Tuesday, January 30, 2007

If Aliens watch Television....

Scientists have speculated that new radio telescopes may be able to pick up TV transmissions from alien civilisations. Any within 1,000 light years of Earth could be detected by spotting their leaking television signals.

(Left. Dear God let it not be Alf)

One of the first of the new-generation telescopes is the Low Frequency Array being built in the Netherlands. It is equipped to receive radio waves emitted by hydrogen molecules in the early universe.

Although these signals originally had short wavelengths, the expanding universe has stretched them over time. Today they have wavelengths of several metres, which means they fall within the range of TV, radio, and military radar transmissions.

Scientist Dr Abraham Loeb, from Harvard University, said: "By a happy accident, the telescopes will be sensitive to just the kind of radio emission that our civilisation is leaking into space." If ET is producing similar signals, these will be visible as "spikes" in the radio spectrum.

But whether aliens are discovered depends crucially on their stage of development. To pick up TV or radio signals from an alien civilisation, it would have to be about as advanced as our own.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Alf was one of the best shows ever, how dare you impune his character. How some Hollywood scumbag hasn't made a movie of his adventures yet is beyond me.

Anonymous said...

And of course this idea will work because obviously all Alien species transmit and have the same form of entertainment as us.

Anonymous said...

What!!! In a galaxy far far away they have Big Brother? You mean there is an alien Jade Goody as well!!

Lieutenant General Creedon said...

@ Cubaboy: You misunderstand- ALF is God. What I don't want is the Aliens to see the last episode where the US Army come and take him away for "experimentation". This could have a disasterous effect on "first-contact". We want to lure E.T.s here and once we have their tech and weapons - then we take them away for experimentation.

@ Aaron: I have video evidence from Fox that an Apple Mac can interface with an Alien mothership in order to upload a virus. If they have that level of technology than they have or at least once-had TV as we know it.

@ PF: No, but there's a human Jade Goody on an alien planet. She's beautiful, intelligent, a joy to listen to and doesn't look like a mildly-retarded pig. It's obvious we have the Alien version.

Anonymous said...

Alf is George Lucas?, Now that you mentioned it, I can see the resemblance.