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September 1960 Radio-Electronics
 [Table of Contents]
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics.
See articles from Radio-Electronics,
published 1930-1988. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
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When
Radio-Electronics magazine owner-editor Hugo Gernsback wrote this
"Interstellar Communications article in 1960, his mention of "hundreds of
billions of stars flung throughout the vastness of space" with "hundreds of
millions of planets similar to our own earth which orbit around stars like our
own sun" was based on a known universe significantly smaller than the one we now
know. Once the
Hubble Space Telescope's optics were corrected in 1993, our view of the
universe grew by many orders of magnitude. Earth-based and space-based
telescopes have improved significantly since then, especially their cameras,
along with post-processing of images, to where the extents of our observable
universe extends to nearly the edge of the Big Bang. Additionally, whereas no
exoplanets had been
observed in 1960, a few thousand are now documented, many of which are
considered "Goldilocks
Planets," believed to have Earth-like environments. Regarding intelligent,
sentient life capable of communications, that assumes all "life" is carbon-based
and "evolves" similar to humanity. We are already approaching human replacement
with silicon-based artificial intelligence (AI) in some areas; therefore,
supposing the possibility of other forms of life is getting less and less a
matter of science fiction.
Interstellar Communication
 ... The Riddle of Life Among the Stars Will
Be Solved ...
By Hugo Gernsback
Slowly, many of our most responsible astrophysicists and other scientists
have come to the inevitable conclusion which thousands of science-fiction fans
have reached decades ago: Man, inhabiting a very minor planet, is not alone as
an intelligent-intellectual creature.
Indeed, such scientists as Prof. Donald H, Menzel, director of the Harvard Observatory
and one of the world's leading astrophysicists; Prof. Giuseppe Cocconi, and Prof.
Philip Morrison of Cornell University, to name only a few, now are certain that
among the hundreds of billions of stars flung throughout the vastness of space are
hundreds of millions of planets similar to our own earth which orbit around stars
like our own sun. The inevitable conclusion, therefore, must be that evolution on
like planets under parallel conditions must in time produce intelligent-intellectual
creatures. That such creatures may not be manlike at all seems certain, but their
shape and appearance need not worry us for the present. Such creatures may be on
a lower or on a much higher plane than man among the far-flung myriads of inhabitable
planets at this very moment.
Evolution of suns and their planets, when compared to man's time scale, is an
unimaginably long process - it may be from 10 to 20 billion years, depending upon
the dimension of each particular sun. Nor do we as yet know even vaguely what the
exact development time of the various types and sizes of different suns is.
But we do know that not all suns and their planets evolve alike. Hence, evolution
on some planets in various universes must be far behind our own, in others far ahead.
On the other hand, scientists have incontrovertible proof that suns are born
and die; in time their nuclear energy runs down. Then such a sun stops giving off
light and other radiation - it becomes a cold burned-out cinder. Its planets, deprived
of light and radiant energy, die soon, too, as nothing can grow any longer on their
icy surfaces. Unless, of course, their intelligent populations - if there are any
- withdraws into the planets' interiors, there to subsist in an artificial, nuclear-heated
subsurface world. Yet such an underworld civilization cannot last forever either
- atomic and hydrogen energy will give out, too, because in a calculable time, the
available fuel - the planet itself - will be consumed.
Many ages before that, the intelligent inhabitants will have taken measures to
emigrate to another neighboring sunlit world, if they can. But this - anywhere in
any universe - is a formidable undertaking. Suns are inevitably far apart on a planetary
distance scale. Our own nearest: neighbor sun, Alpha Centauri, is four and one-third
light years away, i.e., the time it takes light constantly traveling at 186,000
miles a second to reach us, or a distance of 25 1/2 trillion miles. And the nearest
star may not be suitable for emigration purposes - it may be too hot, too large,
or it may have no planets. Thus our marooned-world people may have to select a star
1,000 light years away - 6 quadrillion miles distant! Naturally they would first
wish to explore the distant sun's planets to ascertain if one or some of them were
suitable or inhabitable for their race. So they would try to communicate by radio
with such a distant planet, even if it took a message 1,000 years to go to its destination
and another 1,000 years to come back. Does that make the project impossible? No.
In a few thousand years they would have their answer. It might even come from a
much nearer world, if they kept signaling long enough. Some habited world, sooner
or later, would be bound to intercept the steady, powerful stream of messages.
Does this sound like romantic science-fiction? It does - indeed. The present
writer published dozens of stories of this genre, beginning with World War I, in
his former publications, Science and Invention, Amazing Stories, Wonder Stories
and others.
Nor is the idea of communication with alien worlds a novelty. Fifty-one years
ago, the writer authored a serious article, "Signaling to Mars." It appeared in
his magazine Modern Electrics for May, 1909.* This was before radio. We calculated
that it would take 70,000 kilowatts to span the 35 million miles to the planet Mars!
A lot of energy, but this was in the crude wireless days when Dr. de Forest's vacuum
tube was still in the laboratory.
Since then our scientists have successfully bounced radio signals against the
moon (1946), the planet Venus (1958) and lately (1959) even against the sun, 92
million miles distant, and in the latter case have received the signals back in
a little over 16 1/2 minutes.
Thus we can no longer be too surprised that serious scientists are now actually
beginning to listen for interstellar communications.
As this is written, the new National Radio Astronomy Observatory at Green Bank,
W. Va., has already gone into operation. The observatory's 85-foot parabolic reflector
antenna will be directed at the stars Tau Ceti and Epsilon Eridani, somewhat less
than 12 light years away from the earth. Specially designed supersensitive receivers
will filter artificial signals from the natural confusion of background radio noises,
it is hoped. Dr. Otto Struve, director of the observatory, and Dr. Frank D. Drake,
radio astronomer, know that this is a long-time project that may require many years
before positive results can be obtained. Thousands of stars may have to be investigated
before the anticipated interstellar intelligence can be successfully intercepted
and recorded. Even if the results are negative over a period of many years, we cannot
despair and stop our efforts. There is always the immensity of time and distance
to be considered and the immensity of bandwidth to be studied. If a planet is 500
light years away and has never transmitted before, we may listen in its direction
for 499 years and never get a message, then receive it in the 500th year! And that
is only one message from one planet. There may be millions of others hidden in time,
space and direction.
Soon, in the writer's opinion, the world's radio observatories, geared to receive
interstellar news, will not be on the earth at all but on the moon. Here the conditions
for reception of transgalactic intelligence are almost ideal. The curse of radio
astronomy today is the earth's atmosphere with its bedlam of every imaginable type
of noise. In addition, there are the hundreds of man-made types of electric noise
generators that constantly increase in intensity as time goes on.
A very large percentage of these noises will be absent on the side of the moon
turned constantly away from the earth, since the entire body of the moon will be
interposed between its far side and the earth. It is here that the great radio observatories
will be located, many of them entirely auto-mated and unmanned, permanently recording
all intelligence for transmission to earth.
What about the earthlings' answer to the distant broadcasting "Planet X"? This
problem, pregnant with many socio-political questions, has already been investigated
by a number of scientists and philosophers. There seems to be no agreement so far
as to the most advisable course. It probably had best be left to future and wiser
generations.
-H.G.
* See also "Can We Radio the Planets?" by H. Gernsback, Radio News, February,
1927
Posted July 11, 2024
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