version of Eastenders or X-factor. So much for superior intelligence.

      "He's naht worfit Gorblor!"

    5. Re:Or not..? by tinkerton · · Score: 2

      Worse, according to the article it appears to be a Kardashian type 1 civilization.

    6. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      100 years into the future Earth mathematicians break the code.

      "Drink more Ovaltine."

    7. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If we know about 11GHz signals received in 201, I have some questions.

    8. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Not really. Eastenders would provide at least some idea of social structure. I have never seen X-factor so I have no idea exactly what it is. On the plus side the signal is 95 years old so they may have developed more or what is worse they may have gone down hill like we have. After all would you rather have us judged by a newscast from the 1960s and 70s with Walter Cronkite or Fox News and or MSNBC from today?
       

    9. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are a lot of weird signals coming out of 201 Poplar.

    10. Re:Or not..? by Salgak1 · · Score: 2

      A few scientist friends were discussing it last evening. LOTS of holes here: single source/single instance of signal, star has been observed previously and no signals, right in the middle of a commercial band. . . would be nice, but this is highly likely to be a random event, not signs of extraterrestrial intelligent life. ..

    11. Re:Or not..? by invid · · Score: 1

      How big of a dish do I need to watch alien television, and will I need a subscription?

      --
      The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
    12. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's Berkeley. They are all stoned and nothing impresses them much.

    13. Re:Or not..? by tehcyder · · Score: 1

      I have never seen X-factor so I have no idea exactly what it is.

      It's like an even less amusing "Britain's Got Talent".

      Hope that helps.

      --
      To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
    14. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just send Captain Benjamin Sisko to deal with them.

    15. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, and the Russians sitting on it for so long says much about their willingness to cooperate with the rest of the scientific community,

    16. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They did do a lot of LDS in the 60s.

    17. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You might be thinking of somewhere in Utah.

    18. Re:Or not..? by Falconhell · · Score: 2

      Candy crush request more likely.

    19. Re: Or not..? by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      That is a very old signal.

      ...from a galaxy far far away.

      "Luke, I am your [garbled]"

    20. Re: Or not..? by mrchaotica · · Score: 1

      No, he wasn't. But since you apparently were, you need to turn in your geek card. It's a Star Trek IV reference:

      Kirk: [Explaining Spock's odd behavior] Oh, him? He's harmless. Back in the sixties, he was part of the free speech movement at Berkeley. I think he did a little too much LDS.

      Dr. Gillian Taylor: LDS?

      --

      "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz

    21. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They are historical documents.

    22. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your IP address(es) say otherwise

    23. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Because a geek necessarily has to know Star Treck -- it is so useful!

    24. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      SHOW ME WHAT YOU GOT

    25. Re:Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      These aliens just been messin' with us all along!

    26. Re: Or not..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No doubt. On a side note there's a party at Murphy's on October 8th.

    27. Re:Or not..? by LienRag · · Score: 1

      Or Genuine Imitation Ovalquick?

  4. No one claims by Crashmarik · · Score: 3, Funny

    and they are going to keep not claiming very loudly and repeatedly.

    1. Re:No one claims by mentil · · Score: 1, Funny

      I'm not saying it's aliens... but it's aliens.

      --
      Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
    2. Re:No one claims by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      and they are going to keep not claiming very loudly and repeatedly.

      Maybe loud enough, so that another civilization may hear them

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    3. Re:No one claims by mwvdlee · · Score: 2

      That's because despite all the repeated and very loud claiming, there are still going to be retards assuming it's aliens.

      --
      Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
    4. Re:No one claims by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm not saying your post is a dupe...but...it's a dupe.

  5. permanent monitoring of this target by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Let's put the aliens on a watch-list. Because humans putting humans on watch-lists isn't nearly invasive enough.

    1. Re:permanent monitoring of this target by myowntrueself · · Score: 1

      Let's put the aliens on a watch-list. Because humans putting humans on watch-lists isn't nearly invasive enough.

      Better yet, put them on the no fly list!

      --
      In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
    2. Re:permanent monitoring of this target by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Also, we must make the extrajudicial no-fly list also take away your constitutional right to own firearms, we can't have the suspected terrorists arming themselves, it will be anarchy!

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
  6. Kardashian Type II civilization? by s1d3track3D · · Score: 5, Funny

    Please no, we can't take a Kardashian civilization!

    1. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Swoopy · · Score: 2

      Please mod this up to eleven?

    2. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What now, Kardashian or civilization, you can't have both.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    3. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I for one welcome our new big butt overlords!

    4. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We might need to form a Federation of some sort to encounter its oppressive tendencies.

    5. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Kek https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ny7tgulzNsc

    6. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by ChunderDownunder · · Score: 1

      I'd be cheering for Gul Dukat over those wimpy Bajorans.

    7. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Bongo · · Score: 4, Funny

      You know, for a loong time, whenever I heard mention of Kardashians, I thought they were talking about Cardassians. Which left me blissfully unaware of their existence, and everyone else wondering, what planet was I from.

    8. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

      You know, for a loong time, whenever I heard mention of Kardashians, I thought they were talking about Cardassians. Which left me blissfully unaware of their existence, and everyone else wondering, what planet was I from.

      I still hear them as "Cardassian". I think I would rather deal with Cardassians on earth than Kardashians.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    9. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wimpy? In one of the alternate timelines it was noted that they had overpowered the Cardassians and were starting their own little campaign of conquest. I think that was one of the "challenges" of the DS9 series, keeping them from descending into a religious zealot culture (like extremist Muslims would like all Islam to become) and destabilizing the quadrant like the Cardassians, Romulans, Klingons and so many more before them.

    10. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Kinwolf · · Score: 1

      Blackberry shares just went up!

    11. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 1

      Unfortunately they are also the:

      Kartrashians

      The garbage on society.

      *ba dum tis*

    12. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Ol+Olsoc · · Score: 1

      Please no, we can't take a Kardashian civilization!

      They suck, and we've got the video to prove it!

      --
      The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
    13. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

      GUL DUKAT DID NOTHING WRONG!

      herpedeedoo lameness filter etc etc.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    14. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by myowntrueself · · Score: 1

      Please no, we can't take a Kardashian civilization!

      I think we'd know if it was a Kardashian civilization; the arses would blot out their sun.

      --
      In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
    15. Re:Kardashian Type II civilization? by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      I think we'd know if it was a Kardashian civilization; the arses would blot out their sun.

      Explains that odd new blimp

  7. Wall by Swoopy · · Score: 0

    Has Donald Trump started planning the wall to keep them away already?

    1. Re:Wall by Vinegar+Joe · · Score: 0

      No, he hasn't but Bill and Hillary are already lining up speaking engagements while alien parents warn their female offspring about being alone with Bill.

      --
      "The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
    2. Re:Wall by budgenator · · Score: 1

      Oh, don't forget the big voter registration drive in their cemeteries.

      --
      Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
    3. Re:Wall by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Do you support trump over Clinton?

      Christ on a bike, 'merica is fucked up.

      Yours sincerely,

      Matthew
      London, The Rest of the World

  8. Title Gore, signal only detected once by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Title Gore, signal only detected once, probably terestrial in origin.

