One thing that I wonder is whether we could ever identify an alien communication signal as an alien signal is likely to be much more advanced. In that scenario, the alien civilization is likely to be able to send their signal at the Shannon limit. Additionally an advanced civilization is likely to be sending signals optically instead of over radio waves. But even if we assume radio waves, Shannon says that the you can send the most information when using a random code. As you approach the Shannon limit the signal becomes more noise-like as the encoding tends towards random. So it’s entirely possible an alien signal is likely to look like pure noise to us and hence we may miss a true alien signal.
More like "powerful radio emissions from deep space". The paper doesn't use the term "signal" at all, and a website dedicated to science probably shouldn't have either (although it did help bait my click).
Alternate explanation: there really aren't 12 silent days. They have
(in effect) a directional antenna that happens to be aimed at us on
the 4 other days. When it's not aimed at us, the signal is way below
what <a href="https://www.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de/en/effelsberg" rel="nofollow">https://www.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de/en/effelsberg</a> can detect.
Sci fi daydream here.<p>What would it take for us to actually try to make such a signal ourselves in space? Really huge explosions? I suppose one weird way to see if they could be alien signals is see if we can imitate them.<p>Of course, that would be no guarantee that we aren’t just making bird calls imitating the sounds of car alarms (or other birds for that matter). But, I mean, if we can detect these signals, if we could generate one, maybe some other civilization would too. And if we proved that any civilization of a certain state could use the same technique, it would at least lend more probability to the possibility that these are something not natural phenomena.<p>And who knows, when the alien armada invasion force shows up, you’d know for sure it worked! Ah, such reckless abandon.
What could create a natural radio signal in space?<p>Edit: I should have done some basic googling, turns out a few things:<p><a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomical_radio_source" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomical_radio_source</a>
> an alien signal is likely to be much more advanced.<p>... and therefore they will probably think to themselves 'maybe we shouldn't talk too fast and say things as simply as possible... if we want to increase the likelihood of being understood'.
Didn't we see a movie about this?
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contact_(1997_American_film)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contact_(1997_American_film)</a>
Just think, whether this is an alien device or a quasar / celestial body outputting this energy.<p>It is a truly terrifying level of radiation. I wouldn't like to be a planet in a solar system near the origin of those bursts.