Based on an article by American astrophysicist Caleb Scharf.
Scientific curiosity and logic require us to answer the question - are we alone in the universe? What can happen after receiving an answer to one of the oldest scientific and philosophical questions - do we have neighbors in the cosmic abyss?
There are three ways to search for extraterrestrial intelligence. The first way is the development of the solar system. The Moon and Mars remain the primary targets. These planets have some characteristics in common with the Earth, and it is important that they are achievable for us today. Further Europa (moon of Jupiter) and Enceladus (moon of Saturn), covered with ice, and by all indications hiding whole oceans of water where microbes can live.
The second way is the search and, in the long term, exploration of exoplanets. There are probably tens of billions of them roughly the size of the Earth and with different geophysical ages. Some of them, perhaps, are in many ways analogs of the Earth. Experts are already trying to analyze the chemical composition of the atmosphere and in the most general terms are looking for signs of the biosphere activity of the nearest of them.
We dream of getting to other planets and suddenly one day, either in the Earth's orbit, on the Moon or in the asteroid belt beyond Mars, or perhaps on the nearest exoplanet, we will find an artifact (An artifact is a phenomenon, process, object, property of an object or process, the appearance of which in observed conditions for natural reasons are impossible or unlikely) clearly of artificial origin. Absolutely nothing is known about him, except for one thing - it is an artificial object created by unknown intelligent beings. The find speaks for itself with the utmost clarity: "We are here, we are somewhere near." Someone has put a limit to the carefree expansion of our territory. We stopped at the border of other people's possessions.
Someone will be delighted, someone will indifferently read the news on the Internet. However, most likely, the very fact of the find will launch a chain of events that can lead to devastating results for all of humanity. The little man is smart, quick-witted and will easily complete all the missing information of latent and obvious threats around the find. Experts will feverishly put forward dozens of scenarios, the Internet will be filled with rumors, gossip, guesses and alarming assumptions.
Realizing that the main thing is security, humanity will throw all its minds and resources into the development of super-expensive projects of fantastic weapons of the future - means of defense and attack, detection, analysis, warning and protection. The armed forces will require huge investments. The economy of the entire planet will go into wartime. Such behavior at a possible danger to its offspring is assumed by human nature.
However, this state cannot last long, in search of an answer to the unspoken threat, the degree of overstrain of society is likely to reach the maximum permissible level and humanity will embark on the path of self-destruction. Social security will collapse first. Then everyone will “forget” about harvesting, manufacturing and repairing equipment, maintaining infrastructure in working order - famine will begin and billions will die. And all because of a semi-conscious idea, a whispered hint that infected the world with its uncertainty. But we must understand that the problem can arise in full growth much earlier than we are ready to solve it - humanity is making purposeful efforts to search for extraterrestrial intelligence.
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The third way is the search for extraterrestrial intelligence using the SETI system (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence). This is a sequential viewing and listening of optical and radio emission from space for the detection of structured artificial signals. This is the most risky and promising job. A positive search result will confirm that life exists elsewhere and technological intelligence, different from ours, can be found.
There is a danger that new alien information, like a computer virus, will infect our collective consciousness before we understand what is happening. Once voiced, it will call into question the existing security system, disturb the peace and deprive us of confidence in the future, change our values, norms of behavior and thinking.
In 1976, evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins coined the term “meme” to describe a unit of cultural information. A meme can be any idea, symbol, manner or manner of action that is consciously or unconsciously transmitted from person to person through speech, writing, video or rituals. We are a social species, completely dependent on information and are especially vulnerable to a meme, a replicated and generally recognized cultural component (remember the devastating consequences of the meme "Paradise in the West, move in" for the USSR, and later Ukraine).
For example, we identify the signal as artificial and, having decoded it, we will get a single short bunch of meaning, the meme: "You will die" or "Never" and the like. It doesn't matter if it is a translation or interpretation error. As in the case of the artifact, humanity can panic and, as a result, an irreconcilable struggle of opinions, conflicting decisions, discord in relations between highly significant elite groups, overextension of efforts with further decline and decay of the entire civilization will begin. The effectiveness of such a mental strike is comparable to physical weapons of mass destruction.