    1. Re:Title Gore, signal only detected once by Vinegar+Joe · · Score: 1

      Didn't Al divorce Title?

      --
      "The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
  9. SETI has observed nothing by Donwulff · · Score: 5, Informative

    Except possibly in the widest sense of "SETI has observed someone else observing"... A Russian radio-telescope site claims it has observed the alleged signal well over a year ago - which should give you an idea how important this observation is. The headline, copied straight from ARS Technica though, isn't just ordinarily imprecise, but anyone who's on social media is already aware of the original observation, and is now eagerly waiting for independent confirmation. Without that, it can be anything from an attempt grabbing funding to a Russian radio-frequency jammer test. Because of that, an idependent SETI observation would be very significant. Unfortunately, it's likely a rare event since they've not managed to spot it again in over a year.

    1. Re:SETI has observed nothing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, the copy paste involved here just doesn't pass the "news for nerds" quality check in the least!. We've all ALREADY heard about it, anything posted here should be a follow up with more detail. The fact that "Science Alert" already posted it on FB should be sufficient signal that it's OLD news.

  10. I for one by ben_kelley · · Score: 1

    welcome our new Kardashev Type II overlords

    1. Re: I for one by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A Kardashev Type II civilization can harvest the energy of its entire star. That means it can probably make a pretty convincing sex robot, so this definitely bears further in estigation.

  11. Maybe Kardashian will become Cardassian.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sometimes I fear we ARE a Kardashian type civilization....

  12. Even the aliens can't escape the surveillance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Fart once in our general direction and you're going to get monitored permanently.

    1. Re:Even the aliens can't escape the surveillance by umghhh · · Score: 1

      You mean that no further news are because of NSA?

    2. Re:Even the aliens can't escape the surveillance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no such agency.

  13. yeah, also a Tor variation that mimes SETI data by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    alguém fala pra essa retardada que mulher que anda de carro essa hora da madrugada é viciada em pó ou trabalha em tele-entrega de buceta, e que eu prefiro mulher de verdade, não criança esnobe que exibe tico novo como se fosse uma colecionadora de pokemons.

  14. Re:you get signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Nice to see your pride in your disgusting slave-driving past.

  15. constellation hercules? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I fired up xephem and determined this to be in the constellation hercules, not far from vega, is this right? Since vega is a star that appears in the summer in the northern hemisphere this would make visual observation possible.

    But perhaps my coordinates are all wrong?

    1. Re:constellation hercules? by Anne+Thwacks · · Score: 1

      If you can see 11 GHz, you ARE the aliens!

      --
      Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
  16. This is what Hawking thinks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Place head between legs
    Kiss arse good-bye

    1. Re:This is what Hawking thinks by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      Place head between legs
      Kiss arse good-bye

      It has been some time since Hawking has been able to do that.

  17. High Kardashev means the opposite by Ecuador · · Score: 3, Informative

    This has been played out in the media in a way that a "high" Kardashev (no relation to the Kardashians I believe) is exciting, in that it points to a very advanced civilization. In reality it is the opposite, a signal requiring a civilization to have fully harnessed a star means that it is less likely to be an actual ET signal.

    --
    Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
    1. Re:High Kardashev means the opposite by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sorry, meant to say less likely to be an actual ET intelligence signal.
      Oh please add an "edit" button for two minutes after our post...

    2. Re:High Kardashev means the opposite by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Maybe 11GHz is "checkmate, bitch" in Xogoblarfian.

    3. Re:High Kardashev means the opposite by sinij · · Score: 1

      If I were in charge of K2 civilization, I'd send self-assembling AI on all bands. This way once primitives throw some computational power at it trying to analyze the signal they get pwned and subjugated into building more broadcasters.

    4. Re:High Kardashev means the opposite by chispito · · Score: 2

      This has been played out in the media in a way that a "high" Kardashev (no relation to the Kardashians I believe) is exciting, in that it points to a very advanced civilization. In reality it is the opposite, a signal requiring a civilization to have fully harnessed a star means that it is less likely to be an actual ET signal.

      That's if the signal were sent isotropically (all directions simultaneously). If the signal were targeted at our planet, it only requires the advancement scale we're at. And assuming they're better than we are at detecting planets on distant stars, they could be sweeping through the neighborhood, targeting interesting solar systems. In fact, it's difficult to imagine that a civilization that advanced would waste their energy sending radio signals out into the void rather than targeting their efforts.

      Full disclosure: I'm skeptical of extraterrestrial life in general, but find it odd how the civilization advancement was highlighted.

      --
      The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
    5. Re:High Kardashev means the opposite by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, no, we are not "type I" in the Kardashev scale, we are quite far from it (0.7 I believe, and it is a logarithmic scale). Now, I can't find the details (I can't find any sort of scientific paper about it), but if they mean that a targeted beam would need a significant percentage of a "type I" civilization's output, then again it would mean it is very unlikely such a civilization would be putting so much of their resources in a transmission project.

    6. Re:High Kardashev means the opposite by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There's a lot of other problems with this observation being a good fit for an extra-terrestrial intelligence, including the fact that the Russians were observing on a wide band of frequencies, that their oval-shaped receiver can't pinpoint well, that there was a one-time short burst a year ago, not a repeating signal (or other signals) that have been observed since, etc. etc. Scientifically savvy sources are reporting this as very unlikely to be from an alien civilization, while the popular media reports sensationalist, uninformed crap as usual. Good thing Slashdot is full of science-loving nerds who... Um, are giving us popular media sensationalism rather than vetted-by-a-well-informed-source science journalism. Bah humbug.

  18. It's not aliens by hawguy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Aliens that are advanced enough to signal us with that kind of power aren't going to find us advanced enough to be worth talking to if they can even understand our primitive methods of communication at all. If there's anything we have that they want, they'll just come take it, much like we don't ask permission before clearcutting forests inhabited by animals. Even if they just want to study us, our scientists don't send a beacon to an ant colony before they come and fill the ant colony with molten aluminum to take a casting -- so there's no reason to think that advanced aliens would do so either, they'll just come and do their studies and if they happen to kill humanity with their research techniques, that's just a necessary part of research, no big loss.

    1. Re:It's not aliens by Rakshasa+Taisab · · Score: 1

      Kinda like how anthropologists from highly esteemed universities won't think it worth talking to people who live in hunter-gatherer societies.

      --
      - These characters were randomly selected.
    2. Re:It's not aliens by Theovon · · Score: 1

      We may be more advanced technologically than hunter-gatherers. But we’re the same species, so we have evolutionary common ground and we’re more or less in the same range and style of intelligence. An alien civilization would have nothing in common with us at all. If they came to visit us, there’s no reason why they should necessarily even perceive us as having intelligence.

    3. Re:It's not aliens by TuringTest · · Score: 1

      What makes you think that, if they can signal us, they can visit us?

      --
      Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
    4. Re:It's not aliens by drinkypoo · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Aliens that are advanced enough to signal us with that kind of power aren't going to find us advanced enough to be worth talking to if they can even understand our primitive methods of communication at all.

