Great video! Shocked you don’t have more subscribers. My take is that the Golden Record’s real purpose is an attempt to consider what we want to communicate, who speaks for Earth and a meditation on who we really are.
That's an excellent take as well, thank you so much for sharing my video. It really means a lot. I've been following Cool Worlds for a few years now and I've been very inspired by your work.
Cool Worlds really is my favorite RUclips channel (all genres IMO), if David thinks this channel is awesome, then I bet it is amazing and this video is pretty amazing indeed… SUBBED!
I'm old enough to remember when the Voyager spacecraft were launched and how it inspired an SNL skit featuring a psychic predicting that intelligent aliens would find the disc and send a reply to Earth -- four words that would shake the world: "Send more Chuck Berry!"
IMO, the most probable outcome for the probe is that it will simply be picked up and turned into a museum piece by future humans. Once our tech becomes advanced enough, it would simply make more sense to design faster, better "messengers" that would overtake Voyager anyway.
I agree, we're by far the most likely ones to intercept the Voyagers. But I'd kinda hope that instead we leave them to coast undisturbed, and maybe build the museum around them, like a national park.
Good video. CW sent me here. I recall reading that Sagan and Drake didn’t so much include the disc for the aliens as for the humans. It was a publicity stunt to get people excited about the mission, and to get people thinking about who we are as inhabitants of Earth. And it obviously worked. If aliens also found it, that would be an unexpected bonus.
Finally another great channel to add to the list of cool worlds, pbs spacetime and Isaac Arthur! While I like the enthusiasm of the narratoress, I mostly listen to those channels to fall asleep. So, speaking in a softer role might unlock new audiences to that hidden gem. (Seems she intended that by the bgm anyways)
@@bluedotdweller you know it would be ironic or somehow funny if the voyagers where discovered by "future humans", perhaps hundreds of thousands of years from now 😅
Many nights when I can't sleep, I think about the Voyagers and their journey. To your point, they will likely be the sum legacy of humanity. Thanks for making this video.
Thats kind of a cool thing to think about to fall asleep. Maybe I should try listening to the recordings from it to fall asleep, kind of like people listen to the BBC Shipping Report
Yeah, I love the idea that whatever else happens, at least they'll still be out there, probably outliving Earth itself. We could blow ourselves up tomorrow and all our history could be erased in 5 billion years, but they'll probably still be out there, the last evidence of our existence.
great video. I think your argument is very valid that the Voyager spacecraft will almost certainly never be found. As you put it, if such an object was near Earth we wouldnt know about it unless we were specifically looking for it and even if we did, it would be nearly impossible to "catch it" as it's moving at what, 35,000 mph?
Something like that. I made this video because I felt nobody really talks about this. The golden records are a cool idea but they might be just that, a cool idea.
This is such a well thought out and very amazingly articulated video. Going so far in depth about the pros and cons and giving enough information for the viewers to think on. This is definitely on par with cool worlds quality though I would also say this is also on par with say Astrum or even Anton. It baffles me how you don't have more subscribers but I cant wait to see this channel explode into popularity.
I could imagine an almost zero percent chance of them being found. But it would be SO awesome if they were, it was worth the gamble. And it was philosophically worth doing. Like the current discussions around METI.
You should make an end of mission video. Maybe show how the records will be decoded. There's 117 images, tho you can't show all of them due to copyright. There's 27 songs you could mention. There's definitely possibilities for another voyager video. Nice work with this one.
Dammmm I think I just found little hidden gem of YT. Great video with a lot of merit, very well put together. Shame you don't get more recognition. Helpfully one day your channel will blow up. All best fellow "dreamers"💖
My hope is our descendants will develop improved space travel and catch up to the Voyager probe, repackage it in an even more resilient container and maybe give it a solar sail for a speed boost.
I like this video, though it's about things I've heard dozens of times. Maybe because it's told in a slightly different way and feels casual like discussing space with friends, over a cup of coffee? Anyway, I'm glad I got recommended this channel just after watching a few new Webb vids. All the best to content creator in the future and as players of space games would say, see you in the black :) o7
Nice video, just a quick note whenever you you show pics of galleries, nova n other deap space objects you should name them, like this pic of the Cats Eye nebula..
