Timeline for How might modern humans leave a message for 50,000 years?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
20 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nov 4, 2022 at 15:20 | comment | added | user53931 | DNA encoding is making some great strides today. Encode it into junk DNA segments and then add those to the DNA for some common strains of bacteria and viruses. You get the copying and spreading across the earth for free. | |
| Aug 3, 2020 at 14:57 | comment | added | Mr_Bober | This doesn't feel like an answer to me. It says nothing about how the recipient is supposed to understand the message. | |
| Jan 24, 2019 at 9:03 | comment | added | Shufflepants | (obviously there would be in this case, but including as much text as possible, allows for the possibility of translation in the event that all of the languages that are included are dead 50,000 years in the future, which seems likely). | |
| Jan 24, 2019 at 9:03 | comment | added | Shufflepants | Make sure every copy is stored with many copies in other languages so that the message isn't dependent on any particular language surviving. And also include as much additional meaningful text stored along with the message in as many of the languages as you can. Recently there's been interesting progress in AI translation between languages when there is no parallel corpus. arxiv.org/abs/1710.04087 | |
| Jan 24, 2019 at 9:03 | comment | added | Shufflepants | Don't forget redundancy in language. One of the biggest problems is making sure the message can be understood if it survives. Presumably humans had spoken languages 50,000 years ago, but even if they had had written text back then and something survived, I can guarantee we wouldn't be able to translate it. It took the existence of the Rosetta Stone for us to make any beginning progress on translating ancient egyptian, and that was a language that was still in common usage a mere ~2000 years ago. Make sure that all these copies aren't in just one language. | |
| Feb 22, 2016 at 12:12 | comment | added | nigel222 | The medium is not a problem. Ceramic plates, printed and fired, will last that long. Redundancy will deal with breakages and missing bits. Making the message understandable 50000 years hence is the real problem. | |
| Dec 19, 2014 at 2:44 | comment | added | prototype | But also make sure it doesn't become a meme that people start morphing and playing with, or let it start picking up its own additional levels of meaning over time. | |
| Nov 4, 2014 at 22:18 | comment | added | Brythan | @HDE226868 Thanks. Still need 47 votes for a gold badge though. This particular crown may pass around a lot in the site's youth. This seems to be the second highest answer. And this one is pretty high too. I wonder if 9 is the most downvoted answer? | |
| Nov 4, 2014 at 20:20 | comment | added | AStopher | @HDE226868 Just checked ran a query on the Stack Exchange data explorer, and it currently is the most upvoted question of all time! That said, it currently has 9 downvotes. | |
| Nov 4, 2014 at 0:34 | comment | added | HDE 226868♦ | Brythan - this may be the most up-voted answer on the site. Congrats! | |
| S Nov 3, 2014 at 23:43 | history | suggested | Joe | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
fixed spelling of Pompeii
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| Nov 3, 2014 at 22:46 | review | Suggested edits | |||
| S Nov 3, 2014 at 23:43 | |||||
| Nov 3, 2014 at 20:27 | comment | added | s0rce | Mars is not under vacuum and has an atmosphere (including wind). | |
| Nov 3, 2014 at 17:13 | vote | accept | Nerrolken | ||
| Nov 3, 2014 at 15:58 | comment | added | ChrisLively | The last item is interesting and was somewhat explored in the 5th Element where a monastery maintained historical records until the time was right. The problem, of course, is in making sure they aren't just seen as kooks or somehow killed off in the intervening years. | |
| Nov 3, 2014 at 8:54 | comment | added | ratchet freak | sattelites will suffer orbital decay unless you put them in high earth orbit | |
| Nov 2, 2014 at 21:10 | comment | added | user2695 | Sort of like the idea behind rosettaproject.org/disk/concept | |
| Nov 2, 2014 at 12:33 | comment | added | Renae Lider | While there are considerable space waste that survive in orbits, planetary surfaces are no better than Earth's when it comes to preserving things. Thighs might not decay due to bacterial/fungal activity, but will suffer from all kinds of physical damages like temperature, collision, radiation and in some cases corrosion. Even moon isn't safe; the flag we left there is now white! | |
| Nov 1, 2014 at 0:47 | comment | added | HDE 226868♦ | Ahh, redundancy. Nice, I hadn't thought of that. | |
| Nov 1, 2014 at 0:43 | history | answered | Brythan | CC BY-SA 3.0 |