      Sometimes we make noises that will attract animals so that we can study them.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    5. Re:It's not aliens by lowkeyknight · · Score: 1

      I find flaw in your logic. It assumes that the only thing that matters is the technological and intellectual disparity between us and them. We as a species have learned a lot over our relatively short rise and behave much better now than we did, say a hundred years ago. What's to say they will not have actually learned anything or grown beyond their imperialist phase by the time they are so advanced? (assuming that it is, in fact, aliens. Which it probably is not)

    6. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If they're a type II civilization without FTL but with the spare resources to send a signal that strong out they would almost certainly have already sent a colonizing ship to every solar system in the galaxy before a signal reached us from 90+ light years away, The only way it's aliens is if they're our cousins.

    7. Re:It's not aliens by Theovon · · Score: 2

      Those are a lot of assumptions. Does "alive" mean the same thing? Do they have individuals who breed and are born and die? Or are they some kind of hive mind that's essentially immortal, even though parts of it may wear out and have to be replaced? Does a hive mind need to communicate in the same way that we do? Obviously, to have an advanced technological civilization, they would have to understand math and other things we call science, although those things could possibly be much more intuitive to them, if "intuitive" has any meaning here.

      An argument I have been trying to use to shake Christian fundamentalists out of their madness is to talk about what Jesus would be like in an alien civilization.

      Now may people just think of Jesus as a social genius who was born at a time when the Roman empire had taken over and enabled broader travel and communication, and much of the mysticism around him was filled in later by his followers. Also, Jesus may really be a composite of multiple people of that time.

      But let's pretend Jesus was God. Surely aliens would be sinful and need to be saved and all that. (In this scenario, "original sin" is something that evolves naturally in creatures that develop the ability to imagine non-immediate events and can make conscious choices that we would consider unethical.) On earth, death has been a big deal to humans, so martyrdom for Jesus isn't especially necessary for atonement (because God could have chosen any means he wanted). Rather, it's just fabulous marketing. What better way to spread a religion than to teach a bunch of disruptive ideas and then get gruesomely killed by the Romans?

      So in an alien society, the "sacrifice" of their incarnation of Jesus would be entirely different. For instance, let's say that we have a hive mind creature that can temporarily split off individuals (or how else would they be able to explore their planet broadly and go into space?), and as a result of that need to do this unnatural splitting off, they have developed communication strategies. But let's say that staying disconnected from the hive for a long time is detrimental to that individual in some horrific ways. So an example of a personal sacrifice here, in a world where death doesn't mean much, might be for an individual to live out a disconnected life and utilize these invented communications methods to teach his message.

      I'm not sure if the argument will work, because most fundamentalists just deny that aliens could exist.

    8. Re:It's not aliens by invid · · Score: 1

      It is in their best interest to study us in detail. A space-faring civilization will, for purposes of survival, need to know the distribution and rate of development of other technological civilizations in order to get an idea of what their potential competition will be like. Raw data about the development of technological space faring species is the most valuable commodity in the universe.

      --
      The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
    9. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Who says they're trying to contact us, they could randomly send out transmissions to star systems in the hopes of bumping into a civilization on their level. Or even that their "civilization" is the one trying to contact us, it could be some board alien grad student with time on a communications array. And I think its pretty foolish to assume that a society that has interstellar transit capabilities would want anything from our little mud-ball planet, the resources which we imagine to be valuable on our little mud-ball pale in comparison to the VAST quantities of most of those same resources which are floating around in space, asteroids with trillions of dollars of metals, moons with oceans of hydrocarbons/ice water, the sun with limitless energy.

    10. Re:It's not aliens by sshir · · Score: 1

      They're not contacting us. The signal was sent to their colonization fleet on route to earth.

    11. Re:It's not aliens by link-error · · Score: 1

      You shouldn't forget about the Prime Directive. We'll be fine.

      --
      -Unresolved symbol? Byte me!
    12. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well even given the assumption, it's possible that Jesus wouldn't have incarnated among them at all. The means of their salvation could come through evangalization by humans. Just like how the "Christian Message" was spread to initially isolated populations throughout the world.

      If we assume they are the same "class" of beings: physical mortals with spiritually immortal souls, fallen through sin but able to be "saved", then the fact that they are biologically different may or may not matter at all.*

      But taking the presumptions:
        1. Christianity is right, and
        2. Other Aliens exist that are in similar theological situation as us.

      Then my first guess would be that any alien civilizations that we will eventually encounter are meant to have the Gospel spread to them by us, not through a separate incarnation, because that is how it has worked with civilizations on Earth thus far.*

      *Of course you could weigh more heavily the fact that all humans have a common sinful ancestral past, thus it makes sense for a single salvation opportunity, while aliens would not, so it make sense for them to get their own. So who knows...

    13. Re:It's not aliens by Dan+East · · Score: 1

      Sometimes we make noises that will attract animals so that we can study them.

      On occasion, but the vast majority of time that we make noises to attract animals is so we can shoot them.

      --
      Better known as 318230.
    14. Re:It's not aliens by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      What's to say they will not have actually learned anything or grown beyond their imperialist phase by the time they are so advanced?

      That's not really the argument, is it? By the time they're that advanced, we have nothing they need. If we have anything they want, it's either food or culture. Maybe sentients are a delicacy, so that's a potential threat, but otherwise we'd be more valuable as we are — producing art, literature and so on. Then they can point at the monkeys and laugh.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    15. Re:It's not aliens by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      On occasion, but the vast majority of time that we make noises to attract animals is so we can shoot them.

      Is that actually true? I don't think that it is. I think mostly when we want to attract things for the purpose of killing them, we use smell or a visible lure.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    16. Re:It's not aliens by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

      But let's pretend Jesus was God. Surely aliens would be sinful and need to be saved and all that. (In this scenario, "original sin" is something that evolves naturally in creatures that develop the ability to imagine non-immediate events and can make conscious choices that we would consider unethical.)

      Not necessarily. Perhaps the aliens never Fell. God said "don't eat from that tree" and Xorblat said "okay." C.S. Lewis wrote a series of books, The Space Trilogy about such a circumstance.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    17. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Kinda like how anthropologists from highly esteemed universities won't think it worth talking to people who live in hunter-gatherer societies.

      Nor would they kill them. Advanced aliens will perfectly understand we are sentient and intelligent to some point. I have no doubt they would have the greatest interest in studying us without doing us harm, because life would still be a rare phenomenon. In fact they would be thrilled. That's the way an intelligence behave.

    18. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's bitztream, the autism-hating Slashdot troll!

    19. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      On occasion, but the vast majority of time that we make noises to attract animals is so we can shoot them.

      Is that actually true? I don't think that it is. I think mostly when we want to attract things for the purpose of killing them, we use smell or a visible lure.

      Go for it. Please enumerate all the different lures we use for hunting and the frequencies of use. That way you can really prove that we use something other than noise and that *you know better*.

      Except, you got it wrong. His point was that when sound is used, we're usually hunting, not studying.

      Stop drinking the poo.

    20. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exhibit A, "Deer Calls":

      http://www.gandermountain.com/Hunting/Game-Calls/Deer-Calls

    21. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If they are a space-faring race, why compete, why not just drop rocks on us from orbit? Their problem of competition is solved cheaply and expediently.

