From Charles Mackay
Inverness, Scotland
I would like to add some of my own speculation about the Wow signal
(“Wow! was that ET?”, 9 August, p 46).
Supposing the signal did not originate from a
human source and was not an astrophysical phenomenon, but came from an
extraterrestrial civilisation. If it required a 2.2 gigawatt transmitter, would
that not suggest a civilisation more advanced than our own?
Let’s suppose that the Wow signal was not meant for us, but was transmitted
by Civilisation A to Civilisation B somewhere towards the Galactic centre. The
transmitting power used suggests Civilisation A may be capable of interstellar
spaceflight and B could therefore either be another civilisation or a
colony.
Such a message may have been transmitted hundreds or thousands of years ago,
and only received by us now. Having received it, I believe we should be
returning a signal ourselves, perhaps by repeating the unmodulated blast of
radio noise together with a message of our own.
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For all those who say ET has not been in touch, the truth is that we may have
missed our chance to eavesdrop on a long-distance telephone conversation, one
that stretches light years across the Galaxy.
