CALLING UP THE MARTIANS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 10, 22 December 1932, Page 14

CALLING UP THE MARTIANS

HOW SIGNALS MIGHT BE MADE. Dr. Barnes, Bishop of Birmingham, speaking recently, referred to the possibility of the existence of sentient beings on other planets, and expressed his belief that by improved wireless methods it was probable that “in the course of time man will be able to communicate with the beings on far distant planets.” Dr. Barnes was probably thinking of Mars and -the Martians.

The Bishop is not atone in this belief. The “canals” on Mars, which the American astronomer, Percival Lowell, declared were artificial waterways constructed by intelligent beings faced with the necessity of utilising to the full the scanty water supplies of the planet, have been carefully studied for the last quarter of a century, and many scientists agree that, admitting the symmetrical network of markings on Mars is a canal system, Professor Lowell’s explanation is the only possible one.

If it were possible to set up communication with the Martians the matter would be settled once for all, and of late years more than one method of signalling to Mars has been suggested. Among these was the planting of huge areas with “darkleaved crops arranged in geometrical shapes,” which would prove to the Martians that intelligent beings existed on the earth, and they would probably answer in the same fashion. Another project was light signals on a gigantic scale. But there are obvious difficulties. When Mars is nearest the earth the latter is invisible to the Martians, being in their day sky. When the earth is favourably placed, the distance between us is around 100,000,000 miles, and for the Martians to just glimpse, in powerful telescopes, geometrical or light signals they would have to cover an area of at least 2000 square miles.

WIRELESS SIGNALS.

Wireless signals are more promising, and probably the only possible method Given sufficient initial power', wireless waves could travel from the earth to Mars, as, though the long waves used in broadcasting are turned back to earth by the “Heaviside layer” of our atmosphere, and never reach interplanetary space, very short waves are not thus reflected, and pass into space. But what kind of signals could be used which the Martians could understand? And, how could they answer?

Some believe that mysterious signals occasionally heard on wireless receivers are signaJs from Mars, but no one has so far deciphered them. That is surely a bigger problem than that of setting up any inter-planetary communication. But one day that may be solved. So many marvels have been achieved in the last 30 years—wireless itself, the conquest of the air, submarines, and, on a small scale, the transmutation of the elements—that nothing can be rated out as impossible. Perhaps the Martians will solve the problem of a signalling code both we and they could understand, for if they exist they must be far more advanced in intelligence than we terrestrials. Their world is much older than the earth, and they themsehes had probably been in existence millions of years before the first signs of life appeared on our planet.