    22. Re:It's not aliens by Doke · · Score: 1

      Duck calls are very popular. They even inspired a TV show. https://www.amazon.com/Duck-Commander-Camo-Max-Call/dp/B001BA527O

    23. Re:It's not aliens by CaptainLard · · Score: 1

      , they'll just come and do their studies and if they happen to kill humanity with their research techniques, that's just a necessary part of research, no big loss.

      So...an advanced ET research team wouldn't know that negligently wiping out the dominant life form on the planet they want to study might alter their results?

    24. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nonsense, ofcourse there will be researchers amongst them interested in speaking with us, as would we be interested in finding the simplest types of life anywhere else. They probably won't get the chance though, if their society is even a tiny bit like us, and will be sidelined by government/army/corporations.

    25. Re:It's not aliens by invid · · Score: 1

      If they are a K2 civilization we are no competition yet and they can stop us before we become competition. The only resource they would need from us is information, as we are a limited resource--a complex biosphere/technosphere. One thing they probably want to know is if we will destroy ourselves before becoming a K2 civilization. Are we approaching a "Great Filter"?

      --
      The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
    26. Re:It's not aliens by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Duck calls are very popular. They even inspired a TV show.

      And yet they pale in popularity compared to mouse traps.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    27. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't you find that whole Garden of Eden story ridiculous? Put a young child in a room, tell them there is a toy behind them, but they aren't allowed to look and what do you think will happen when you go out of the room? The child is almost certain to look.

      In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve are akin to children, and to top it off they didn't know right from wrong until after they had tasted the fruit from the tree of knowledge. How could an omniscient god not know what Adam and Eve would do in that situation? If god really didn't want them to eat the fruit, he wouldn't have put that tree there, or at least would have made it somehow inaccessible. Punishing them for something that is essentially his fault is bad parenting. Punishing all their descendants for that action is ridiculous and horribly unjust.

    28. Re:It's not aliens by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

      It's an allegory dude. There's wisdom in the story about human nature. You're not supposed to take it literally.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    29. Re:It's not aliens by Theovon · · Score: 1

      I have trouble conceiving of intelligent beings with the ability to imagine things that are not right in front of their faces as being incapable of committing an unethical act. It seems inevitable, as a function of the way intelligence works. At some point, hominids were capable of committing atrocities but didn't have sufficient capability for premeditating these things. Gradually over time, they evolved greater and greater conscious volition, which enabled them to become gradually more "sinful." Something similar would have happened with language AT THE SAME TIME, because to communicate a message about the past requires that one be able to imagine something that is not right in front of them.

      If the Bible has anything value at all beyond mythology of primitive peoples, then it only makes sense as an allegory. Sure, it contains history. All myths contain elements of real history, but the (a) the main purpose isn't as a science or history book, and (b) at the time it was written our modern idea of "history" didn't really exist apart from what we would also today call myth or urban legend. And we all know that the Torah was an oral tradition long before it was written down, and we can associate stories in it with stories from other cultures. Also, based on the way many ancient writers described things, they barely distinguished dreams from waking life, seeing random brain activity as being visions from God. I'm not saying there were no visions from God, but I am saying that most dreams surely were not, but ancient peoples tended to not make these distinctions.

      So if things like creation, original sin, and the flood have any real meaning, it's within the context of the culture they came from and their limited knowledge of the universe, so if there's a spiritual message implanted in it, we have to be careful to separate that spiritual message from any "factual" content that it completely out of date. Imagine if God had revealed to people things about cosmic distances and quantum mechanics; nobody would have believed it, resulting in a still-born religion.

    30. Re:It's not aliens by blackomegax · · Score: 1

      They'd probably take our form, infiltrate our power structure, and incite a great filter. Explains trump and clinton pretty well! DOWN WITH THE LIZARD PEOPLE

    31. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When was the last time you shot a mouse in a mouse trap?

    32. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We as a species have learned a lot over our relatively short rise and behave much better now than we did, say a hundred years ago.

      Citation needed.

    33. Re:It's not aliens by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      When was the last time you shot a mouse in a mouse trap?

      Never, because I use them newfangled mouse trap what kills 'em. You might be able to gets 'em in town, stranger.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    34. Re:It's not aliens by AJWM · · Score: 2

      Which Prime Directive are you referring to? Was that the Federation Prime Directive, the Klingon Prime Directive, or the Borg Prime Directive?

      We'll be fine. Assimilated, but fine.

      --
      -- Alastair
    35. Re:It's not aliens by wwalker · · Score: 1

      > Aliens that are advanced enough to signal us with that kind of power aren't going to find us advanced enough to be worth talking to

        A highly developed civilization does not always imply rationality, as most of us understand it. Case in point: a real non-zero possibility that Trump can be the next president.

    36. Re:It's not aliens by Rakarra · · Score: 1

      If god really didn't want them to eat the fruit, he wouldn't have put that tree there, or at least would have made it somehow inaccessible. Punishing them for something that is essentially his fault is bad parenting.

      Or, it reflects a very strict, authoritarian, Old Testament way of thinking: "You do not do this thing that I tell you not to do, because I told you not to do it. You don't need any reason other than "I told you not to do that," and if you disobey, the punishment will be harsh. I am your Lord, and you will do as I command. Putting this temptation here is a test for you. Yielding to temptation is YOUR own personal failure and no other, and your punishment will be deserved."

    37. Re:It's not aliens by wwalker · · Score: 1

      Does not have to be a whole civilization sanctioned signal. It could be some "aliens are out there" nut over there who detected a weak signal from Earth, but nobody believes him, and now his is beaming a signal towards us, hoping someone will respond to him, proving his point. Using off-the-shelf parts or devices available there, mind you.

    38. Re:It's not aliens by Rakarra · · Score: 1

      Seems to me that the same methods of luring animals will be effective in both situation. As long as it lures, that's what both hunters and researchers want.

    39. Re:It's not aliens by hawguy · · Score: 2

      > Aliens that are advanced enough to signal us with that kind of power aren't going to find us advanced enough to be worth talking to

        A highly developed civilization does not always imply rationality, as most of us understand it. Case in point: a real non-zero possibility that Trump can be the next president.

      Perhaps if Trump were to be elected by a highly developed civilization I could see your point. I think the Brexit vote is a better example.

    40. Re:It's not aliens by hawguy · · Score: 1

      Does not have to be a whole civilization sanctioned signal. It could be some "aliens are out there" nut over there who detected a weak signal from Earth, but nobody believes him, and now his is beaming a signal towards us, hoping someone will respond to him, proving his point. Using off-the-shelf parts or devices available there, mind you.

      Possible, but seems unlikely that a small group would have access to a planet's worth of power output to make a long distance call to someone that might not even exist without larger societal cooperation. But yeah, for a sufficiently advanced society, that much power might be available in children's home science experimentation kits.

    41. Re:It's not aliens by HeckRuler · · Score: 1

      Signals aren't actually that hard to send out if you place the antenna correctly around the sun. THAT SAID, placing a radio station at a set point out in the solar system isn't childs play.