I have wrapped my mind around the golden record almost enough to know that's how another intelligence would resimulate an extinct human species along with the Lageos saltelites, maybe they already did. Thats my theory. 1977 could be 1 or 2000 years ago & we are the product. I go into this hypotheses more on my channel.
I wonder about the condition of the records since they are just sitting there on the spacecraft itself and not tucked away safely (well.. relatively safely) inside it.
I was in high school when the probes were launched. I so wished that I could hitch a ride to wherever they are headed. Didn't care if I would be alive or not. Just wanted to get out and explore the cosmos
Voyager was made possible by a once in a lifetime planetary alignment. But we still launch probes - Cassini, Galileo, and the recently announced Uranus explorer, not to mention the multitude of less expensive ones.
I think you misunderstand the purpose of the Voyager program. The main goal of the voyagers was not to "explore outside the solar system". Its goal was to flyby and observe the outer planets of our solar system... Which up to that point had not been done before. And they accomplished this due to a special only-once-every-173 years planetary alignment. And the voyager mission objective is now largely irrelevant, since we have transitioned to longer term orbiting probes of the outer planets (like the Cassini probe for Saturn & the Juno probe for Jupiter). In fact, neither Voyager is headed to any stars or objects. Voyager 1&2's trajectories out of the solar system were determined by the results of the gravity assist maneuver required to get them to flyby specific objects. They couldn't be "aimed" at anything outside the solar system. The probes were forced to take trajectories they were given by the laws of physics. And thats all. *The likelihood that either one will ever pass by any object ever again is basically ZERO. Nada. Ziltch* . And besides.... They will be completely dead & out of power in a few years anyway.
Though the Golden Record was designed to teach to some strange and distant beings about our World and our music, instead they taught more to ourselves, about our hopes, our fears and our dreams. Also, Amazing video!
Thank you! Your presentation was lyrically beautiful, and very deeply moving, like literature. (But at one point toward the end you briefly touched on human arrogance. Yes, even if the disc is ever found and played, Chuck Berry will not BE "Chuck Berry " and Mozart will not BE "Mozart" to an alien; rather, just something similar to our own impressions of, say, a cricket randomly chirping.)
The irony of cosmic proportions would be if in a couple of millions of years, future humans find these very probes. And for a moment they think it's from some alien civilization 👽🤣
Maybe Voyagers are destined to be found by future humans that can recover it ..serving more as time capsule / i would like that better than being lost for ever
Hopefully it does stay lost forever. Wars have been started over alot less than one advanced civilization misinterpretting another civilizaion's actions as a threat.
I said the building blocks for life, such as hydrogen and oxygen molecules, MAY have started to form that early. So, the components for life could have formed quickly, but not life itself quite yet.
I don't think it's pointless but I have to ask would another intelligent species be able to understand how to use it let alone comprehend what they would be hearing? Obviously we don't know but it's a question unlikely to be answered in our lifetime
Good question. There's not really a way to know, because we have no idea what intelligent alien life would be like; they might not understand anything about the Voyagers.
Excellent job. The golden record is interesting, but you leaned into it a bit more about what it means, philosophically. It was probably more for us, than any potential aliens who could find it. Sociologically speaking, who are we? What are we about? How do we present ourselves? “Everyone showers on the first date,” is a favorite expression of mine. Invariably, humans put their best foot forward, introducing everyone to all the good things about them and their life. You have to really get to know someone, before you begin sharing the dirt, the ugliness, the mistakes....the TRUTH. We all know that we all do it, and it seems like an unwritten rule, that you have to figure out if you even like someone, before telling the unvarnished truth. So, is that gold record the truth? Or is it a shower on the first date kind of a thing? We should also wonder, “Wouldn’t any intelligent alien species also manipulatively put their best foot forward when/if we meet them?”
