Technology invades the modern world

Chapter 493 What is this?
"Yes, as you have heard the rumors, we have received a signal from the universe. We have preliminarily ruled out the possibility that the signal came from an Earth country, but we still have no way of confirming that it really comes from an extraterrestrial civilization as rumored, because it is just a sequence of prime numbers."

Perhaps it's just a joke played by the universe and humanity.

Therefore, we need to hold a press conference like this to explain the situation clearly to the people of the whole country.

At the same time, I would like to appeal to the people of America to calm down and leave this task to NASA. Do not go to the deep mountains and forests to look for traces of aliens, and do not listen to the calls of a few media outlets to sneak into military bases to look for alien corpses.

Please trust me, trust NASA, we will handle this matter properly. Any new developments will be explained to the nation through press conferences, just as we are doing now.

Lin Ran sat in the East Room of the White House, next to Nixon.

This White House press conference was broadcast live to the nation.

The American flag in the background, the podium that had already been set up, and the rows of simple plastic chairs below the stage filled with journalists from different media outlets around the world.

Nixon spoke first, explaining the current situation and emphasizing that America had the ability to solve any challenge, whether it came from the Soviet Union or from outer space.

For a Cold War-era president like America, such a statement was quite conciliatory.

Soviet Russia was merely a challenge, not a problem, and was only mentioned simply as an example.

Clearly, none of the reporters present were very interested in Nixon. During the subsequent Q&A session, all, yes, all the reporters turned their questions to Lin Ran.

Nobody cared what Nixon said, and nobody cared whether Nixon could solve the problem.

All the president needs to do is approve the budget for NASA, right? Any president could do that, could they? That's what the reporters thought, and that's what the American citizens watching this explosive news on television thought as well.

"Me? Of course I hope this is a signal from extraterrestrial life, because it would mean that civilization is capable of leaving its home planet."

The universe is so vast, and humanity is so lonely. If this signal comes from extraterrestrial life, then I think we can gain the motivation to leave Earth and draw inspiration from their technology through communication with extraterrestrial life.

Just as England brought about the first Industrial Revolution, the Age of Exploration spread technology across the globe.

This is a good thing for civilization.

"War? I'm not too afraid of wars waged by extraterrestrial civilizations, nor will I place my hopes on their benevolence. I simply believe that humanity is capable of solving any problem."

The reporters bombarded Lin Ran with questions one after another, and Lin Ran didn't stop.

Nixon, sitting next to him, seemed more like an assistant to the director.

He finally understood what he had heard from long-time White House staff about the rift between Johnson and Lin Ran, and where Johnson's dissatisfaction with Lin Ran came from. If you experienced a few more such situations, you would also feel dissatisfied.

Even though he was the president, he didn't hear "Mr. President, what do you think?" but instead kept hearing "Professor", as if they were not in the East Room of the White House, but in a classroom at Columbia University.

"Professor, if there really is an extraterrestrial civilization, and humanity has entrusted you with the role of messenger to communicate with them, what would be your first words?" Jenny, who had been waiting for a long time, stood up and asked.

Lin Ran explained to her what had happened, and instead of waiting until they returned to the villa, they went directly to the East Room of the White House around noon.

After a moment's thought, Lin Ran said, "At this point in time, humanity welcomes your arrival."

On the television, the image was focused on Lin Ran. Nixon only occupied a corner of the screen, and his entire face was not even fully visible. He seemed to be just an insignificant shadow on the scene.

"Gentlemen, I've detected a signal! It's incredibly strong! I thought my receiver was broken! This signal is even stronger than the last one, and the waveform is different too!" Juan rushed in.

Juan shares the same name as Prince Juan, but he is not the Spanish prince. Instead, he is the eldest son of a wealthy local family in Puerto Rico and a radio enthusiast who provided them with his observation point on the edge of the Arecibo Valley.

Here in the highlands of the Arecibo Valley, amidst a dense thicket of bromeliads, the most striking feature besides the tents are the enormous antennas strung up, which are only so conspicuous in the jungle.

There is a diesel generator outside the tent to ensure a stable power supply. The telephone line pulled from the residential area is not for maintaining contact with the outside world, but for security. In case of any accident, such as robbery or thief, Juan can contact the outside world for protection immediately.

"What is it?" Philip Dick asked hastily. He was already sitting at his workbench, pen and paper ready, prepared to record what Juan had to say.

The other three, besides Hawking, took similar actions, all on high alert.

"It is the same signal, but this signal is the continuous repetition of two pulses."

It feels like binary 0s and 1s. If a short pulse represents 0 and a long pulse represents 1, then the string of numbers is 01110010. If it's reversed, with a long pulse representing 1 and a short pulse representing 0, then the string of numbers is 10001101.

