On October 10 , the European Space Agency ( ESA ) sent 3,775 messages in the direction of Polaris , the North Star . This was part of a project called “ A Simple Response to an Elemental Message ” , which purpose to raise awareness about humanity ’s function in the environmental changes our satellite has go through in the last few hundred old age .
The project , spearheaded by Irish - born creative person Paul Quast , ask the populace to submit text - based answer to this question : “ How will our present environmental interactions regulate the future ? ”
The answers were then coalesce into a single 14 - moment - foresightful transmittal and air towards the North Star by ESA ’s deep - blank space tracking place at Cebreros in Spain .
Polaris was chosen not because it may or may not have outlander subsist nearby , but because it symbolized a mostly unchanging direction in the sky since it is located in the commission of true north . The unchanging part is not on the nose true , though , as Earth ’s axis slow moves in a roundabout every 12,000 years .
Even if there are aliens around Polaris , they ’ll have to wait a longsighted time before listening to the substance . The star is up to 433 light - years from Earth and these noncitizen would have get a lot more signaling before then , include the illustrious Beatles ’ song “ Across the Universe ” , which was beamed byNASA in 2008 .
This late content is likely quite timely , as there have been several give-and-take on the safety of herald our bearing to alien civilization .
“ It ’s hard not to see this as gratuitously risky , especially as it would be undertaken for no other reason than to satisfy our rich intellectual curiosity , ” pronounce physicist Mark Buchanan in a recentNature Physicsissue , which was not related to this project .
“ We have almost zero idea of whether alien are potential to be severe , although the exclusive history of germinate biological life-time that we be intimate of – here on Earth – carries a strong root of violent difference , eternal battle for resource and the oppressiveness of weaker groups by stronger unity . ”
Professor Hawking has expressed similar concerns in arecent documentary : “ Meeting an advanced civilisation could be like Native Americans encountering Columbus . That did n’t wrench out so well . ”
Although Hawking does n’t want to flag our front , he is one of the citizenry behind the Breakthrough Listen project , which hopes to obtain foreign civilisation . The project has recently get the stake ofChinese telescopesas well .
