http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-aliens7-2009jun07,0,172507.story
From the Los Angeles Times
How do you greet an extraterrestrial?
The Bay Area-based SETI Institute, dedicated to the search for alien life, is asking space enthusiasts around the world to think about what we should say if we ever get a cosmic phone call.
By John Johnson Jr.

June 7, 2009

What's the proper conversation starter when greeting an alien?

How about, "This is Earth speaking. We would like to know you. Please reply."

Less graciously but perhaps more honestly, you might offer, "Down here we are all confused."

And by the way, if you do come for a visit, please "don't kidnap us and poke us. We hate that."

These are all authentic, if occasionally crack-brained, suggestions for how we might go about opening a dialogue with an alien civilization.

During the last few decades, the search for life beyond our planet has focused almost exclusively on trying to find a signal in space from an intelligent civilization. Such searches are becoming increasingly sophisticated.

The SETI Institute, the world's best-known organization dedicated to the search for alien life, recently unveiled plans to scan a million stars over 10 billion communication channels at its Hat Creek radio telescope facility north of Sacramento.

Now, the private Bay Area organization has launched a companion project called Earth Speaks that asks space enthusiasts around the world to think about what we should say when, or if, we finally get that cosmic phone call.

"Most conversations about this subject until now have been among academics," said Douglas Vakoch, who is heading up the new effort at SETI, which stands for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. "We want to really expand the discussion."

Center director Jill Tarter, a lifelong alien hunter on whom the Ellie Arroway character from the movie "Contact" was based, said there is no simple answer. But it is vital, she said, that there be a global consensus on what we say and do before it happens.

Based on the first few hundred suggestions collected by the Earth Speaks website, that consensus might be elusive. So far, the messages break down into a few distinct categories. Some people want to throw a block party to welcome the aliens to the neighborhood. Others, less trusting, would warn the aliens that we've got guns and know how to use them.

Another group, possibly influenced by having seen too many movies, would have us hide under the bed until they go away. "If we discover intelligent life beyond Earth, we should not reply -- we should freeze and play dead," wrote one contributor.

There is a fourth category of people who refuse to take the whole idea seriously. One tongue-in-cheek writer suggests we broadcast, "There's nothing to see here. Move along."

SETI has no plans to actually send the messages into space. Vakoch said that before anything like that is undertaken, it should be subject to international discussion.

The first serious effort to contact intelligent life outside Earth was made in 1974, using the big radio telescope at Arecibo, Puerto Rico. The three-minute transmission by a group at Cornell University attempted to describe Earth and its inhabitants in binary code.

Over the last few years, a Russian group has sent greetings in Russian and English to targeted stars in our galactic neighborhood, generating a major dust-up in the small but passionate SETI community. Critics say the Russians are acting out of turn, without asking permission to open what would amount to diplomatic relations with another civilization. The problem is that nobody has the authority to grant permission.

Some observers say there is no need for us to broadcast a message. We're already doing that in the form of leakage into space of our radio and television signals. Those signals, however, are much too weak to travel far. A coordinated communications effort would require a powerful transmitter, a highly focused beam and a receiver pointed in the right direction.

Tarter acknowledged that there is plenty of reason to be cautious about replying to an alien signal.

"We're in an asymmetric position," she said. "We don't know if there are other civilizations out there, but if there are, we can be pretty sure we are the youngest." And, therefore, the most vulnerable.

Earthlings have had the technology to broadcast and receive electromagnetic waves for about a century. But the galaxy has been around for billions of years.

Any civilization that contacts us is likely to be much older.

"As the new kids on the block, we should listen first" and reply later, Tarter said.

---

Interesting topic. There is a Contact-like novel that I have been wanting to read for years, but haven't gotten around to it yet. It is about a conversation that an active SETI group has with an ETI. It takes several generations for each transmission and reply to travel, so the questions are carefully selected.

I would think that the conversation would be about topics like ethics and morals, rather than questions like "Hey, is the circumference of a circle divided by it's diameter 3.14159... in your neck of the woods too?"

That is, if we both are able to figure out each others signal/language intelligence mechanisms (modulation, encoding, base, language, and who knows what else). Its possible that their language might not even convey precise meanings, it may just be a means to express abstract "emotions". We communicate to each other in this way with what we call music.

Well I think that regardless of what we end up saying, the initial message will be mathematics. Despite the cliche, sending prime numbers or simple mathematical formulae would be an easy way to, at least, get someone's attention.

Once we got their attention, then comes the hard part. How do you actually communicate with aliens? It's not going to be like Star Trek where everybody can fluently speak English. How would one go from broadcasting numbers into a language? In other words, how could you convert 2,3,5,7,11, etc... into "We live on the third planet out from our star"?

---

You will be assimilated...bunghole!

"How do you greet an extraterrestrial?"

If it's in person, with suspicion,
until they smile,
if their facial features allow such a thing :)
Us smiling back at them could be a profound insult in their culture.

If they have cracked FTL travel,
they are likely to be quite advanced.
Getting them interested in a topic of conversation could be difficult,
unless it is something of a general nature, like culture - ours/theirs,
their route up the evolutionary tree compared to ours etc

---

*** Those who know, don't speak,
those who speak, don't know ***

I know that you have asked this as a serious question,but....