Oh, of course, and the shower analogy is a good one. But I do think the mere fact we made the records and put them out there isn't just about putting our best foot forward. We have no idea if there's intelligent species out there, as far as we know it's one big bet on all or nothing. But if they are found and understood, it's good that they showcase some of the best things humanity is. Thinking about who we are and what we want to be our best features is pretty philosophical in and of itself, I think.
Pick up a stone, write your name upon it, and cast it into the deep sea. odds are you will be the last person to touch that stone. Such is the fate of the Voyager probes. Unless some highly advanced civilization, with interstellar travel a commonplace event, should stumble upon them. While our technology is so very limited, Human Optimism is unlimited.
Ιt was never a guarantee to success. It was a desire to success. Same as SETI. It is a symbol of humanity's desire to communicate. It was not send so it would be found. That was never the intention. It was send with the hope to be found.
Yeah, I too find that we tend to be a bit overly optimistic when it comes to complex alien life. The odds of life existing out there are unknown, but focusing on intelligent one: about 100B humans have lived on Earth over the last 50,000 years. Out of these 100B, how many truly ushered humanity’s knowledge in scientific fields, so that nowadays we get to study and interact in (what we call) depth with the Universe ? A handful. Newton, Einstein and their peers are but exceptions in the history of mankind. What if aliens simply never birthed their own equivalents to these guys? It wouldn’t be that unlikely. Granted, most of humanity could be considered complex and intelligent. But what proportion of it could potentially think up the things these guys thought up? By all accounts, their minds were exceptional and highly uncommon. What if it’s the same with aliens? What if the stars never aligned (ha!) for their very own geniuses to get to shine? And that’s assuming that complex and intelligent life is common out of all the forms of life that could exist. There are about 9M species of life on Earth (including plants, fungi, animals and more). Out of these 9M, how many complex and intelligent ones? A single one. Edit to add: that’s 9M *today*. Over the last 2B years, how many species have lived, thrived and died out without ever getting close to becoming intelligent? So many more. All in all, the bunch of fellas who got humanity’s scientific prowess to where it is today (in maths and physics at least) is a handful of dudes out of 100B, this 100B being itself 1 in 9 millions* (*or actually even more than 9 millions if we’re looking at things through the total length of existence of life on Earth). Why do we expect aliens to just be naturally good (and interested!!!) at science, especially the kind that looks out into outer space? A lot of our expectations for alien life and how it would behave are ridiculously human. The way scientists tend to describe them is just as exotic superhumans with a sci-fi twist. They build Dyson Spheres and travel faster than light and sometimes are evil for some reason? They too want to travel the Universe and colonise other worlds and leave a mark wherever they go… we’re just projecting our humanity on them. And since they’re super smart creatures they just find ways to casually disregard what we consider to be hard rules in term of science (once again, FTL travel - why do we just expect aliens to breach that limit?)… I swear, so many scientists seen to take alien FTL travel for granted. Nothing tangible fosters such expectations, yet they’re very present in the literature I reckon. Now obviously I have no grounds to support the arguments I’m making (I’m realising that a lot of what I said in my last paragraph could be applied to the concept of a God, what with projecting human traits on hypothetical super powerful and advanced beings out there). But in a see of optimism, it’s my duty as party-pooper in chief to ruin everybody’s enthusiasm, and your vid gave me just the material to do so :) I know it’s great that we hope and have high standards for alien life, but it seems we tend to forget that none of these grand expectations actually rely on anything concrete. You got yourself a new sub as well by the way, thanks Cool Worlds for sharing the link!
Those are some great points you're making. I guess it's just human nature to be optimistic, but I do believe we have to ground ourselves from time to time. Keep in mind the modern popular idea of aliens may not be what scientists actually think. A lot of science ideas get bastardized and oversimplified by the media to fit a narrative, or simply for clicks and engagement. I think most scientists totally realize the things you said, but the average person mostly bases their idea of aliens on what's popular in movies and TV.