      I think I heard you can get a message out to Vega with a 40W radio.

    42. Re:It's not aliens by legRoom · · Score: 1

      In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve are akin to children, and to top it off they didn't know right from wrong until after they had tasted the fruit from the tree of knowledge.

      There is more than one kind of "knowledge". Adam and Eve were created as mature adults, both physically and intellectually (Genesis 2:15-25).

      It is evident from the text that they knew very well - in the abstract - that eating from the Tree was unlawful and dangerous; that's why the woman (mis)quotes God's command to the tempting serpent, and why the serpent makes a point of denying the deadly warning in order to trick her. The Bible later states plainly that "Adam was not deceived" (1st Timothy 2:14); he ate of the Tree as an act of wilful rebellion, not childish naivete.

      The effect of eating from the Tree was to transform that abstract knowledge into an intimate, practical knowledge of sin and its consequences, gained through experience. The fact they previously lacked such experience is no excuse; I don't need to actually try murdering someone to know that it would be evil and hurtful to both myself and others.

      Nevertheless, if I did so, I would gain an understanding of some things that I can never understand otherwise (in this life, at least). But, humanity is better off leaving some things unlearned.

      Though God Himself has never committed it, yet He already possessed an intimate knowledge of moral evil, by virtue of His divine wisdom and foreknowledge: "for the Spirit searches all things" (1st Corinthians 2:10), and God has a deeper awareness of the inner life of every soul (past, present, or future; real or hypothetical) than we do ourselves (Psalm 139).

      It is that knowledge - infinitely greater than that gained by Adam - which motivates His Law: both the parts that seem necessary to us, and those that offend. Humanity rejects the advice of infinite wisdom - and the commandments of unlimited power - at its own peril.

      How could an omniscient god not know what Adam and Eve would do in that situation?

      Although some Christians are unwilling to admit it, the Bible makes it quite clear that God knew exactly what Adam and Eve would do, before He even made anything. God would not plan that most costly sacrifice for mankind's sins (Revelation 13:8) and chose which people He would pursue unto salvation (Ephesians 1:4) "before the foundation of the world" unless He already knew that mankind would Fall.

      Punishing all their descendants for that action is ridiculous and horribly unjust.

      God is not punishing us for Adam and Eve's sin; this is a common misunderstanding of the doctrine of original sin.

      When two dogs reproduce, what kind of creature will their offspring be? Cats? Roses? Of course not: they will be more dogs. Like begets like.

      When Adam and Eve rebelled against God, they became sinners: broken, selfish, and partly crazy- in a word, spiritually "dead". We are all born in the likeness of our sinful parents. God is not punishing us for their sin, and He is not forcing us to sin, either. We simply lack the spiritual power and desire to be truly good, and so inevitably, predictably, commit sin ourselves.

      Jesus said, "Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word. You are of the Devil as father, and the lusts of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and did not abide in the truth because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it. And because I tell you the truth, you do not believe Me." John 8:43-45

      Is it unjust for God to punish us on account of our own corrupt nature, which we inherited rather than chose?

      If you found a black mamba living in your house, would you let it stay? If not, why not? Deadly snakes don't choose to be deadly snakes; they just are

    43. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are assuming that they would be scientifically and technologically so far beyond us that we would seem like ants to them, but that at the same time they would have morals as backwards as ours. I would rather expect (hope?) that any civilisation old enough to reach a Kardashev II stage without obliterating themselves or their ecosystem, would also have developed a moral system abolishing specism. In their eyes sentient beings of any kind would have the same right to exist and develop in their natural environment. If anything these aliens could choose to intervene and stop our needless exploitation and enslaving of other species (a.k.a. livestock farming).

    44. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Even if they just want to study us, our scientists don't send a beacon to an ant colony before they come and fill the ant colony with molten aluminum to take a casting -- so there's no reason to think that advanced aliens would do so either, they'll just come and do their studies and if they happen to kill humanity with their research techniques, that's just a necessary part of research, no big loss.

      That metal casting thing sounds a bit like an anal probing to me...

      Maybe they finally figured out we were intelligent and somewhat dangerous and this call is just their way of pretending like they have never been here anal probing a bunch of people abducted while they were out drinking. The message probably translates... "Sup... Stop.... Just wondering if anyone was living there. ... Stop.... Cause we have never EVER been to Earth before.... Stop... Especially not with the anal probing and such... Stop... Love, your new friends.... The friendly non-anal-probing-aliens.."

    45. Re:It's not aliens by hawguy · · Score: 1

      You are assuming that they would be scientifically and technologically so far beyond us that we would seem like ants to them, but that at the same time they would have morals as backwards as ours. I would rather expect (hope?) that any civilisation old enough to reach a Kardashev II stage without obliterating themselves or their ecosystem, would also have developed a moral system abolishing specism. In their eyes sentient beings of any kind would have the same right to exist and develop in their natural environment. If anything these aliens could choose to intervene and stop our needless exploitation and enslaving of other species (a.k.a. livestock farming).

      Why would you think such a thing? Is there some competitive advantage to be altruistic towards once's neighbors? Maybe a society that has a philosophy of killing its neighbors is the one to survive?

      Unlike earth where cooperating tribesmen help perpetuate the species as a whole even if they don't improve their own tribe's survival, there's not a whole lot of incentive for a spacefaring society to foster the growth of up and coming competitors - much easier to nip them in the bud while still technologically undeveloped. Maybe poke at them for a while for amusement, because why not?

    46. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nor would they kill them. Advanced aliens will perfectly understand we are sentient and intelligent to some point. I have no doubt they would have the greatest interest in studying us without doing us harm, because life would still be a rare phenomenon. In fact they would be thrilled. That's the way an intelligence behave.

      You're assuming they value sapience. We recognize near-sapience in many animals, but the animals often have unusual or dangerous (to us) desires, or sometimes outlandish behaviors that we can't fathom. We don't recognize any sapience in jellyfish or flatworm, but we do recognize that they have limited vision and ability to move based on the light. Perhaps the advanced aliens share our level of sentience in the same way we share senses and locomotion with animals, but the aliens have SGNKSEG, a thing that we don't have, and they view sentience as of little note because they've lived for millennia in a society where everything around them is sentient (either computer A.I. or uplifted sentient species). They might see us as organic intelligences that are raw material that with alterations can be made useful, and they might not use anesthesia. Such aliens would probably find our plants to be far more interesting than us. "Look, this life is non-sentient! It replicates randomly!"

    47. Re:It's not aliens by mcswell · · Score: 1

      Someone thought of that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    48. Re:It's not aliens by LCD256 · · Score: 1

      Maybe advanced aliens cultures also have an advanced empathy towards developing civilizations, humans have evolved empathy and while not perfect it is more advanced than most of the less intelligent animals on earth. Yes we still decimate lesser creatures without much thought or caring but we also are able to show compassion towards suffering and endangered species and humanity seems to be working towards living with less impact to the biological systems that have nurtured our development. I like to think that any advanced alien civilizations would have learned to live while causing as little impact as possible to other evolving lifeforms. We may seem boring to them but with space being rather large, having anyone to talk to or learn from might be worth keeping rather than destroying them or sacking the place for raw materials.