Even an unambiguously understood, detailed message can have the same harmful consequences as a message with an undefined interpretation. Scientific results or technological samples sent to us as part of the exchange can have a destabilizing effect on the economy of the Earth.
In a philosophical statement, a religious meaning can be found and then it can cause interfaith conflicts and unrest. Pogroms and terrorist attacks will begin. Even the innocent message "Is there anyone here?" can become a problem, because a dispute about whether to answer can provoke a serious confrontation in society, up to a civil war. Having found signs of the biosphere on any of the exoplanets and obeying a romantic impulse, we can frivolously make contact by sending a meaningful signal. But interstellar memes don't bode well.
However, we need to know if humanity is lonely? This is necessary for understanding our own nature and our place in the Universe. Then, probably, trying to protect oneself from the destructive knowledge of other civilizations, it will be necessary to build a protective wall - a planetary information security system. We need a Commission on Contacts (Commission on Contacts ("Comcon"). Or an all-planetary security committee, like the KGB of the USSR, whose task was to protect the stability and development of our state from external and internal threats.
Remember, the Strugatskys devoted a number of novels to this topic - "A beetle in an anthill", "Waves extinguish the wind." How to interpret alien information, how to protect oneself from incomprehensible and frightening results of possible influence? It is natural to proceed from the worst-case scenario, building a defense against alien progressor / regression. The same theme is considered in the novels of Sergei Lukyanenko "Stars - Cold Toys" and "Star Shadow". A technically super-developed analogue of human civilization, hiding behind the idea of universal friendship, forcibly imposes its path of development on other civilizations) which would take upon itself the work of detecting extraterrestrial life, analyzing, evaluating and filtering other people's information, for disinfecting and dispensing it when communicating to the public. Such a filter would help sift through and control the flow of memes,like Internet firewall and antivirus programs, they protect the computer's operating system (mind) from viruses by carefully checking the origin and purpose of the transmitted data packets. The protection system could include a ban on private optical and radio telescopes with sufficient sensitivity to accidentally detect extraterrestrial footprints.
Such a protective system could also hide the true state of affairs on Earth from an external observer, or completely mask the presence of life on it. Further, following sinister plans, she could herself actively infect other worlds with destructive memes to reduce potential threats to our civilization.
The best protection for your computer is physical isolation from the Internet. A kind of global Faraday cage that surrounded the entire planet with sensitive elements of the information security system could hide the earthly civilization from the entire Universe.
An even more radical option would be the Dyson sphere, covering the entire habitable zone in the solar system, with the sun in the center, the so-called "Goldilocks zone." It would be possible to physically isolate our living space from a hostile space. On the other hand, an attempt to withdraw into oneself, self-isolation from the outside world will lead to stagnation and degradation.
All of the above is so far only speculative. Humanity cannot develop without the development of external resources, without expanding its territories in space, without knowing other cultures and philosophical movements. We must not abandon the idea of finding the most convenient places for life in space and we hardly ever want to protect ourselves from the wonders of the universe. As they say, you need to be careful in your desires.
The Faraday cage is a device invented by the English physicist and chemist Michael Faraday in 1836 to shield equipment from external electromagnets of fields.
The Dyson Sphere is a hypothetical astro-engineering project proposed by Freeman Dyson, which is a relatively thin spherical shell of a large radius (on the order of the radius of planetary orbits) with a star in the center. It is assumed that a technologically advanced civilization can use such a structure to maximize the use of the energy of the central star and solve the problem of living space (we do not consider the obvious instability of such a structure here)
The Goldilocks Zone is a region around a star (any) where the average temperature on the planet allows liquid water to exist. Where there is water, there may be a different life. Venus and Mars, like Earth, are located in the potentially habitable zone of the solar system. The Goldilocks Zone of the Solar System moves to the periphery of the Sun as it gradually flares up more and more brighter. … In the tale, Goldilocks tries to use several sets of three homogeneous objects. In each of the sets, one of the objects turns out to be too large (hard, hot), the other - too small (soft, cold), and the third, intermediate between them, the object turns out to be "just right"
