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I need to set the record straight about something: Papa D designed and sent the 1974 Arecibo message. Carl Sagan was one of several folks he tested the message on, but Carl did not send it. (1/?) https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2014/11/28/40-years-ago-earth-beamed-its-first-postcard-to-the-stars/
The reason I care is that the backstory is actually super interesting. Dad tested the message's contents on several colleagues -- he was curious about whether they could decipher it. He sent it to astronomers, chemists, biologists, others. (2/?)
As Dad recalls in his book, Carl deciphered almost all of the message -- but the chemistry eluded him. However, the chemists easily got that part and not some of the others. Same with other disciplines. (3/?)
Dad's take-home was that should we ever be lucky enough to receive a message from ET, we'll mostly likely need to marshal the collective expertise of humanity to decode it. No single person will have the knowledge to decode it on their own. (4/?)
(Unless they're basically Carl Sagan with a bit more chem knowledge!) But most likely, understanding ET will be a species-wide project -- and isn't that super fun? (5/?)
More broadly, the 1974 Arecibo wasn't so much a message to ET as it was a message to Earth -- same with the Voyager Golden Record, that magical time capsule hurtling toward the stars. (6/?)
That's part of why places like Arecibo are so meaningful -- they do as much to help humans on Earth as they do to amass knowledge about the cosmos. Both those endeavors matter. I'll end there, but here's a link to our 40th anniversary story again: (7!) https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2014/11/28/40-years-ago-earth-beamed-its-first-postcard-to-the-stars/
Add *transmission into the sixth tweet in the thread because my fingers forgot to type it at the time. (urgh)
