Because of the drift, explained Werthimer, “if we
had looked at the sky even a few seconds later we wouldn’t have found a match”
for this candidate. A signal that drifts so quickly that it can only be heard
for seconds at a time at a given frequency can only be detected by blind luck.
Needless to say, such a transmission is an unlikely vehicle for message from an
advanced civilization
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Now it seems to me that he is making an unfound
assumption. Namely of all signals likely to be received from ET are INTENTIONAL
signals. I think that is It is far more likely to receive unintentional signals.
Let me explain. In the small amount of time that we had a marginal
capacity of space travel. We sent out dozens of probes. It is not hard to
imagine an advanced civilization in the course of its existince from a few
hundred years to a few thousand years for it to send out thousands of
probes(varying in size and sophistication), not to mention "space junk". The
actual number of probes has to be in a ratio of 1000 to 1 when comparing to the
existence of planets that CURRENTLY have advanced civilizations that are
transmitting in our direction. Probes and space junk can conceivably outlive
their respective civilizations by thousands of years.
What would it take to concentrate to detect errant
signals from probes? They would have be narrowly focused. and they may rotate as
consequence of their travels when they initially did not rotate. And in
that case their signal would not be corrected. contradicting Dr. Werthimer. If
they are intended to be truly long distant and therefore would transmit at that
favored frequency? Wouldnt that make sense?
perhaps we should change the definition of advanced
civilization to one that can send probes?