Session 12: Making Contact

Start thinking: if you could send a message into space that any alien civilisation, with no knowledge of Earth, might one day receive, what would you send?

This might seem simple, but did you think about these challenges?

Would they understand our language?

Would they understand a photo of a person?

Would they hear sound the same way that we do?

Would they see light the same way that we do?

Would they even realise we are sending a message?

Today’s Big Question:

Is it possible to make contact with aliens?

Is it possible to make contact with aliens?

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PATHWAY 1

Alien Life

• SETI, the global effort to listen for signals
• The Wow! signal
• Unexplained detections

10 mins

PATHWAY 2

En Route To Another Solar System

• Attempts to contact alien life: the Arecibo message and the Voyager Golden Record

10 mins

Finished? Complete the Message Across the Stars Minigame

Design Your Own Golden Record

You have been asked to design a message to send into space. You have room for three items: one sound, one image and one object.

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The rule is the same that Frank Drake and Carl Sagan followed: your message must be understandable to a mind with no knowledge of Earth, no shared language, and possibly no eyes or ears like ours.

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You will present your plan to the class after 5 minutes.

Design Your Own Golden Record

Reflect: what was hardest: choosing something that represents humanity well, or choosing something that would actually be understandable to an alien?

WE HAVE COVERED:

• What SETI is and what kind of signal SETI scientists look for
• Unexplained signals SETI has detected, including Wow!.
• What the Arecibo message contained and why it was designed the way it was.
• What the Voyager Golden Record contains and why gold was chosen as a material.
• The challenge of designing a message that needs no shared language to be understood.

Learner Journal

Part 1: Three Things I Learnt Today

Open your Learner Journal. Write down three things you learnt. These can be facts, ideas, or things that surprised you.

Write your response in your Learner Journal, then finish sections 3-5.

Learner Journal

Part 2: Reflective Question

The Arecibo message won’t arrive for 25,000 years. Why do you think humans sent it anyway, even knowing we would never see a reply?

“This is a present from a small distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts, and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours.” Jimmy Carter, President of the USA, in his message on the Golden Record in 1977

For 60 years, scientists have listened for a signal that nature could not produce. Humanity has deliberately sent two of our own into the dark. Neither has had an answer yet. Voyager will not reach another star system for 40,000 years. We may never know if anyone receives it. But we sent it anyway. Perhaps, in thousands of years, someone will find our message and know that, for a brief moment in cosmic time, we were here.

Lock-In Quote

Extension Activities

Extension 1

Extension 2

Dolphins & Aliens

Solving a Cosmic Cold Case