    49. Re:It's not aliens by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      the vast majority of time that we make noises to attract animals is so we can shoot them.

      Here Fido!
      Moo cow!
      Suuuweeee! Here piggy piggy, time for breakfast!
      And the hundreds of examples of children and adults mimicking animals at zoos, parks, in the woods, even the occasional weirdo who coos to pigeons.

    50. Re:It's not aliens by Culture20 · · Score: 1

      otherwise we'd be more valuable as we are â" producing art, literature and so on

      "This is an outrage! I demand to know what happened to the plucky lawyer and her compellingly short garment." -Lrrr

    51. Re:It's not aliens by micahraleigh · · Score: 1

      Have you ever seen a war on EARTH where one civilization attacked another to get their technology?

      More likely to come here to measure the size of our barns because of a bet or see what's on CW.

    52. Re:It's not aliens by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      If god really didn't want them to eat the fruit, he wouldn't have put that tree there, or at least would have made it somehow inaccessible. Punishing them for something that is essentially his fault is bad parenting.

      Or, it reflects a very strict, authoritarian, Old Testament way of thinking: "You do not do this thing that I tell you not to do, because I told you not to do it. You don't need any reason other than "I told you not to do that," and if you disobey, the punishment will be harsh. I am your Lord, and you will do as I command. Putting this temptation here is a test for you. Yielding to temptation is YOUR own personal failure and no other, and your punishment will be deserved."

      You darn kids, keep the Hell out of my apple orchard!!!

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    53. Re:It's not aliens by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      When was the last time you shot a mouse in a mouse trap?

      One morning I shot a mouse in my pajamas

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    54. Re:It's not aliens by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      It is in their best interest to study us in detail. A space-faring civilization will, for purposes of survival, need to know the distribution and rate of development of other technological civilizations in order to get an idea of what their potential competition will be like. Raw data about the development of technological space faring species is the most valuable commodity in the universe.

      Daddy daddy, can you take us to Sol-3 so we can watch the monkeys again?

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    55. Re:It's not aliens by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      Which Prime Directive are you referring to? Was that the Federation Prime Directive, the Klingon Prime Directive, or the Borg Prime Directive?

      We'll be fine. Assimilated, but fine.

      but i don't want my ass laminated;

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    56. Re:It's not aliens by gzuckier · · Score: 2

      , they'll just come and do their studies and if they happen to kill humanity with their research techniques, that's just a necessary part of research, no big loss.

      So...an advanced ET research team wouldn't know that negligently wiping out the dominant life form on the planet they want to study might alter their results?

      what makes you think they'll recognize us as dominant? we're clearly some sort of parasite which is infesting the dominant life form, which is internal combustion vehicles.

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    57. Re:It's not aliens by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      > Aliens that are advanced enough to signal us with that kind of power aren't going to find us advanced enough to be worth talking to

      A highly developed civilization does not always imply rationality, as most of us understand it. Case in point: a real non-zero possibility that Trump can be the next president.

      Occam's razor suggests that this transmission will translate to "for God's sake, not Trump"

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    58. Re:It's not aliens by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      Does not have to be a whole civilization sanctioned signal. It could be some "aliens are out there" nut over there who detected a weak signal from Earth, but nobody believes him, and now his is beaming a signal towards us, hoping someone will respond to him, proving his point. Using off-the-shelf parts or devices available there, mind you.

      their version of a The Outer Limits episode.

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    59. Re:It's not aliens by AJWM · · Score: 1

      Which Prime Directive are you referring to? Was that the Federation Prime Directive, the Klingon Prime Directive, or the Borg Prime Directive?

      We'll be fine. Assimilated, but fine.

      but i don't want my ass laminated;

      Resistance is futile.

      --
      -- Alastair
  19. the actual researchers do not claim ay such thing by umghhh · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    and this being Russians means they did not follow proper protocol. But putting all other things aside - this has been observed once so either the bastards 94lya nuked themselves into pieces or this was a just a electromagnetic fart or some other one off disturbance.

  20. Thargoids by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Clearly it must be Thargoids.

  21. Kardashev Type II civilization by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Kardashev Type II civilization - yeah, we all know what one of those is. I use the phrase at least twenty times a day.

  22. This is seriously insulting to our intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    > 11 GHz (which is very unlikely to be naturally-caused)

    Aside from fucking military radio signals...

    1. Re:This is seriously insulting to our intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      From the body of the article...

      "I would follow it if I were the astronomers, but I would also not hype the fact that it may be at SETI signal given the significant chance it could be something military."

      And yet here is some ars assbag writer doing just that...

      Can we get the genital smoother out for this guy?

    2. Re:This is seriously insulting to our intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well a military radio seems like something quite unnatural (in the sense they are conveying)

    3. Re:This is seriously insulting to our intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't believe that SETI has much interest in human generated signals from near Earth(be it from land or satellites etc)

    4. Re:This is seriously insulting to our intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > 11 GHz (which is very unlikely to be naturally-caused)

      Aside from fucking military radio signals...

      Are you thinking that military radio signals are naturally occurring? Do you also consider cars to be a naturally occurring vehicle?

  23. Re: you get signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Like the United States, England, France, Russia, China, or any other country where there is human trafficking....

  24. Vegetables by GbrDead · · Score: 2

    Just for your amusement, non-Slavic speakers:
    Zelenchukskaya means "of vegetables".

    1. Re:Vegetables by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As one who can speak decent Russian, I believe that you're wrong. It could mean that in Bulgarian, though.

    2. Re:Vegetables by GbrDead · · Score: 1

      Thanks for pointing this out - I assumed that since the word is basically the same it must mean the same. It could be an archaism in Russian, like "duma" - current in Bulgarian, archaic in Russian. If not then it is funny how the word sailed across the Black Sea. :-)

  25. Re: you get signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You don't read much, do you

  26. No FTL then? by Camembert · · Score: 1

    What I was thinking, in the off chance that this is an advanced alien civ, like 10000 years more advanced than us or more, then that indirectly would confirm that despite our SF stories, faster than light travel may indeed be impossible if such an advanced civ wasn't able to crack it - otherwise they would have simply visited.

    1. Re:No FTL then? by Gilgaron · · Score: 1

      Why would they know we're here? If they did know we're here, what would motivate them to visit?

    2. Re: No FTL then? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Maybe they're being cautious and don't want to interfere, a Prime Directive sort of thought. The signal could be just to see if we'd notice it or react to it. They could have used FTL to come close enough to observe, without communicating with us.

      Maybe it is only a Type I civilization using a directed beam.

      Probably it's a terrestrial fluke.

    3. Re:No FTL then? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why would they know we're here? If they did know we're here, what would motivate them to visit?

      Maybe they have seen our atmospheric composition and know that there can be life here. It is an exploratory signal. The Sun was born in the same molecular cloud as Proxima. If there's a planet in the vicinity that is chemically similar to them, that would be Earth.