• Border Guard:"Passport?"(weird looking creature hands over a card of some sort)
  
• Border Guard:...."and your purpose in coming to (insert country of choice)"
  
• "is business or pleasure?"
  
• Weird Looking Creature:"+&@~~#%09)(?"
  
• Border Guard:"I said.Is your visit Business or Pleasure?"
  
• Weird Looking Creature:"+&@~~#%09)(?"
  
• Border Guard Mutters under his breath "beep-beep Foreigners!!"(hands back card)
  
• Weird Looking Creature:"And the same to you!!!"
  

This is what I thought of when I saw the title of your thread.rofl Bye now.

---

Old enough to know better(but)still young enough not to care

If its an 'in person' encounter, they came here; it seems that they're already interested in us. Finding out why shouldn't be too difficult. Michael

If its an 'in person' encounter, they came here; it seems that they're already interested in us. Finding out why shouldn't be too difficult. Michael

They likely want a DNA swap to check on their panspermia project. ;)

---

Well I think that regardless of what we end up saying, the initial message will be mathematics. Despite the cliche, sending prime numbers or simple mathematical formulae would be an easy way to, at least, get someone's attention.

Once we got their attention, then comes the hard part. How do you actually communicate with aliens? It's not going to be like Star Trek where everybody can fluently speak English. How would one go from broadcasting numbers into a language? In other words, how could you convert 2,3,5,7,11, etc... into "We live on the third planet out from our star"?

Didn't the Voyager plaque address that fairly well?

---

Well I think that regardless of what we end up saying, the initial message will be mathematics. Despite the cliche, sending prime numbers or simple mathematical formulae would be an easy way to, at least, get someone's attention.

Once we got their attention, then comes the hard part. How do you actually communicate with aliens? It's not going to be like Star Trek where everybody can fluently speak English. How would one go from broadcasting numbers into a language? In other words, how could you convert 2,3,5,7,11, etc... into "We live on the third planet out from our star"?

Didn't the Voyager plaque address that fairly well?

Well, the third planet part out, yes. But what about language? :)

---

You will be assimilated...bunghole!

There's been some discussion on how to build up a working language from mathematics. Once you have the numbers-- say one pulse for one, two for two, etc., it should be simple enough to introduce concepts like true, false, equal, unequal, greater than, less than, approximately, exactly, and so forth. Just select a distinctive modulation to indicate the concept, and plug in the appropriate numbers. For example: 4+3=8 *** 4+3=9 *** 4+3=7 +++ 4+4=8 +++ I trust it's obvious that *** means false, and +++ means true. Nouns would be more difficult. We could start with the chemical elements, giving the numbers of their atomic weights. Molecules would follow. Chemical and Physical reactions and properties could be cited to illustrate various general concepts like solid, liquid, gas, combustion, explosion, expansion, contraction, absorption, emission, and so forth. Specific objects could be named by referring to their chemical make up and state of matter. This is, of course, the very barest of beginnings. It's unclear how far this kind of thing could take us, but every new word made comprehensible would be a kind of victory. Michael

Interesting topic. There is a Contact-like novel that I have been wanting to read for years, but haven't gotten around to it yet. It is about a conversation that an active SETI group has with an ETI. It takes several generations for each transmission and reply to travel, so the questions are carefully selected.

The Listeners

GREETING ALIENS

---

We choose to go to the moon and to do other things, we choose to go to the moon not because its easy but because its hard. kennedy

Probably something along the lines of "...you can't park that thing here. You haven't completed a risk assessment..." Only applies if they land in England.

---

hmm, how to greet ET?

If a personal contact is made, probartl hold my hand up with palms showing, and trying to put on a kind face.

I guess pictures would be the first format, to try and convey information, that or math.

It kind of hard to say, if we know they are kinda evil and have come here to hurt us, I might greet em with the long barrle of a shotgun ;P

---

As a bit more serious, I think we should send an answer signal if one is ever dedtected. The reason is that if the common consensus say 'No', there the is bound to be a mino groupe that does anyway. Its better we are all aware of what we send IMO.

As for what to send? Not that we got guns, a loose threat is never a good way to start relations with another species. If they are advanced enough to reciove signals, they surly can manage to take care fo tehm self with their own weapons if needed ;). And they are likly going to be an older race then us, since making contact with a young race as ourself is highly unlikly. And we would just come off as "chlidish" to put it like that.

We need to send a neutral greeting, maby telling them a bit who we are, and some basics about our culture. We are: Male and Female, both equal but yet different, tell tehm that we are a gropu of many different nations and cultures, but yet one race. Cause for all we know they might be united as a species, humanity sure is not, and they might get mixed signals. And explanation of that is in order.

But there are so many good responses made already that I hardly can think of any decent new ones ;)

---

(Me sitting on front porch doing nothing)

(big flash, aliens in front of me)

ET: *^$5&^%&645*%$@^
Me: Um, greetings?
ET: *^$5&^%&654*%$@^
Me:Er, didn't you already , um ,say that?
( abduction, me missing, put in zoo on Mars)

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-aliens7-2009jun07,0,172507.story
From the Los Angeles Times
How do you greet an extraterrestrial?

Most likely any greeting would be wrong.

---

me@rescam.org

Nanu Nanu of course!

we could do what the movie district 9 does..... WHY are YOU HERE????????

How do you greet an extraterrestrial? Very carefully! Sorry, just my way of getting on the message board.