Hawking immediately realized: "114 or 141."

Apart from Tomasetti, the other three understood what Hawking meant: if it was binary, then convert the binary string into decimal numbers.

114 or 141.
Hawking's voice came through the machine: "114? 141? Neither of these numbers is a prime number."

Juan quickly said, "Professor Hawking, you misunderstood. This string of numbers was repeated four times."

Arthur Clarke countered, "Repeated?"

Juan nodded: "That's right, it's just a repetition."

On the oscilloscope of a HARM radio receiver, this signal was clearly repeated.

Ignoring unnecessary errors, it was repeated four times in total.

That is, 114, 114, 114, 114.

Or 141, 141, 141, 141.

Silence fell over the room; no one could understand the meaning of the string of numbers.

"Sir Clark, Mr. Dick," Tomasetti said, "now it's time for science fiction writers to use their imaginations."

Clark picked up his teacup. Old England preferred tea to American dishwater, even if the tea here wasn't much better.

His gaze passed through the tent flap and fell upon the dark and deep night sky, as if he were watching the source of the signal.

“Repetition. Repetition,” Clark muttered to himself. “Repetition itself is a form of emphasis. If the first signal is to prove to us, ‘We are here, we understand mathematics,’ then what is this signal trying to tell us? A certain frequency? A certain cycle?”

Dick seemed more agitated, pacing back and forth, nervously clutching his hair: "No, it's not just the cycle."

If they want to express frequency, why not use a simpler, purer waveform?
The four repeated 114s or 141s form a string of information.

However, 114 and 141 have no special meaning in the decimal system.

They are neither pi nor natural constants.

They are not even prime numbers.

Hawking’s voice rang out again: “We may have been misled by the number system.”

If it's not binary, what would it be?

"But Juan said it is the constant repetition of two pulses, a short pulse and a long pulse."

"This is almost the most primitive form of binary!" Tomasetti retorted.

Juan suddenly looked up sharply: "Wait! What if it means quantity, not numbers?"

He walked to the workbench, quickly picked up the chalk, and drew two sequences on the makeshift blackboard:

01110010
10001101
"Look, in the first group, there are 4 1s and 4 0s."

In the second group, there are 4 1s and 4 0s!
They are perfectly symmetrical!

He drew two large arrows on either side of the number with force.

“Not only that!” he pointed to the number of repetitions: “This entire sequence was repeated four times!”

Dick's eyes lit up, as if struck by a crazy inspiration.

He picked up a pen and quickly wrote several large characters on the paper: 4-4-4
“It’s the structure!” he exclaimed excitedly. “They don’t care about the numerical value of 114 or 141; what they care about is the structure ratio! Out of the eight bits, four are long pulses and four are short pulses.”

The entire information unit was repeated four times.

This is a type of graphic information, an expression of an abstract concept.

After a moment's thought, Clark said, "Symmetry?"
Any intelligent civilization in the universe would understand the concepts of symmetry and balance.

They are teaching us how to read their information.

Hawking's machine gave his interpretation: "4."

Perhaps 4 is the key number they are trying to convey.

四个基本作用力、四维时空、四象限或者他们想让我们将这4乘以8等于32个脉冲，以某种方式排列成一个4乘8的矩阵？”

Tommasetti immediately got to work, tearing off a piece of paper and starting to draw a table with four rows and eight columns on it.

“No matter which direction we choose, every row of the matrix is ​​completely repeated, which still doesn’t provide any new information.” Tomassetti shook his head as he looked at the matrix.

“Then let’s change the arrangement!” Dick said confidently, as if he had already seen the truth. “8 times 4.”

When Tomassetti drew an eight-row, four-column matrix and filled in the numbers in the order of the signals, everyone fell silent.

The new matrix has two rows that are repeated.

This still doesn't make sense.

Clark calmly picked up the chalk and rewrote the four-by-eight matrix on the blackboard, but this time he made a change.

Instead of arranging the four repeated signals in rows, he arranged them in columns.

He constructed a new matrix by using the first signal as the first column, the second signal as the second column, and so on.

In the new matrix, all numbers are repeated both horizontally and vertically.

“This is completely redundant information!” Tomassetti exclaimed in frustration.

Hawking said, "On the contrary, that is precisely its significance."

Redundancy is an important concept in information theory.

It's not just about repetition; it's also a form of verification.

If information is corrupted by interference in the universe, repeating the signal can ensure that we receive the complete message.

“But it doesn’t offer any new information, Professor!” Tomassetti said urgently.

Hawking said, "Because it is not a picture, it is not text, it is not anything that needs to be decoded."

It is an instruction.

All eyes were on Hawking.

"I think it's a timer."

Hawking felt a faint excitement, a sense of anticipation for the future.

His heart stirred again.

