5.0 von 5 Sternen
Detailed description of SETI and consequences, 16. September 2001
Rezension bezieht sich auf: Beyond Contact: A Guide to SETI and Communicating with Alien Civilizations (Gebundene Ausgabe)
The book "Beyond Contact" gives the reader a thorough knowledge about SETI (Search for Extrateresstrial Intelligence) and CETI (Communication with ETI).
The first two parts of the book contain a lot of information about SETI in general, about the technological challenges and about the likelihood of actually finding something. I have already read many articels about the different SETI projects in the past, present and future, but I have never found such a compact and well-written summary. This is very useful for everybody who wants to know more about the technological background of SETI and what we still have to do in the years to come.
The first half of the book can be read by anyone with an average knowledge in science an physics. The author often gives nice and simple explanations of difficult to understand concepts.
If you have the SETI@home program running on your computer and you want to know what this program really does in the background - you will find all the details about the successful SETI@home project in this book.
After having explained how to establish radio oder laser communication with an alien civilisation, the second half of the book is about the author's own academic work. He has developped a huge system of self-explaining symbols. How can you transport a message to somebody you have nothing in common with? Is it really possible? The amazing answer is yes, and Mr. McConnell's system is quite convincing to me. He does not make any wrong assumptions and defines everything from scratch. To read this part of the book, it is helpful for you to have at least a small knowledge of computers and a programming language. The author's concepts can also be used to improve nowadays computer systems.
SETI is something very important to all of mankind. If there is a signal out there, it is our duty to find it. The search will last for centuries maybe, but I think the effort is worth it. Read this book and expand your mind to the incredible scopes of finding or even communicating with ETIs!
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5.0 von 5 Sternen
Absolutely fascinating., 15. Mai 2001
Von Ein Kunde
Rezension bezieht sich auf: Beyond Contact: A Guide to SETI and Communicating with Alien Civilizations (Gebundene Ausgabe)
Are we alone in the universe? Most probably not is the encouraging answer, that Brian McConnell suggests. But how can we deal with the issues of getting into contact and understanding each other?
The book consists of three main parts. Part 1 gives an outline of Seti (search for extraterrestrial intelligence) research. Part 2 deals with physical communication based on radio waves and optics. Part 3 discusses the most complicated task: how can we share information while having nothing in common but mathematics and physical laws. To reach this objective Brian McConnell combines current results from genetics and computer science in a really amazing way.
You should have at least a basic understanding of the fundamentals of programming languages to catch the main ideas of the book. But (even more important) you should be open-minded to accept some of the fantastic consequences of this approach
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