WarpMyMind

Hi. Please forgive the slightly dramatic title, but I couldn't resist it. A while back there was a discussion regarding file feedback systems on this site and the importance of feedback in general*, and Slutinmyhead said:

"I only share my files for the feedback. Otherwise, I might as well be uploading them into outer space."

This gave me an idea that I have been thinking about on and off since. It fascinates me. I want to send a mind control file into space! Seriously. Obviously there are a number of problems with this, many of which could be terminal to the project. However, I consider this to be a scientific experiment and I intend to proceed methodically.

My first priority then is to create a file that would be worthy of space travel. Leaving aside all other issues for the time being, I am concentrating on how to communicate with as wide a variety of intelligent lifeforms as possible. Please do not tell me that aliens don't exist, I am making an assumption that they exist - sometimes you have to assume that something is there in order to discover it. If I can create such a file, I will consider it a triumph in its own right. But I could use a little help here.

To communicate with other intelligent life, we have to consider the nature of intelligence. People who have seen the film Contact will know that this idea has already been explored, using mathematics to initiate communication between species that are alien to one another. In the film, a signal was received from space that appeared to be a list of prime numbers, thereby indicating the significance of these numbers. In this way, the beings sending the signal were declaring themselves as intelligent lifeforms. This would be a logical way to proceed.

On the other hand, a more organic approach might work better, especially if we are dealing with lifeforms that are more basic than we expect. Using images and sounds to appeal to the instinctive urges of life, rather than relying on logic. After all the purpose of this file is to communicate with as wide a variety of intelligent lifeforms as possible.

Perhaps we can use both at the same time? I would welcome any ideas that people want to share.
Cheers
ZAP



* http://www.warpmymind.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=5664&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=

This is hilarious because I just read the book "sphere" and it philosophizes about if "aliens" would be 3 dimensional and have the same dominate senses that humans have. Because if they don't hear or see (the visible light spectrum) then how do humans communicate with them.

But lets say that they do live in the 3rd dimensional plane, and that their hearing apparatus can hear the same range that humans do...

So then we have to figure out a space constant... such as light, the elements, and numbers.

"Send a mind control file into space"

.. will that be in English, binary, hex?
Will it contain words, colors, wavelengths, numbers?

Just some quick thoughts

Not only that, but if relating to them on that more primitive level you mentioned, how are they receiving this data?

Not to mention, the instinctive urges on Earth are common to most mammals at least, but we have no way of knowing how truly alien an alien would be.

Their food could be rocks, or something we don't even have on earth. They may not need sleep. They could reproduce by budding, or if they have sexual reproduction, it may be TOTALLY incompatible with our notions of sex.

I'm reminded of a Star Trek Enterprise episode where they met a species that, although vaguely humanoid, was offended by EATING...because eating was as private as copulation in their culture.

zapnosis wrote:
... I am concentrating on how to communicate with as wide a variety of intelligent lifeforms as possible. Please do not tell me that aliens don't exist, I am making an assumption that they exist - sometimes you have to assume that something is there in order to discover it....

To communicate with other intelligent life, we have to consider the nature of intelligence...

Hello Zap,

There is one thought that occurs to me. If there are aliens, and if they are intelligent, why in the world would they want to communicate with us?

Sarnoga

Hello Zap,

There is one thought that occurs to me. If there are aliens, and if they are intelligent, why in the world would they want to communicate with us?

Sarnoga

I would imagine for much the same reason we wish to communicate with them, ie to further our knowledge and understanding of the universe.

Who says intelligent aliens have to be a massively advanced culture? What's to stop them being a race with a level of development not far beyond ours?

dldrip wrote:
So then we have to figure out a space constant... such as light, the elements, and numbers.

Exactly, but I believe that there are more of these than are immediately obvious. I'm looking for 3D aliens, aliens who must experience gravity and therefore have an understanding of concepts such as "up" and "down" and other directions as well. Our words for these things may be meaningless to them, but the concept itself will be very familiar.

To start with, I am planning to communicate in video, to cover as many senses as I can (touch, taste and smell not travelling easily). So no, we don't use english or binary, we use images that represent these instictive understanding (e.g. arrows). This is what I referred to as the "organic" approach. We're talking colours, basic images, sounds, the odd photograph... a pulsing experience!

Another method would be to use science as the primary form of communication, follow the "Contact" method of creating equations that can be easily understood in order to establish the meaning of symbols and set off communication. However, I don't think that this would lend itself as well to mind control.

Ladon wrote:Not only that, but if relating to them on that more primitive level you mentioned, how are they receiving this data?

Not to mention, the instinctive urges on Earth are common to most mammals at least, but we have no way of knowing how truly alien an alien would be.

Their food could be rocks, or something we don't even have on earth. They may not need sleep. They could reproduce by budding, or if they have sexual reproduction, it may be TOTALLY incompatible with our notions of sex.

I'm reminded of a Star Trek Enterprise episode where they met a species that, although vaguely humanoid, was offended by EATING...because eating was as private as copulation in their culture.

For communication I am assuming eyes and/or ears or something similar. Partly I am assuming this because these are the kind of lifeforms that communication would be most usefull with, partly because of the theorey behind this project:

Everything happens for a reason. Nothing "just happens". Every electrical, chemical or physical reaction has its causes and its effects and this is why things are the way they are.

We didn't just happen to develope ears and eyes, they developed because they were of use to us in this universe. If there are other beings out there, it is likely that they can either sense these things or that they have machinery to do it for them.

For the same reason I doubt that they would eat rocks, there isn't much energy in rock. Their sex may be different to ours, but they must reproduce and understand the importance of reproduction, otherwise they wouldn't be there.

So we have stuff to work with, yeah it's not much and after a while we're going to have to say F--- it and leave it to SETI, but I still want to have a go!

sarnoga wrote:
Hello Zap,

There is one thought that occurs to me. If there are aliens, and if they are intelligent, why in the world would they want to communicate with us?

Sarnoga

Hello Sargona,

I'm going to mind control them! If they don't find that interesting then they are welcome to ignore me!

ZAP

We don't know that any potential aliens have a biology even resembling something we would consider life in the conventional sense, is all I was saying. They might NOT have instincts that would be at all familiar to us.

What if they obtained all their energy from photosynthesis and absorbed nutrients through their skin? Would they even HAVE skin?

I don't mean to say it's a bad idea, but the possibilities being incomprehensibly large, it would be hard to prepare a recording for such a job. That's why NASA has invested so much into 'universal' communication techniques for the various spacecraft sent beyond our solar system.

But upon seeing the engraved images of nude humans, there is no reason to suppose they would deduce that our heads contained our thinking, seeing, hearing, and tasting organs, nor that the strange formations between our legs were for reproduction.

I dunno about sending hypnosis into space, but having more space-themed hypnosis files might be fun.

So I guess that I'm better at starting things than I am at finishing them, but when I do finish something I want it to be real. Space-themed hypnosis? *shudder* :p

This one's still on the back burner...