Of everyone present, he was the only one who most longed for the arrival of aliens.

His illness is certainly incurable with Earth's technology, but to extraterrestrial civilizations capable of interstellar travel and transmitting signals from distant galaxies, it might just be a minor ailment like a cold.

From the moment he received the extraterrestrial signal, Hawking felt like he was twenty again, and his heart was filled with more hope than ever before.

Everyone else present held their breath, waiting for the physicist, who was trapped in his wheelchair, to give his explanation.

"If it were a graphic, it would be completely meaningless redundancy. As Tomassetti said, all the information is repeated four times, with nothing new."

But what if it's not spatial information, but temporal information?

Arthur C. Clarke and Philip K. Dick exchanged a glance.

"The first signal, that sequence of prime numbers, proved to us that they understood mathematics, which is the cornerstone of language," Hawking continued. "And this signal proved that they understood time."

Or more accurately, they know how to synchronize.

Juan said it was a combination of short and long pulses.

We assume that the duration of a short pulse is shortT and the duration of a long pulse is longT.” He paused to make sure everyone present understood this basic assumption.

"In cosmology, we cannot rely on any earthly units of measurement, not on seconds, minutes, or hours, much less on any symbols unique to any civilization."

But we can rely on proportions.

If the goal of this signal is to establish a common time standard, then the most natural way is to establish a clear proportional relationship.

Therefore, we have reason to infer that the long T must be an integer multiple of the short T, such as twice.

This is the simplest and most elegant setup in physics, requiring no new variables.

Dick quickly calculated: "If the short pulse is T, the long pulse is 2T."

So the total duration of a complete octet is "

Hawking's voice rang out again: "12T".

The breathing of the crowd quickened; this number was clearly more appealing than 114 or 141.

"Now, look at the complete structure of this signal."

It is an information unit with a total duration of 12T, repeated four times.

The total duration of these four repetitions is 48T.

They didn't give us a complex picture that needed interpretation, nor did they give us an obscure algebraic formula.

They simply struck four times, like a grand cosmic clock striking the hour four times.

It is establishing a common frequency unit for the universe.

12T is a clock cycle, and four repetitions constitute a calibration signal.

It is telling us: from this moment on, measure the rhythm of our communication in 48T cycles, or 12T units.

This isn't a message; it's a countdown.

They used prime numbers to demonstrate wisdom to us.

Now, they are demonstrating stability and rhythm to us through this perfectly symmetrical structure and four repetitions.

They want to make sure we don't miss the next message, or make sure we know when the next message will arrive.

I dare say that in the near future, after this 48T cycle ends, or at a specific point in time related to 4T or 12T, the third signal will arrive.

Moreover, that signal will no longer be a simple mathematical verification; it will contain real information, such as coordinates or instructions.

They weren't talking to us; they were setting a meeting time.

Hawking's explanation clearly aligns perfectly with the aesthetic sensibilities of science fiction writers.

The handshake between interstellar civilizations should be rhythmic, and this is how we should elevate the scale infinitely, allowing us to define time.

Compared to diplomacy between different countries around the world, which is always filled with various exchanges of interests and compromises, using numbers and time as a prelude is such a beautiful thing.

The atmosphere inside the tent instantly shifted from confusion to excitement and tension.

If Hawking's inference is correct, then they not only received a signal, but also an invitation to an interstellar civilization, and were informed of the specific pace of the meeting.

Dick asked, "48?"

Does this mean the next signal will arrive in 48 hours?

Or is T a distance in some coordinate system?

Clark said, "Hours are not used as a unit of time in the universe."

All we can do now is accurately measure the actual duration of this T and wait for the clock to strike again.

Juan said timidly, "Professor Hawking, what I want to say is that the duration of a long pulse is not necessarily twice that of a short pulse."

Hawking countered, "How many times?"

Juan said, "It's about twice as much."

Everyone present was speechless; your questioning makes no sense.

Juan blushed and said, "What I mean is, Professor Hawking, your guess was so accurate. You deduced the quantitative relationship between the duration of short and long pulses without even knowing the details."

A sense of pride flashed through Hawking's mind as he said, "Juan, bring your HARM radio receiver here. We need to accurately measure the duration of the short pulses."

I think this is the only ruler we have to measure the passage of time in the universe.

As it turns out, even Hawking didn't perform much better than a monkey when faced with the unknown.

China is the only country in the world that has accurately deciphered the meaning of this message.

Who told them to read the heavily modified version of "The Man in the High Castle"?

In the heart of Area 51, Chinese experts immediately recognized what this thing was.

Xie Xide circled the internal structure of the eight-bit binary number on the blackboard with chalk.

"It's not just mathematics; it's an identifier for machine language."

