Join us for another thought-provoking discussion @ the Salon! Julia DeMarines, of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, will be leading the discussion! This month's Salon will engage a thought-provoking discussion on whether we should be directly messaging extraterrestrial civilizations.

Host: Julia DeMarines

Title: "Messaging ET!"

When: 11/15/2012 @ 3:00 PM US Eastern

Where: http://saganet.org/group/s-a-g-a-n-salon (to join click on 'Salon Chat' on the lower left)

Julia's Discussion Details:

Have you ever thought about what you would say to an Extraterrestrial? How would you do it and why? Did you know that there have been multiple messages sent with information regarding Earth and humanity sent out in hopes to one day be intercepted by an ET? What would be your reaction if a message was sent that had content you didn’t feel comfortable sharing? What are our current technologically capabilities of messaging? What are the risks involved in messaging? Should we be messaging at all?

In this salon, I will be leading a discussion on the topic of messaging to extraterrestrial intelligence, a subject known as Active SETI or METI. I’ll walk through a history of messaging, what has been sent and who’s been messaging, what are the risks, and then open the discussion of ‘should we be messaging?’ Ponder the questions above and wet your palate with the suggestion reading below. This should be a tasty discussion! Please don’t forget to wear headphone to reduce annoying feedback... or perhaps the feedback is actually messages from ET... AHHHHH!!!! RUN AWAY! (just kidding... or am I?) Tune in to find out! 

Suggested (not required) reading:

• A Protocol for Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence (Atri et al, Space Policy 2011)
  • http://saganet.org/group/bmsis/forum/topics/meti
  • The Benefits and Harms of Transmitting Into Space (Haaq-Misra et al, Space Policy, in prep)
    • http://saganet.org/group/bmsis/forum/topics/the-benefits-and-harms-of-transmitting-into-space
  • “Who Speaks for Earth” (Grinspoon, D., Seed Magazine, 2012.)
    • http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/who_speaks_for_earth/
  • “The METI Controversy: Is the Effort to Send Messages to Alien Civilizations a Threat to Earth?” (Article in the Daily Galaxy)
    • http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2011/02/weekend-feature-the-meti-controversy-is-the-effort-to-send-messages-to-an-exo-civilization-a-threat-.html
  • For a brief history of messaging to ET wiki isn’t bad! Poke around in here (and keep in mind that it is wikipedia)
    • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_SETI#cite_note-3

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