Mensajes a las estrellas

Si pudieras enviar un mensaje a una civilización alienígena, ¿qué enviarías? Según la Astronomy Picture of the Day correspondiente al 2 de Abril, la primera página del mensaje enviado por el Proyecto Cosmic Call es la siguiente:

The message itself has been designed using some of the principles of interstellar communication proposed in the early works of Hans Freudenthal, Frank Drake and Carl Sagan. Mathematics and physics have been used to define the message, so that it will be clear and based on universal concepts. For example, the hydrogen atom can be used to describe quantities such as mass, electric charge and length. To these basic ideas were added simple notions of astronomy, biology, geography and cosmology. Easier concepts and ideas are at the beginning while the more elaborate ones appear at the end of the message.

Any true communication is not complete without an answer. Therefore, the last page of the message invites anyone who reads it to reply, sending information about themselves.

The message has been built to minimize the loss of information due to noise introduced into the signal during its interstellar flight. To minimize the risk of confusion, a set of characters was created which are fairly different from each other. Redundant information is included to allow cross-checking of the message. The addition of a frame around each page of the message, and the inclusion of page and section numbers will also help the translation process.

Ésta imagen es claramente diferente al mensaje enviado en 1974 llamado M13, en el que se da información básica de nuestra forma de vida basada en carbono, ADN, sistema solar y el medio usado para transmitir. Supongo que éste nuevo mensaje es la versión simplificada de aquel mensaje. Ahora no queda más que esperar la respuesta.