@@bluedotdweller yeah you’re right on that last part, I guess the theories involving “cool sci-fi aliens” are more marketable than their more down-to-earth (ha! again) counterparts. I saw a headline the other day about a guy advising we hide Earth’s electromagnetic signature in case it gets detected by hostile aliens who would then want to invade us for some reason… I get you can never be too cautious but woah dude, that’s a whole lot of assumptions you just made, lol. But yeah, gotta keep in mind these are fringe thinkers and not the majority of scientists - another example of survivor’s bias. The papers must have thought it’d make for a great clickbait article I guess.
Is Voyager's Golden Record Pointless? More or less ! it's akin to a prisoner in jail writing a note on a paper airplane saying I am here in jail please contact me, and tossing it over the prison wall to the middle of nowhere. On the off chance, a passerby found it they would not be able to respond just as if you found a note from an anonymous prisoner laying on the ground outside a prison wall. "Welcome to prison planet Earth" !
Quick correction, the sun won't go nova. After extending its life as a red giant, it will merely planetary nebula so its surface will lift up into space peacefully-- leaving behind that white dwarf
Everything that's sent into the great unknown that's not doing work should be sent into the void maybe in a few million years something will see and say theirs another planet with intelligence out here let's track we're it came from and have a look
Great video! Shocked you don’t have more subscribers. My take is that the Golden Record’s real purpose is an attempt to consider what we want to communicate, who speaks for Earth and a meditation on who we really are.
That's an excellent take as well, thank you so much for sharing my video. It really means a lot. I've been following Cool Worlds for a few years now and I've been very inspired by your work.
Cool Worlds brought me here
If cool world likes this channel so do we. Cheers and I’m a subscriber now thanks David you educate us on all things cool
Can't beat an endorsement like cool worlds. Immediately hit subscribe once I saw this comment.
Cool Worlds really is my favorite RUclips channel (all genres IMO), if David thinks this channel is awesome, then I bet it is amazing and this video is pretty amazing indeed… SUBBED!
I'm old enough to remember when the Voyager spacecraft were launched and how it inspired an SNL skit featuring a psychic predicting that intelligent aliens would find the disc and send a reply to Earth -- four words that would shake the world: "Send more Chuck Berry!"
IMO, the most probable outcome for the probe is that it will simply be picked up and turned into a museum piece by future humans. Once our tech becomes advanced enough, it would simply make more sense to design faster, better "messengers" that would overtake Voyager anyway.
Great sci fi potential there: one of these new messengers finds Voyager but the golden disc has been removed....
I agree, we're by far the most likely ones to intercept the Voyagers. But I'd kinda hope that instead we leave them to coast undisturbed, and maybe build the museum around them, like a national park.
Good video. CW sent me here. I recall reading that Sagan and Drake didn’t so much include the disc for the aliens as for the humans. It was a publicity stunt to get people excited about the mission, and to get people thinking about who we are as inhabitants of Earth. And it obviously worked. If aliens also found it, that would be an unexpected bonus.
Same here! Subscribed.
Well said. Nicely balanced viewpoint. You're either a lawyer or a labor negotiator.
Finally another great channel to add to the list of cool worlds, pbs spacetime and Isaac Arthur! While I like the enthusiasm of the narratoress, I mostly listen to those channels to fall asleep. So, speaking in a softer role might unlock new audiences to that hidden gem. (Seems she intended that by the bgm anyways)
Cool worlds sent me here. Keep it up! 👍
Thanks for coming here!
@@bluedotdweller you know it would be ironic or somehow funny if the voyagers where discovered by "future humans", perhaps hundreds of thousands of years from now 😅
@@peterpaul195 What would be even crazier is if they forgot the Voyagers even existed and they would be so blown away by the golden records!
Pretty cool. Can never have too many space and science channels.
Many nights when I can't sleep, I think about the Voyagers and their journey. To your point, they will likely be the sum legacy of humanity. Thanks for making this video.
Thank you for watching my video!
Thats kind of a cool thing to think about to fall asleep. Maybe I should try listening to the recordings from it to fall asleep, kind of like people listen to the BBC Shipping Report
Yeah, I love the idea that whatever else happens, at least they'll still be out there, probably outliving Earth itself. We could blow ourselves up tomorrow and all our history could be erased in 5 billion years, but they'll probably still be out there, the last evidence of our existence.
great video. I think your argument is very valid that the Voyager spacecraft will almost certainly never be found. As you put it, if such an object was near Earth we wouldnt know about it unless we were specifically looking for it and even if we did, it would be nearly impossible to "catch it" as it's moving at what, 35,000 mph?
