What If A Morse Code Signal Came From Space?

What if they have been sending transmissions out in their own language? What if they spoke in static or some high pitch noise? We could hear these transmissions daily and have no clue to what we are listening to......Why would they speak English, or any language we are aware of?

reply to post by Chrisfishenstein


Well, the root assumption is that anyone deliberately beaming communications across interstellar space wants to be understood. Otherwise, why bother?

The signal must stand-out from the background noise. It must be easily identifiable as having an intelligent, non-natural source (in "Contact", the aliens transmitted prime numbers as an attention-getter, and had a more detailed signal transmitted at the 21cm wavelength of neutral hydrogen multiplied times pi).

A lot of people have had fun trying to figure out a way to make a message understandable to aliens. Surprisingly, in this scenario we can find common ground: Since they are using high-powered radio, they understand physics & electromagnetism the way we do. Conversely, since high-powered radio is their chosen method of communication, they are assuming that we understand physics & electromagnetism the way they do, otherwise we would not detect their signal. Mathematics is also universal. Two and two is four, whether you're counting on your fingers or your tentacles.

reply to post by Saint Exupery

Well, the root assumption is that anyone deliberately beaming communications across interstellar space wants to be understood. Otherwise, why bother?

We've been beaming television and radio out into space since we invented it, inadvertently. This could also be true for E.T.

Just on the original premise of your question, "could" they use Morse code? Sure. Morse is one of the original "digital" codes used for communications. You either hear something or you don't. Spacing in the patterns tell you what the "words" are.

One nice thing about Morse Code is that as a simple modulated carrier, it's has much more penetrating power. This is why up until recently, it was required on all ships on the seas. Now with much more sophisticated satellite base options, it's a more mundane mode. I still use it from time to time (I'm a ham).

For quick exchange of info, spoken word is more desirable. But much of the power goes into modulating the carrier (or frequency if FM).

Just a note, most beam antennas used by hams today, are not as directional as you'd think. If you ever listen to any ham conversations, you'll hear phrases like "...of the side of the beam..." or, "...back of the beam...". This does depend of frequency however. As frequency increases, directivity also increases. If you're communicating at 1.2GHz, the norm is using "wave guide" antennas. VERY directional.

I'd expect that if an intelligence decides it wants to communicate with us, if they're not already "here", it would be in frequencies even above 1.2GHz. Higher frequencies allow jamming more info at the same time.

Hope that helps!

reply to post by HomoSapiensSapiens


It would also make zero sense, since Morse code was developed on Earth and the language itself is not universal, i.e. it was put together randomly by Morse using patterns to associate English letters as he saw fit.

So, for a message FROM space to be in Morse code, it would also have to be in ENGLISH or another Earth language for us to even be able to decipher the morse code itself into an intelligible language.

That would mean that whoever is sending the message, either a) knows about Earth's languages extensively (so why the need for the extended Morse translation?), b) Is actually from Earth, or c) is a prankster alien just effing with us.

Originally posted by eriktheawful
We take sound (a low frequency of like 10 Hz to 20 kHz) and modulate it with a higher electromagnetic frequency so that it can be amplified and propagated using a transmitter and antenna.

Ah. You've got that backwards. You modulate the RF with the sound, not the other way around.

I used to work on Radars while in the US Navy and know quite a bit about radio frequency transmitters and receivers.

I design them.

Whatever they respond with? Lets just hope they don't take the first transmission they get and reply without waiting for more. Err.... The 1936 Olympic Games weren't necessarily the image I'd like to think we leave as a first impression on a radically advanced race.

If we get 10,000 aliens in little Hitler suits, thinking it's a compliment to our Planet to mimic the first leader they had the opportunity to see in a Terran Video? I'm checking out of this nut house forever. Just sayin'

Originally posted by phishyblankwaters
reply to post by Saint Exupery

Well, the root assumption is that anyone deliberately beaming communications across interstellar space wants to be understood. Otherwise, why bother?

We've been beaming television and radio out into space since we invented it, inadvertently. This could also be true for E.T.

I knew someone would say that. This is one of those times when definitions are important, so forgive me if I get pedantic.

TV & radio (the music, news, etc. kind) are not beamed, they are broadcast - i.e. transmitted in all directions. This causes the signal strength to drop-off very rapidly, and thus they are likely to be too weak to detect at interstellar distances (in Carl Sagan's book "Contact", he got around this by giving the aliens a planet-sized receiving array at Vega).

The term "beaming", in the context of this discussion implies a strong directional signal, like a flashlight or a laser. As others have pointed out, the higher the frequency, the tighter the beam (which means less signal loss and thus longer detection range). A larger antenna also improves directivity.

In fact, we have been beaming radio energy into space for decades in the form of radar - particularly Ballistic Missile Early Warning radar. Radars searching for ICBMs coming over the north pole is probably the most detectable signal that we transmit. However, it only says - inadvertently - that we are here. It does not carry a message, per se.

This why, in my post that you quoted, I specifically and deliberately used the phrase, "deliberately beaming communications across interstellar space".

Hope this clears things up.

Originally posted by HomerinNC
if it was morse code, i'd think it was the Battlestar Galactica and the 12 Colonies coming

Galactica happened hundreds of thousands of years ago, they already came here and they are all gone now.

reply to post by Saint Exupery

Note that the Wow! Signal was only detected by one telescope. The signal was not discovered in real-time, but rather during data analysis after the fact. When the same and other telescopes searched the same area, the signal was not repeated.

I am pretty confident that I saw a documentary on discovery or history channel that claimed that this signal was also found by another reciever. From what i recall it just wasnt verified since it wasnt recorded and once the signal stopped they never found it again.
I have no idea if this is true or if my memory is faulty though, but I can recall seeing some documentary that claimed this.

By the time it got here we would prob. Look like mars.