Decoding a SETI "WOW" signal

Decoding a SETI "WOW" signal

Ok, pretend for a moment that YOU personally have some computer algorithm that decoded one of the SETI@home work units and you actually found one of those magic "WOW" signals yourself. So you download lots of work units and you get the complete message that was transmitted by ET.

So, pretend its like in the film "Contact" with Jodie Foster. You have the full message, thousands of lines of code. Lets say you find the "Primmer" and you piece together lots and lots of incredibly complex technical and engineering drawings. Wow, now that would be incredible, wouldn't it!!!

So naturally you email the project scientists here at SETI@home to let them know the incredible discovery you made.

Now remember what you found, and what your saying in the email to tell the SETI@home scientists;
Your saying YOU detected extraterrestrials, you decoded the signal, you have the complete set of engineering drawings, but your unable to interpret the drawings by yourself without help because they are so complex. You don't know what the engineering drawings mean? After all, your just an ordinary Joe-soap. Even if you sent the drawings to the SETI scientists, they would most likely say you drew them yourself on your own computer.

What if they did not believe you when you emailed them? Who would you tell? Remember there are so many lunatics out there today, anyone suggesting they found ET and decoded all his engineering drawings won't be believed!! You can't tell the cops, they will arrest you! You can't tell a priest, he will think your anti God. You can't tell your family cos they will dis-own you. Even scientists who work in the field of SETI are so wary of lunatics they don't pay any attention to your rubbish.

How far would you go to try to learn and understand the incredibly complex engineering drawings?

What would you do if this fictitious situation were real?

John.
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Right on, let the astronomers interpret potential radio ETI signals.

If your methodology is sound, you'll be able to show and prove to anyone your findings and how you arrived at them.

The rest is just fearful fodder because of not being able to fool everyone into thinking you've found something when you really haven't.

If you make bold claims and can back them, people will listen. If people aren't listening, then they're trying to tell you something, and it isn't that they just don't understand.

There are many people with many claims who also have evidence to back their claims up. But because people won't believe an incredible story such as this, that evidence would go untouched by those who would understand it and maybe even accept it. Just because someone doesn't believe you, doesn't make it untrue. At a time no one believed we could go into space, much less the moon. But we did. Now are the people with the evidence that we could make it "UFO entusiasts" who were crazy?
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"By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible". Hebrews 11.3

Sorry, but that's not true. Plenty of scientists would be more than willing to hear your story and see your evidence if there's anything to it. People are willing to listen. Sure, the bolder the claim, the more likely it will get brushed off, but if you have proof, people will be forced to listen.

At a time no one believed we could go into space, much less the moon. But we did.

Just because someone doesn't believe you, doesn't make it untrue.

Science isn't simply about somebody "believing" you through faith. Science is about observation, repetition, and critical thought. Don't worry about people "believing" you. Give them all the evidence you have and let them sort through it for themselves.

OzzFan its interesting that you mention the word "faith" when talking about science. Because even though scientists never like to use the word faith, they still MUST have faith that when they carry out research, they must trust the scientific work done by others. For instance, one gravitational research scientist must "trust" and have "faith" that Newton and Einstein's formula's are 100% correct. If Newton and Einstein's formula's are wrong, then all NEW research based on those formula's will be wrong!

So funny as it might be, scientists must trust and have faith in the work done by others in the past.

Now another thing to add to that is that scientists, no matter how reputable and qualified they are, they are human and they do make mistakes. And another thing, scientists also tell lies just like any other person. They tell lies and make up results just to finish a paper and get it published. This happens far more frequently than you think! And peer review does not alway weed it out. If i'm peer reviewing another scientists paper, i will tend to simply have faith and trust that he did all the work. Thats how bad science ends up in mainstream science text books. Bad science does slip through the net.

OzzFan i personally believe that hugh sections of todays mainstream science are based on assumptions and bad science. Putting it simply, far too many scientists just simply "trust" the work done by others and base their research on science that was never 100% proven. OzzFan i know this for a fact! Why?? Because i have found tonnes of stuff that is just bad science and i'm about to publish this in the coming months. One of those errors is to do with gravity research, and the error is colossal.

John.

You see OzzFan,
I will give you another example of blind faith in modern science;

Evolution!!!

Now don't jump the gun here!!! Open your mind and don't simply quote something you heard someone else saying or something you were taught in school!

Fact; Charles Darwin's theory of HUMAN evolution is still just a theory. If your a genuinely scientifically minded person, then you will have to concede that we DON'T have a full concise record of human skulls leading from 2 million years ago to present day. We have partial fragments of a few species of very different monkey's and variations of Neanderthal man. We do not have a complete record leading to the modern human brain. But!!! Any good scientist will kind of "make room" to allow the theory to work. In other words, we have "faith" that as time goes on, we will build a better picture of evolution.

Also, we have absolutely no proof yet of how life can actually spontaneously start by itself in the primordial earth situation. So that is also an assumption and most scientists are happy to ASSUME on BLIND FAITH that we will work out the biology of single cell RNA life eventually.

Now thats a lot of blind faith and trust, and assuming we will eventually find the scientific evidence! And in science class in schools, evolution is now being taught as 100% fact! What if it turns out to be wrong?

How long should we wait for the bio scientists to find exactly how life gets started by itself in primordial goo? Should we keep going on blind faith for 50 years? 500 years? 5,000 years? After that, it starts to sound like religion.

You see i'm just making the point that Hugh sections of science do depend on stuff that has not been proven yet! I don't care which is right or which is wrong. I don't care if i evolved from simple life or if an invisible God put me here. I just want to know which is right. And so far, neither science nor religion has given us a 100% correct answer? This is why i'm so driven to find the answer to this question myself!

John.
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Wow. You're lack of understanding of science and the entire scientific process is astounding.

Everything in science is just a theory. Gravity. Evolution. All of it. We call them theories because at any moment newfound information could change what we think. Some of your claims intend to do this. And yes, if your facts are sound, they will be incorporated into science.

But none of it is on "blind faith". Blind faith would mean that we never test it and never argue with it. Scientists are constantly re-checking their facts to ensure that our data is as accurate as our current knowledge will allow.

The assumptions made about the origins of life on Earth aren't made randomly and out of the blue. They are the most sound, logical reasons that make the most sense based upon the evidence we've found to date.

None of the assumptions made are not done with trying to force any future evidence into fitting with what we've found in the past. Lots of ground-breaking new evidence comes into play all the time, displacing what was previously assumed to be true.

And in science class in schools, evolution is now being taught as 100% fact! What if it turns out to be wrong?

How long should we wait for the bio scientists to find exactly how life gets started by itself in primordial goo? Should we keep going on blind faith for 50 years? 500 years? 5,000 years? After that, it starts to sound like religion.

You see i'm just making the point that Hugh sections of science do depend on stuff that has not been proven yet! I don't care which is right or which is wrong. I don't care if i evolved from simple life or if an invisible God put me here. I just want to know which is right. And so far, neither science nor religion has given us a 100% correct answer? This is why i'm so driven to find the answer to this question myself!

A theory is an explanation for facts.

Just a theory is just an explanation for facts.

The formal concept of proof is limited to math and logic. It applies to nothing else.