US Navy Picks Up 'Martian' Radio Broadcasts

I saw that story on Slashdot; it's really quite fascinating, and as one commenter pointed out, a great example of science at a time when everyone thought it was more likely than not that Mars was inhabited.
 
I don't quite understand: They pick up a signal, is it actually Martian or not and they just think it is?
 
I don't quite understand: They pick up a signal, is it actually Martian or not and they just think it is?

I'm not sure if it would have mattered if the signals were Martian or if they only thought they were, in either case there would have been a major effort to reply.

Anyone know just how powerful a radio transmitter could have been built back then? I know that the 'Aspidistra' transmitter was in the 500-600kw range, but could a larger transmitter been built earlier?
 
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Is it feasible that they could have been hoaxed?

It would depend on just what was being attempted. You have to remember that the basics of direction finding were well understood & more importantly if someone did try to fake martian morse messages it would have been very simple to determine that all the messages were sent by the same person(s).
 
Would the message have been asking for the return of some stolen Illudium Q36 and the extradition of the rabbit who stole it? :D
 
Even if we assume that they did get something, who other then fervant followers of HG Wells at the time would take it seriously? Scrambled radio signals will not provide conclusive proof for most.
 
Depends if it was listened to by the same people who listened to Orson Wells :D:D

Depends on whether the radio officers spend hours listening to the eerie
Martian radio static; then start acting very strangely (disobeying orders,
making unauthorized modifications to the radio equipment, etc.) ...

(followups to ASB...)
 
According to pulp rules, contact is swiftly established, with alien instructions navy scientists build a teleportation device, Martians invade and sieze control of the area with their death rays (shrink rays, disintegrators, heat rays, anti-gravity rays, freeze rays...rays can do anything), and then build a Doomsday device to wipe out mankind/paralyze human civilization till they can bring in their invading hordes, only being stopped at the last minute by a Heroic Sacrifice.

Shortly afterwards, Mars blows up.

Bruce
 
Sounds exactly like the plot to the movie Red Planet Mars (1952) when "Martian" broadcasts cause some major political ripples.

Edit: spoilers for those unwilling to face the horror of 50's sci-fi/propaganda: the "Martian" broadcasts are really the work of a commie plot to destroy the western economy by collapsing industry with promises of free Martian super-tech.
 
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Well, if we actually received broadcasts from Mars, you're going to have to go back millennia to make changes for that to even be feasible. There are theories that life existed on Mars until struck by a massive body (asteroid, meteor, etc.). The impact was ginormous shifting the planet's crust and dissipating its atmosphere leaving us with the dead world we have today. Of course, its cold core is another problem altogether (with no molten middle, oxygen cannot be recirculated into the atmosphere). Now if Mars has life, and that life is intelligent, who knows what comes next. Leave that to the pulps.
 
Well, if we actually received broadcasts from Mars, you're going to have to go back millennia to make changes for that to even be feasible. There are theories that life existed on Mars until struck by a massive body (asteroid, meteor, etc.). The impact was ginormous shifting the planet's crust and dissipating its atmosphere leaving us with the dead world we have today. Of course, its cold core is another problem altogether (with no molten middle, oxygen cannot be recirculated into the atmosphere). Now if Mars has life, and that life is intelligent, who knows what comes next. Leave that to the pulps.

Perhaps it's been colonized by aliens from another solar system? Some low-gravity, space-adapted species that is already accustomed to living inside of asteroids, etc. They don't settle Earth because they usually don't settle life-rich planets with uncomfortably deep gravity wells.

Bruce
 
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