Plugging Away

SCHOOL VIEWS:  CJ and Annabelle's adventure in private pilot ground school continues. Every weekday morning we take them to Aviation High, where they spend seven some hours mostly in classroom settings.

The photo above is their view of the King County International Airport/Boeing Field runway from the third floor, across the street to the west. 

Once in awhile classroom lectures are interrupted with flight simulation training, by a visiting guest speaker, or a mini field trip to see something at The Museum of Flight. On one recent trip, they got to see the upper level lounge on a vintage 747.

 It's absolutely groovy, isn't it?

I wish I could get my hands on some of the orange upholstery pictured above!

LONG DISTANCE CALL:  An interesting article popped up in my feed today. It was titled, "If aliens call, what should we do? Scientists want your opinion."

How could I *not* click on that?

The story, on the website Vox, talked about the pros and cons of communicating with extra terrestrials, and made note of a couple of programs to that end underway right now. 

One of the questions posed was how, if it all, humanity should respond if we receive a message from an alien civilization?

Some, including physicist Stephen Hawking and SpaceX's Elon Musk have warned that communicating with extraterrestrials could pose a catastrophic risk to humankind. Right now, scientists at the UK SETI Research Network (UKSRN) are mulling over the topic, and one thing they seem to agree on is that Earthings are "woefully unprepared to handle an alien message if we receive one," per the Vox article. 

Some of the issues at hand are who should get to decide what is communicated and when. The UKSRN has posted a survey online. Some of the questions posed include: 

• Some people think we should send messages into space even if we don’t receive a message first. What is your opinion?
• If we receive a message, do you think we should reply/make contact or not? Why?
• What would you consider a "credible source"?

You can read (or respond to) the "Message from Afar" questions here: https://www.fromafar.world/opinion

Another 'message-to-space' project underway involves the Arecibo Observatory, in Puerto Rico. A little back story: In 1974, scientists used the enormous Arecibo telescope to send a radio broadcast into outer space. It was a message of zeros and ones, designed to alert aliens who intercepted it to our existence here on Earth. To commemorate the 45th anniversary of that transmission, researchers at the observatory asked teams of students from kindergarten to age 16  to create the New Arecibo Message.

While there's no monetary prize for the contest winner, it would be a bit of a feather in one's cap to  have your message broadcast into space and to potentially become the first human ever to communicate with extra terrestrials. 

The deadline for entries has passed, unfortunately. The winning team will actually get to travel to Puerto Rico to be part of the special celebration of the 45th anniversary of the original Arecibo Message, November 16-17, 2019. in  Pretty cool! I'm looking forward to learning what the winning message is!