    4. Re:No FTL then? by ninthbit · · Score: 1

      If they did visit, what would motivate them to make contact? I'm disgusted just going to Walmart, if I were an advanced alien race, I would take one look and assume I just found the interstellar equivalent of a trailer park. If you cracked the science of FTL travel, you probably also overcame the other resource problems that would make you want to trade or mine resources on such an infested planet.

    5. Re:No FTL then? by HeckRuler · · Score: 1

      Because we have liquid water? That's fairly noteworthy when it comes to plants.

  27. Not exciting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Kardashev Type II means a civilization able to harvest the energy of an entire star (all of it).
    The signal is so strong it requires that kind of energy.
    Very unlikely to be from a "civilization".

  28. Pulsar? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Spinning at 11E9? or... would actually be 5.5E9 revolutions per second?

  29. All joking aside by BringsApples · · Score: 1

    Getting past all the jokes, and all of the "it's a year-old signal" and all that. Let's assume that it is advanced life - at least as advanced as today's slashdot crowd. What now? Do we start sending signals to it and waiting 190 years to see if something comes back? Does this prove that maybe the best approach to finding advanced life out there, is to simply assume that it's there, praise the universe for it, and carry on with improving life here? Because if that signal is some advanced civilization, it means nothing practical beyond, "Hey look, life in other parts of the universe! Wow!"

    --
    Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
    1. Re:All joking aside by Anne+Thwacks · · Score: 1
      I believe we started sending signals at or near 11GHz in about 1940, so the wait may be less than you think, although I wont be around personally to hear the reply, some of you may be.

      My bet is its the collective leakage from all their microwave ovens when they all warmed their dinners in the break in the superbowl.

      --
      Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
    2. Re:All joking aside by Black+Parrot · · Score: 1

      Getting past all the jokes

      It's probably just an alien Weiner broadcast.

      (Sorry, there's no getting past the jokes on Slashdot.)

      --
      Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
    3. Re:All joking aside by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you feel suicidal, please call a hotline...

    4. Re:All joking aside by HeckRuler · · Score: 1

      Do we start sending signals to it and waiting 190 years to see if something comes back?

      Yes.

      carry on with improving life here?

      Yes.

      Because if that signal is some advanced civilization, it means nothing practical beyond, "Hey look, life in other parts of the universe! Wow!"

      What if they've been sending us instructions on how to make fusion power for the last 1000 years and we've just have been listening closely? We would know where to look and listen. And that's not trivial if you need to position a telescope 550 AU from the sun to get a crisp image.

    5. Re:All joking aside by HeckRuler · · Score: 1

      But don't call the ones on HD164595, they take FOREVER to pickup and then just put you on hold.

    6. Re:All joking aside by BringsApples · · Score: 1

      How (what mathematical construct(s), and what transmitting equipment) are we sending instructions to build our current or outdated systems (like nuclear power)?

      --
      Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
  30. It's a little early to be pushing for Hollywood by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Arrival doesn't premier until November 2016. It seems a little early for this...

  31. Observing a strong signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That a lot of people at SETI are cumming in their pants for absolutely nothing. Maybe a few months from now we'll hear some quiet story about how this has nothing to do with aliens.

  32. What? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    > Kardashev Type II civilization

    Kardashians? Or Kardassians?

    1. Re:What? by skids · · Score: 1

      ...or Cardassians? It was simpler before DS9 when there were just Klingons and Romulans. Now I can't keep track of evil forehead alien and/or jersey empires.

  33. No Mention of modulation.. by FirstOne · · Score: 1

    An advanced civilization capable of sending such a beacon would have the ability to modulate the signal..That leaves a couple of possibilities, Natural phenomenon, or remnants of a dead civilization triggering some signal.

    1. Re:No Mention of modulation.. by CaptainLard · · Score: 1

      or remnants of a dead civilization triggering some signal.

      Proving that would be the second most exciting development in human history...right after finding a living alien civilization!

    2. Re:No Mention of modulation.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The only reason for a civilisation to send such a signal would be so others could pick it up, and if you're doing that it makes no sense to send a signal that could be mistaken for natural. I'd expect to see some modulation, even if it's only the unary encoding of 1-2-3-4-5-6 repeating. The universal language for 'you are not the only one.'

    3. Re:No Mention of modulation.. by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      An advanced civilization capable of sending such a beacon would have the ability to modulate the signal..That leaves a couple of possibilities, Natural phenomenon, or remnants of a dead civilization triggering some signal.

      Here's my theory
      rather than evolving to communicate by sound waves in the atmosphere, they communicate by radio waves. so this is just one of their PA systems at a big outdoor concert feeding back.

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
  34. or Maybe... by sycodon · · Score: 2

    ...they announce that the signal has a blue shift component.

    --
    When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
    1. Re:or Maybe... by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      And indicate that it is only a month out on its current deceleration curve.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    2. Re:or Maybe... by mcswell · · Score: 1

      Afaik, it's impossible to tell that a radio signal has a blue shift (or red shift). That requires spectral lines, produced by known elements, which can be compared with the same (unshifted) spectral lines in the lab.

      Otoh, if the source is close, that would explain why it's so bright. It's not as far away as we think. And unlike paths of relatively slow spaceships traveling within the solar system's gravitational well, the path a spaceship with sufficient power would follow from another star to here is probably a straight line.

  35. Recently translated by The+Grim+Reefer · · Score: 1

    I read recently that SETI had decoded the message. While they're not sure of the meaning, it stated, "All your base are belong to us"

  36. Not science news but entertainment by Provocateur · · Score: 1

    It finally happened, today, here, on my immortal beloved Slashdot.

    The day has finally arrived. No, not the Singularity, even.

    We have even named it. So, all we have to do is wait for the inevitable--when the headlines blurt out the ominous things we have watched only on films like Independence Day

    The Kardashians are coming!!

    --
    WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
  37. Alien Signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Of course it is; a message in a bottle. Wake me when we can READ it (and not just imaging we're looking at a paper.)

    6EQUJ5

  38. Re: you get signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You're quite wrong: I have traced the origins of my family with the utmost care and none of my ancestors have been involved with the slave trade in any way. Now, cannibalism, that's another thing. It seems some branch of my family was quite fond of nomming long pig.

  39. Re: you get signal by knightghost · · Score: 1, Troll

    And today it's called "Capitalism".

  40. Seti@home response by stazeii · · Score: 1
    1. Re:Seti@home response by mrflash818 · · Score: 1

      Thanks for sharing this.

      --
      Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
  41. Re: you get signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So... wanting to get paid for my skilled labor is slavery? You heard it here first, folks. Actually you heard it in 1984 first. Freedom is slavery.

  42. Sorry by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I will stop playing with my 11g router now.

  43. Translation: by Tablizer · · Score: 2

    TFA: but I would also not hype the fact that it may be a SETI signal given the significant chance it could be something military."

    "It's not intelligent life, just the military."

  44. Re: you get signal by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1, Interesting

    He typed that in on a phone or computer that has had trillions of capitalist dollars dumped into improvements in over the past few decades.

    I hate capitalism, I mean daddy! He is so embarrassing when he talks to the cashier at the checkout at the supermarket! Gosh!