Something like that. I made this video because I felt nobody really talks about this. The golden records are a cool idea but they might be just that, a cool idea.
@@bluedotdweller As you said in the title, "Forever Lost in the Void". Perhaps the keyword here is, "Forever". That little, benign human flag.
This is such a well thought out and very amazingly articulated video. Going so far in depth about the pros and cons and giving enough information for the viewers to think on. This is definitely on par with cool worlds quality though I would also say this is also on par with say Astrum or even Anton. It baffles me how you don't have more subscribers but I cant wait to see this channel explode into popularity.
That's so nice of you to say, thank you. To be honest I haven't been making videos for very long but it's great to see people enjoy what I do!
I could imagine an almost zero percent chance of them being found. But it would be SO awesome if they were, it was worth the gamble.
And it was philosophically worth doing. Like the current discussions around METI.
From the comments here, you have a really nice and intelligent viewership!
It doesn't matter if it ever gets found, no matter what it is a beautiful gesture towards hope
Cool Worlds sent me here. Enjoyed the video: well researched and well presented. Thanks.
You got a new subscriber. Looking forward to see your more of great content like this!!
Please keep uploading your videos. They are incredibly intelligent and well thought out. Excellent quality!
Fascinating and very well written and presented. Keep 'em coming.
Excellent episode! Subscribed and greatly looking forward to more. You certainly caught Dr. Kipping's attention. :)
Ended up here on Prof. Kipping's recommendation. Great content and also subbed.
Came across your channel + subscribed
Thanks to Cool Worlds
Thanks for being here!
Great video, you are so good at it. Thank you very much.
Lovely video, very well spoken with a nice cadence to your delivery. Enjoyed every minute. Thanks!
You are a true poet, and l am happy to have found your channel.
Very thought provoking, thank you. I remember when the Voyager (and Pioneer) missions began.
Love the content, keep it coming!
You may get a bit more subs/engagement after the shout out from Cool Worlds 😊. Keep up the good work!
Thanks for kind words!
This is so good I'm glad I found you
You should make an end of mission video.
Maybe show how the records will be decoded. There's 117 images, tho you can't show all of them due to copyright. There's 27 songs you could mention. There's definitely possibilities for another voyager video. Nice work with this one.
That's a neat idea, I'll look into it
Dammmm I think I just found little hidden gem of YT. Great video with a lot of merit, very well put together. Shame you don't get more recognition. Helpfully one day your channel will blow up. All best fellow "dreamers"💖
Great video with some original points of view. Really a pleasure to watch. I really hope that the number of subscribers will skyrocket very soon.
Thank you :) honestly it's been going quite well considering I started last Februari, and only have 5 videos!
You just got another subscriber coming from the Cool Worlds camp thanks to David sharing your video.
My hope is our descendants will develop improved space travel and catch up to the Voyager probe, repackage it in an even more resilient container and maybe give it a solar sail for a speed boost.
Wow amazing video! Like many I came from CW. So glad he he shared your amazing channel with us!
I like this video, though it's about things I've heard dozens of times. Maybe because it's told in a slightly different way and feels casual like discussing space with friends, over a cup of coffee?
Anyway, I'm glad I got recommended this channel just after watching a few new Webb vids.
All the best to content creator in the future and as players of space games would say, see you in the black :) o7
If we launched a new interstellar space probe, Koyaanisqatsi and Baraka are the perfect movie to be sent.
Great video! Came here on Cool Worlds recommendation please make more content. Subscribed to your channel too!!
I'm working on something right now! But I've been sick so it got postponed. Keep an eye out, I'll make more videos soon! Thank you for being here.
@@bluedotdweller take your time, quality content is always worth the wait!
Cool Worlds sent me. Subbed!
New cool channel to subscribe to!! Keep up the good work 💥
Lovely presentation!
