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Science fiction has been teaching us for decades that when aliens come to Earth, it will be a bad day for humanity. These fictitious horror stories have not deterred some scientists from finding ways to attract extraterrestrial civilizations to Earth, and a new feasibility study suggests we could send a laser beam into the cosmos to act as a beacon for the world. extraterrestrial life.
The work, which was published in The astrophysical journal, suggests that existing technology could be used to produce an infrared beam bright enough to be spotted by intelligent extraterrestrial civilizations. Once discovered, it would be like a trail of bread crumbs pointing to the Earth, and the extraterrestrials could come and call each other.
"It would be a difficult project, but not impossible," said James Clark, author of the study, in a statement. "The types of lasers and telescopes built today can produce a detectable signal, so that an astronomer can look at our star and immediately see something unusual in his spectrum. I do not know if intelligent creatures around the sun would be their first hypothesis, but it certainly would attract more attention. "
The biggest challenge to creating a beacon that Alien can spot is to make it bold enough to be seen from afar, even if the Sun does its best to surpass it. The document explains that a 1 to 2 megawatt laser could suffice if it was shot through a telescope with a maximum height of 45 meters.
Feasibility aside, there are many voices in the scientific community who are not as optimistic about the idea of meeting aliens in the first place. Discovering an intelligent life outside the Earth would obviously be a monumental event, but the potential consequences of inviting a space race on Earth are potentially risky. There is a legitimate fear that Earth's resources are too tempting to resist and that we can provoke our own extinction by attracting aliens to our area.
It is important to note here that there are no concrete plans to implement such a "porch light". Humanity has already sent probes indicating the earth's orientation towards interstellar space, in the hope that something can find the spacecraft and make a trip to our planet. Finally, something could find us, either by one of these means, or entirely by chance. Let's hope they're in a good mood when they do.
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