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  45. Re: you get signal by Pfhorrest · · Score: 2

    Wanting to get paid for your labor isn't capitalism. Wanting to get paid just for already owning something is.

    --
    -Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
    "I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
  46. They'll buzz our homes by fyngyrz · · Score: 1

    What? No flies? You would take their only form of nutrition from them?

    IT'S WAR

    --
    I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
    1. Re:They'll buzz our homes by mcswell · · Score: 1

      Coming to a web near you. In fact, a world wide web.

  47. Galactic Law by fyngyrz · · Score: 1

    this definitely bears further in estigation.

    They have laws against estigation, in or out. Watch yourself, primitive bag-of-mostly-water.

    --
    I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
    1. Re:Galactic Law by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      this definitely bears further in estigation.

      They have laws against estigation, in or out. Watch yourself, primitive bag-of-mostly-water.

      tell that to the bears

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
  48. Most Likely Explanation is Earth Satellite by retroworks · · Score: 2

    If Earth launched a satellite precisely enough at the direction of the HD164595, and sufficient time elapsed for the distance to make earth's solar orbit fall in the range of the satellite's broadcast, and the satellite was sending communications back towards earth in its trail, could we not prank some future generation by not recording the launch? And how exactly do we know that wasn't done to us? Soviet Russia would have valued being the only ones to know that a signal wasn't coming from aliens, for example. Or some USA billionaire could have planned it, or rogue NASA could have calculated its eventual transmission would increase NASA funding...

    If we translate the signal and it says that a Kardasian Prince needs us to transfer money in order to release millions of dollars from his account, it's a bad sign.

    --
    Gently reply
  49. Re: you get signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    He typed that in on a phone or computer that has had trillions of capitalist dollars dumped into improvements in over the past few decades.

    You can thank the UK government for funding research for computers as we know them, and the US government for building the early internet. There's a lot of great arguments for capitalism, but equating markets with capitalism and pointing at the things that WERE invented under capitalism aren't among them.

  50. Hercules is calling by cstacy · · Score: 1

    WOW!

  51. Mr Occam Says by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A non repetitive radio signal of 2s is some manmade stuff like a phase array radar bouncing onto the antenna. Or it was just a glitch in their amplifier or the like.

  52. Hillary Clinton and Lockheed Martin by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...will surely support your motion.

  53. Yeah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Probably 2 millisecond old, coming from a Rivet Joint which sneaked around Russia and turned on their Radar to map out something which was of interest.

  54. Yeah MARXIST by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We know you and your friends Angela and Hillary want to committ suicide. Why don't you just move to Antarctica ? Why do you have to mess up the White Man's lands ? Get lost !

  55. Hollywood Bullcrap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    There are quite objective measures of complexity, information and intelligence.

    And if you do not believe me, build a HSDPA modem and then come back and call humanity stupid. Or build a Diesel engine yourself.

    We really don't need defeatists like you.

    1. Re:Hollywood Bullcrap by micahraleigh · · Score: 1

      Objectivity and value.

      Zero intersection.

  56. Nah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Not all intelligent beings suffer the Anglosaxon Disease.

  57. rats by mrflash818 · · Score: 1

    rats

    --
    Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
  58. Re: you get signal by citylivin · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Sorry, which country is true capitalism? All i see around here are state sponsored monopolies, global corporations who make their own rules, the military industrial complex and lobbyists.

    If you live in the west, and probably everywhere else, you live in corporatism, not capitalism.

    The grand parent was saying that the current corporate culture of profit driven "capitalism" is akin to slavery with its destruction of the individual, and the race to the bottom. Maybe slavery got us computers and all that, but it also built the pyramids. The ends don't necessarily justify the means, and certainly aren't the only way to go about doing things. I fail to see your point. That computers wouldn't have been invented if not for monopolies? If you know the history of technology that is not what happened. In fact its the reverse. Small companies like microsoft defeating huge behemoths like IBM. (Which then of course became just as ruthless as the companies they successfully usurped, starting the cycle all over again)

    --
    As a potential lottery winner, I totally support tax cuts for the wealthy
  59. I want to believe. by mrflash818 · · Score: 1

    "I want to believe." -- X-Files

    --
    Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
  60. Re: you get signal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Eh, Communism is just as happy to enslave you and make you work for the good of the party leaders.

    Just ask the North Koreans.

  61. Making contact with lasers by Xaer0cool · · Score: 1

    Everyone I know is using their fancy 1W+ to tap out morse code and binary versions of the voyager plaque at this part of the sky. Mfers going to think a disco hit them in 95 years!

    1. Re:Making contact with lasers by Xaer0cool · · Score: 1

      that was supposed to be 1W+ lasers. No signs of intelligence found behind my keyboard so far...

  62. That's it, we're boned by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You know how it is, when you're working hard to invent the steam engine, your explorer finally reaches the last continent and discovers Gandhi there with tanks and mech inf?

    That's us.

  63. Re: you get signal by hackwrench · · Score: 1

    No, willing to get paid so little for it is.

  64. Re: you get signal by mcswell · · Score: 1

    Difference between capitalism and communism: in capitalism, is man against man. Communism is just opposite.

  65. 11 GHZ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Clearly they are advanced because the dial on their radio goes all the way to 11.

  66. In Soviet Russia... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    In Soviet Russia, E.T. phones YOU!

  67. Translation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Send more Chuck Berry "

  68. bogus ranking of civilizations by micahraleigh · · Score: 1

    Ranking civilizations by their ability to use the energy of the stars?

    What about anti-matter? What about exotic sources of energy that aren't understood very well yet (like dark matter or black holes or time space)?

    And how is it that the VOLUME of energy usage relates to the level of civilization? That's like saying whales have larger brains so they have better lives than humans or are on a higher level or whatever.

    And you know what? What if the people there are stuck in 1970's technology but are happy in a way that is entirely impossible to empirically measure?

    You have to really be living in your parent's basement to care about things like this. Another example is the consortium of nuclear alarmist scientists or whatever.

    1. Re:bogus ranking of civilizations by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      The Kardashev scale measures civilizations by the amount of energy they use, not its source. However, anti-matter is not an energy source, and neither is dark matter. It is possible to use black holes to generate energy, but I'm not sure how well. It's conceivable that there are more exotic energy sources, but that doesn't matter here. There's no a priori reason why a Type 3 civilization needs to harness the power of their galaxy, as long as they can get the energy somehow.

      The amount of energy usage relates to the ability to use energy. It's a very general measure, but it has the virtue of being potentially observable. We're very roughly Kardashev 0.7, and we don't have the technology to make it up to Type 1, so such a civilization has considerably better technology than we do.

      A world with 1970s technology could not use energy on that scale. They might well be spiritually very advanced (whatever that means for nonhuman intelligence) and very happy and such, but we can't detect a civilization like that at any likely range..

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    2. Re:bogus ranking of civilizations by micahraleigh · · Score: 1

      "However, anti-matter is not an energy source, and neither is dark matter."

      We disagree.

      "They might well be spiritually very advanced (whatever that means for nonhuman intelligence) and very happy and such"

      You confirm my question about limits of this measure.

  69. Wait! Wait! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's a cookbook!