Yes they’re are pointless. There’s better odds (and they’re slim to none) we’ll retrieve them before anything else finds them.
Yeah there's that chance. Who knows!
Yeah, the listeners will be humans who cannot remember what the records are?
Nice video! Glad I stumbled on your channel. New subscriber.
Great video!
Thank you!
Nice video, just a quick note whenever you you show pics of galleries, nova n other deap space objects you should name them, like this pic of the Cats Eye nebula..
I have wrapped my mind around the golden record almost enough to know that's how another intelligence would resimulate an extinct human species along with the Lageos saltelites, maybe they already did. Thats my theory. 1977 could be 1 or 2000 years ago & we are the product. I go into this hypotheses more on my channel.
Brings together universal scale and our twin probes. Well done!
Not sure why ABBA are not on the disk ..... the thought of aliens having a boogie to Dancing Queen warms my heart .
The amount of subs aren't fair to the quality of this video
Nice video! You’ve earned my subscription!
Wonderful video! Thank you!!
Great video. Thanks!
Hi , great vid. From third stone from the sun resident x
Loved the video quality!!
I wonder about the condition of the records since they are just sitting there on the spacecraft itself and not tucked away safely (well.. relatively safely) inside it.
I was in high school when the probes were launched. I so wished that I could hitch a ride to wherever they are headed. Didn't care if I would be alive or not. Just wanted to get out and explore the cosmos
New sub...good stuff
Why are we not making a Voyager 3? With updated technology and discs?
Voyager was made possible by a once in a lifetime planetary alignment. But we still launch probes - Cassini, Galileo, and the recently announced Uranus explorer, not to mention the multitude of less expensive ones.
I think you misunderstand the purpose of the Voyager program.
The main goal of the voyagers was not to "explore outside the solar system". Its goal was to flyby and observe the outer planets of our solar system... Which up to that point had not been done before. And they accomplished this due to a special only-once-every-173 years planetary alignment.
And the voyager mission objective is now largely irrelevant, since we have transitioned to longer term orbiting probes of the outer planets (like the Cassini probe for Saturn & the Juno probe for Jupiter).
In fact, neither Voyager is headed to any stars or objects. Voyager 1&2's trajectories out of the solar system were determined by the results of the gravity assist maneuver required to get them to flyby specific objects. They couldn't be "aimed" at anything outside the solar system. The probes were forced to take trajectories they were given by the laws of physics. And thats all.
*The likelihood that either one will ever pass by any object ever again is basically ZERO. Nada. Ziltch* .
And besides.... They will be completely dead & out of power in a few years anyway.
Though the Golden Record was designed to teach to some strange and distant beings about our World and our music, instead they taught more to ourselves, about our hopes, our fears and our dreams.
Also, Amazing video!
Bluedotdweller... Such a cool name 👍🌎
Thank you! Your presentation was lyrically beautiful, and very deeply moving, like literature.
(But at one point toward the end you briefly touched on human arrogance. Yes, even if the disc is ever found and played, Chuck Berry will not BE "Chuck Berry " and Mozart will not BE "Mozart" to an alien; rather, just something similar to our own impressions of, say, a cricket randomly chirping.)
Awesome video
Your content is good
Loved your video
I got goosebumps at the end of this.
Great video. Very informative
Hey you gained a subscriber
Give me more videos like this
Subbed. Sent from cool worlds
We'll know what kind of aliens we're dealing with as soon as we get a response. It's either gonna be "Send more Mozart" or "Send more Chuck Berry"
Whatever is possible is inevitable
Anyone who finds that golden record will know we cared enough to make contact.
Subbed from CW
Thanks for subscribing!
Nice video indeed
Followed Cool Worlds here
Talk about existential dread!
The irony of cosmic proportions would be if in a couple of millions of years, future humans find these very probes. And for a moment they think it's from some alien civilization 👽🤣
it won't be millions
likely a hundred or two hundred years
Best reasonable estimate, there are or have been 20 civilizations in our galaxy over the last 9 billion years. With an error of + - 95%.
Awesome video, you cool nerd 🤓 ✌️
Thank you!