Based on our understanding of extraterrestrial technology, consecutive blocks of 1s and 0s often signify the division of fields.

The first signal must be 0; it must be 01110010, not 10001101.

Because 0 is the start bit, it's the signal that the machine begins processing.

As for the structure repeated four times, in machine language, this is essentially a fixed-length data packet format, or more precisely, a four-byte address.

Of those present, only Dean Qian had seen Lin Ran's version of "The Man in the High Castle".

He said, "In technical terms, this is a cosmic network identifier protocol, and I agree with Professor Xie's point that it means address."

Our next step is to connect to this address.

Connect to the alien spaceship.

After a brief discussion, everyone accepted Dean Qian's naming rule, which was to be simply referred to as Yuwang IP.

"If we set up a network link and if this is an address, then the next step is to try to connect."

Chinese experts have adopted a frequency keying method to represent binary data using audio signals.

They designed a simple sound card that converts the computer's output current signal into transmittable audio pulses, which are then transmitted via a radio transmitter.

They used the four repeated strings as the target address.

"But how do we connect to it, how do we let it know that we want to establish a signal connection with it?"

Should we also use binary?
If it were binary, the information that this call request could convey would be far too limited, not even enough to represent a single Chinese character's encoding. How then could it possibly represent the full picture of our civilization?

“We need to let them know that we are intelligent agents, that we understand your addresses, and that we have the ability to communicate.”

Experts debated endlessly about the most fundamental issue of establishing connections in the future computer world.

Dean Qian recalled that there was a string of numbers on the printed version of "The Man in the High Castle".

He applied to the authorities in Beijing by phone, and after they confirmed the figures, they sent them to him by telegram.

Finally, he went to the laboratory and wrote a 32-bit binary code on the blackboard.

"use this!"

The experts present looked at each other, no one spoke, but with just their eyes, they confirmed their previous guess: China had unearthed the remaining alien relics on Earth.

If we didn't unearth alien relics, where did the Raspberry Pi come from? Where did the technology come from?
As for the fact that the alien technology computer contained detailed technical data on America's U2 spy plane, this is easy to explain. America also found it; their U2 spy plane was built based on alien technology data.

The same group of aliens came to Earth.

The senior engineer sat in front of the computer screen.

They encoded the address and request and sent the signal into space via a massive array of radio transmitting antennas.

The signal shot into the distant starry sky.

Then, they switched to receive mode and stared at the monitor screen.

The experts present stared intently at the screen, which displayed an oscilloscope image showing a calm wave moving slowly across it.

Something is moving!

A new pulse appeared on the waveform.

This time, the pulses are no longer simple repeating sequences, but a very high-speed, very dense coded stream.

"It replied!"

"This is a handshake signal confirming the connection!"

The most crucial step is decoding.

This response signal is far more complex than the initial address.

They recorded the received high-speed pulse signals onto paper tape using a high-speed punching machine, and then input the paper tape into a computer for offline analysis.

After 72 hours of continuous work, they finally identified the header information and data payload in the response signal.

When they used a simple program to project the data transmitted from space onto the screen, the two successfully established a connection.

The connection here requires a GPS network, which is an all-weather, low-latency microwave data transmission network.

Throughout the connection process, information is broken down into extremely short, high-speed burst data packets and transmitted only to specific targets.

This system responds only to requests with a fixed length of 32 bits and low payload, filtering out automated, meaningless cosmic noise.

The network's routing nodes detected this signal.

It detected an address match, and the signal hit the currently available access address it was broadcasting.

The request packet structure was found to be a standard 32-bit structure, and the request type conformed to the handshake request format.

Only then will the corresponding GPS satellite node execute the response command, calculating the Earth's precise spatial coordinates based on the direction of the received signal.

Then, using the GPS's built-in high-gain antenna, an extremely narrow microwave beam was generated, pointing directly at the signal's geographical location.

To avoid interference and save energy, nodes transmit high-speed bursts of data within a very short time window to establish connections.

The key to a successful connection lies not in the transmission power, but in the understanding of the protocol and the accuracy of the frequency.

The network does not broadcast over a wide range of radio waves, but rather uses a very narrow high-frequency microwave band.

In response, it injects packets into a very narrow frequency and time window.

If the receiver's frequency deviates by even one percent, or if it does not receive the call within the correct period, the data packet will be missed or cannot be decoded due to the frequency offset.

Signals coming from the universe are sent out in a general manner, while signals returning are sent out point-to-point. Once a connection is established, the communication becomes even more singular, going back and forth.

The moment the program started, the lights in the computer room seemed to dim, and everyone held their breath.

On this early LED screen, a dot matrix was drawn line by line, flashing to reveal an extremely simple image: a huge grid.

Everyone present had only one question in their minds:
"what is this?"

(End of this chapter)