Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Credit: Breakthrough Listen

How can we determine the meaning of a message from a distant civilization if we don’t have a common language?

That’s the topic tackled in a new research paper – “How to decode interstellar messages” – appearing in the journal, Acta Astronautica.

Credit: Michael Matessa, et al.

Highlights of the paper include:

• Five electromagnetic properties can be used in interstellar message transmission: frequency, amplitude, polarization, phase, and duration of transmission.
• Decoding messages can be done in three steps: find the dimension of the message, find the symbols, and find the symbol meanings.
• Finding the message dimension can be helped by using prime number proportions.
• Finding the symbols can be assisted by considering symbol types: delimiters, values, relationships, and functions.
• Finding symbol meanings can be helped by sub-symbolic types, redundant symbols, expression consistency, physics ratios, and physics expression patterns.

Technique and principles

This new paper presents a general technique and principles for decoding interstellar messages. First, find the dimension of the message. Prime numbers may be useful in determining the proportions of messages.

If it’s just us, it seems like an awful waste of space. In the movie Contact, a radio astronomer receives the first extraterrestrial radio signal ever picked up on Earth. How best to decipher the message and decide upon a course of action?
Credit: Warner Brothers

Next, find the symbols. This can be done considering symbol types: delimiters, values, relationships, and functions.

Then, find the symbol meanings. Features that can help in determining meaning include sub-symbolic type, redundant symbols, expression consistency, physics ratios, and physics expression patterns.

Concepts detailed in the paper can be used when a message from another civilization is received, or they can be used to create messages, which can teach communication theory concepts.

To access the paper – “How to decode interstellar messages” – by lead author, Michael Matessa of METI International in San Francisco, California, go to:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0094576521006263