Maybe Voyagers are destined to be found by future humans that can recover it ..serving more as time capsule / i would like that better than being lost for ever
What if those who discover it are an advanced warrior civilization bent on conquest, and we just told them we are here.
Hopefully it does stay lost forever. Wars have been started over alot less than one advanced civilization misinterpretting another civilizaion's actions as a threat.
That's scary to think about! You could be right.
The sobering thought is that after 4.6x10^9 yrs and at least a billion species only one technical civilization has arisen here on Earth.
779? oh wow! I had to double take.
Sorry for the nit pick but isnt it “we think life may have started 100m years after earth formed” and not “100m years after the big bang״
I said the building blocks for life, such as hydrogen and oxygen molecules, MAY have started to form that early. So, the components for life could have formed quickly, but not life itself quite yet.
I don't think it's pointless but I have to ask would another intelligent species be able to understand how to use it let alone comprehend what they would be hearing? Obviously we don't know but it's a question unlikely to be answered in our lifetime
Good question. There's not really a way to know, because we have no idea what intelligent alien life would be like; they might not understand anything about the Voyagers.
There is a theoretical chance somebody will find it so it is not utterly pointless.
As mentioned by either derek from veritausium or Micheal from Vsauce , This golden record is meant more for us than the aliens
Excellent job. The golden record is interesting, but you leaned into it a bit more about what it means, philosophically. It was probably more for us, than any potential aliens who could find it.
Sociologically speaking, who are we? What are we about? How do we present ourselves? “Everyone showers on the first date,” is a favorite expression of mine. Invariably, humans put their best foot forward, introducing everyone to all the good things about them and their life. You have to really get to know someone, before you begin sharing the dirt, the ugliness, the mistakes....the TRUTH. We all know that we all do it, and it seems like an unwritten rule, that you have to figure out if you even like someone, before telling the unvarnished truth.
So, is that gold record the truth? Or is it a shower on the first date kind of a thing? We should also wonder, “Wouldn’t any intelligent alien species also manipulatively put their best foot forward when/if we meet them?”
Oh, of course, and the shower analogy is a good one. But I do think the mere fact we made the records and put them out there isn't just about putting our best foot forward. We have no idea if there's intelligent species out there, as far as we know it's one big bet on all or nothing. But if they are found and understood, it's good that they showcase some of the best things humanity is. Thinking about who we are and what we want to be our best features is pretty philosophical in and of itself, I think.
Pick up a stone, write your name upon it, and cast it into the deep sea. odds are you will be the last person to touch that stone. Such is the fate of the Voyager probes. Unless some highly advanced civilization, with interstellar travel a commonplace event, should stumble upon them. While our technology is so very limited, Human Optimism is unlimited.
It will probably fall into a gravity well and will be smashed or melted depending on the parent body.
are you EvolutionSquare?? If not you sound and look JUST like her. If you are, I'm so glad you're branching out!
Oh no, I am not her and I've never even heard of her before this moment, but she does look like a fun person, so thank you :)
@@bluedotdweller no worries! this channel piques my interest just as well, if not more. Keep at it :)
I am smitten!
Hey... Im your new family member 😜
Ιt was never a guarantee to success. It was a desire to success. Same as SETI. It is a symbol of humanity's desire to communicate. It was not send so it would be found. That was never the intention. It was send with the hope to be found.
An old Star trek show found voyager lol
Unfortunately that was fiction
Yeah, I too find that we tend to be a bit overly optimistic when it comes to complex alien life.
The odds of life existing out there are unknown, but focusing on intelligent one: about 100B humans have lived on Earth over the last 50,000 years. Out of these 100B, how many truly ushered humanity’s knowledge in scientific fields, so that nowadays we get to study and interact in (what we call) depth with the Universe ? A handful. Newton, Einstein and their peers are but exceptions in the history of mankind. What if aliens simply never birthed their own equivalents to these guys? It wouldn’t be that unlikely. Granted, most of humanity could be considered complex and intelligent. But what proportion of it could potentially think up the things these guys thought up? By all accounts, their minds were exceptional and highly uncommon. What if it’s the same with aliens? What if the stars never aligned (ha!) for their very own geniuses to get to shine?
