Re:SETI spots dozens of new mysterious signals emanating fro...
by saalweachter on Thursday September 13, 2018 @06:15PM
(#17983152)
Even then you have to ask "How long do ETs live?"
Listening for radio signals is way, way cheaper than broadcasting. It might be fair for an advanced civilization to fire up its transmitter for one year every thousand, and transmit a dense "welcome to the universe, here are our civilization's greatest achievements" message to all the listening civilizations. Running a listen-to-the-sky antenna for 500 years is still vastly cheaper and easier than what the advanced civilization has to do to transmit the message, and transmitting constantly is kinda hella wasteful.
Listening for radio signals is way, way cheaper than broadcasting. It might be fair for an advanced civilization to fire up its transmitter for one year every thousand, and transmit a dense "welcome to the universe, here are our civilization's greatest achievements" message to all the listening civilizations. Running a listen-to-the-sky antenna for 500 years is still vastly cheaper and easier than what the advanced civilization has to do to transmit the message, and transmitting constantly is kinda hella wasteful.