And that’s assuming that complex and intelligent life is common out of all the forms of life that could exist. There are about 9M species of life on Earth (including plants, fungi, animals and more). Out of these 9M, how many complex and intelligent ones? A single one.
Edit to add: that’s 9M *today*. Over the last 2B years, how many species have lived, thrived and died out without ever getting close to becoming intelligent? So many more.
All in all, the bunch of fellas who got humanity’s scientific prowess to where it is today (in maths and physics at least) is a handful of dudes out of 100B, this 100B being itself 1 in 9 millions* (*or actually even more than 9 millions if we’re looking at things through the total length of existence of life on Earth).
Why do we expect aliens to just be naturally good (and interested!!!) at science, especially the kind that looks out into outer space?
A lot of our expectations for alien life and how it would behave are ridiculously human. The way scientists tend to describe them is just as exotic superhumans with a sci-fi twist. They build Dyson Spheres and travel faster than light and sometimes are evil for some reason? They too want to travel the Universe and colonise other worlds and leave a mark wherever they go… we’re just projecting our humanity on them. And since they’re super smart creatures they just find ways to casually disregard what we consider to be hard rules in term of science (once again, FTL travel - why do we just expect aliens to breach that limit?)… I swear, so many scientists seen to take alien FTL travel for granted. Nothing tangible fosters such expectations, yet they’re very present in the literature I reckon.
Now obviously I have no grounds to support the arguments I’m making (I’m realising that a lot of what I said in my last paragraph could be applied to the concept of a God, what with projecting human traits on hypothetical super powerful and advanced beings out there). But in a see of optimism, it’s my duty as party-pooper in chief to ruin everybody’s enthusiasm, and your vid gave me just the material to do so :)
I know it’s great that we hope and have high standards for alien life, but it seems we tend to forget that none of these grand expectations actually rely on anything concrete.
You got yourself a new sub as well by the way, thanks Cool Worlds for sharing the link!
Those are some great points you're making. I guess it's just human nature to be optimistic, but I do believe we have to ground ourselves from time to time. Keep in mind the modern popular idea of aliens may not be what scientists actually think. A lot of science ideas get bastardized and oversimplified by the media to fit a narrative, or simply for clicks and engagement.
I think most scientists totally realize the things you said, but the average person mostly bases their idea of aliens on what's popular in movies and TV.
@@bluedotdweller yeah you’re right on that last part, I guess the theories involving “cool sci-fi aliens” are more marketable than their more down-to-earth (ha! again) counterparts. I saw a headline the other day about a guy advising we hide Earth’s electromagnetic signature in case it gets detected by hostile aliens who would then want to invade us for some reason… I get you can never be too cautious but woah dude, that’s a whole lot of assumptions you just made, lol.
But yeah, gotta keep in mind these are fringe thinkers and not the majority of scientists - another example of survivor’s bias. The papers must have thought it’d make for a great clickbait article I guess.
Is Voyager's Golden Record Pointless? More or less ! it's akin to a prisoner in jail writing a note on a paper airplane saying I am here in jail please contact me, and tossing it over the prison wall to the middle of nowhere. On the off chance, a passerby found it they would not be able to respond just as if you found a note from an anonymous prisoner laying on the ground outside a prison wall. "Welcome to prison planet Earth" !
Quick correction, the sun won't go nova. After extending its life as a red giant, it will merely planetary nebula so its surface will lift up into space peacefully-- leaving behind that white dwarf
I looked it up again - and you're right. The Sun's end is a bit less dramatic than I remember.
@@bluedotdweller don't worry, just a friendly astrophysics major here to point out a very minor misspeak in an otherwise amazing video
I doubt if we are alone? Pretty naive to think that we are alone with such proportional odds in terms of the infinate universe??
Everything that's sent into the great unknown that's not doing work should be sent into the void maybe in a few million years something will see and say theirs another planet with intelligence out here let's track we're it came from and have a look
You voice is beautiful you look gorgeous