Jerry Ehman, a professor at Franklin University in Columbus, looked at the printout from Big Ear Observatory and circled the standout signal "6EQUJ5" and scribbled "Wow!" in the margins.
As on every other night, while Big Ear was searching the skies for an alien signal, its observations were being recorded on a printout sheet.
A long list of letters and numbers was continuously being churned out, one long string for every one of the 50 channels scanned by the telescope.
A series of characters appeared recording an unusual transmission at the frequency of channel 2: "6EQUJ5" the list read. This startled Big Ear volunteer Jerry Ehman, a professor at Franklin University in Columbus, who was monitoring the readings that night.
He circled the code for later reference and added a single comment in the margins" "Wow!" The signal entered SETI lore as the "Wow!" signal.
The series "6EQUJ5" described the strength of the received signal over a short time-span. In the system used at the time at Big Ear, each number from 1 to 9 represented the signal level above the background noise.
In order to extend the scale, the staff added letters, with each one from A to Z representing increasingly stronger signal levels. 6EQUJ5 represented a signal that grew in strength to level "U," and then gradually subsides.
In more familiar notation, the signal increased from zero to level 30 "sigmas" above the background noise, and then decreased again to zero, all in the span of 37 seconds.
Two aspects of this signal immediately caught the attention of Ehman and project director John Kraus, who saw the results the following morning.
First of all, 37 seconds was precisely the time it takes the Big Ear scanning beam to survey a given point in the heavens.
Because of this, any signal coming from space would follow precisely the "Wow!" signal's pattern - increasing and then decreasing over 37 seconds. This practically ruled out the possibility that the signal was the result of Earthly radio interference.
Secondly, the signal was not continuous, but intermittent. Kraus and Ehman knew that, because Big Ear has two separate beams that scan the same area of the sky in succession, several minutes apart. But the signal appeared on only one of the beams and not on the other, indicating that it had been 'turned off' between the two scans. A strong, focused, and intermittent signal coming from outer space: could it be that Big Ear had detected an alien signal?
Wow Signal
I honestly believe that the signal he saw was that of alien being's. He was at the right place at the right time. It is funny that we never heard it again. MY opinion is that he detected life from somewhere else. Fantastic and Outstanding.
Kenny (St. Louis)
Theories
Just want to make two points
I see a big problem. The big ear was designed to recieve ETI transmissions, which it did. There is no reason to doubt that it did. You can't deny evidence that it did. It's like smelling smoke and assuming nothing's burning. A tool was built to gather evidence and it did. To deny it's existence would just be wrong.
There are many reasons why the signal could have been what it was. Maybe there was a single transmission between a space-ship and it's mother planet that we just happened to pick up. We have no idea what caused it, or for that matter, what exactly it was. All we really know is that it was a focused radio transmission, and that it really happened!
I also have a question. Would a nuclear explosion in deep space cause a signal like this?
This signal was around the
This signal was around the 1420mhz range. Since this is the resonating frequency of hydrogen and therefore the best and cleanest range to transmit in I don't think it likely that a nuclear explosion would be restricted to this frequency.
As for the nature of the signal itself. Keep in mind that when humans transmitted a signal into space we only did it once and then moved on so to speak.
wow
Could it not be that the radio signal we sent in space came back? if not why not?
ET Phoned From Home
Could be we have proof of aleins all along. And plenty of reasons we never found the signla again. ET could have been transmititng an intergalatic HEY (We wanted to, but a lot of people feared it'd leave evil aliens to us so they could invade), hoping some laienr ace would receive and respond. The sent their signal, and we picked it up. Maybe the time constraints msised several repeated signals. Then ET simply stopped beaming in our direction. Maybe we caught the last signal sent and 5 others were braodcats before it? Best bet would be for us to broadcats our own Yo, anybody dial us? in their general direction.
Wow!
Wow! Can't wait 'til someone finally makes contact. Great movie by the way! Book is pretty good too!
The Wow Signal
I am not doubtful that Big Ear detected a transmission from an ET technologically advanced society. It is mathematically impossible for there not to be an abundance of highly evolved animal worlds, in raw numbers, in our galaxy of 200 to 300 billion stars, a sizeable percentage of which our space science is finding to have planetary systems which in turn likely have moon systems. Logically, many of these worlds would be older and younger than and near in age to our star and planet and will have life forms, of all inconceivable and conceivable kinds, that are more and less advanced than our species and that also will be of commensurate intelligence as the ranges of individual intelligence of our species. Some of these worlds may have co-existing different species with both overlapping and radically different advanced abilities or intelligences. Heck, there may be long-lived and highly evolved subsurface life on Mars, the asteroid-belt dwarf planet Ceres, the Jovian moon Europa or the moons Enceladus or Titan of Saturn.
If an advanced ET intelligence transmitted a signal to our science technocracy advertising its existence, probably top national security authorities would want to control or hide this fact to avail our technocracy and national security of advantage over foreign competitor science technocracies and private, and other dangerous and irresponsible (superstitious, hysterical, paranoid and bigoted), interests and forces among our species in making further contact and building rapport with such life that could very well greatly benefit our science, medicine and technology, and our industrial, political, social and military power.
Re: The Wow Signal
I'm sorry but that post is somewhat ridiculous. The Fermi Paradox/Great Silence Problem strikes at those same 'large number' arguments: if life is so easy, then the number of valid entities which are predicted should mean that in a MW galaxy that is 100,000 light years across there should, given our late arrival on the scene, be quite a few civilizations whose narrow-band signals should have been seen.
Even assuming current, 'slow' interstellar travel is the only physically allowable means, a civilization can COLONIZE the galaxy in between 5 and 50 Million years as calculated by Crawford (we won't even touch on von Neumann expansion). During which time, the civilization would expend huge energetic costs that we'd likely see. Yet, we don't. Not even one.
It is not "mathematically impossible for there not to be an abundance of highly evolved animal worlds" -- that is incorrect, I'm sorry. Given the "big numbers" your touting, there should be many, may "highly evolved" species, yet we don't see this. Where are they? Obviously, there is a "Great Filter" as Hanson stated, and while I can't say if it on the conditions which allow simple life to start or evolved life to emerge -- the reality is they just aren't there when we look.
I mean, these statistical responses begging the scale of the universe irk me. Try picking 'the' correct vacuum state out of M-theory, it's something like 1 out of 10^500. Yet, we did it.
The concept of us being somewhat special and unique isn't ignorant, but -- perhaps unfortunately -- the most probable hypothesis given the 50 year and ever expanding sample.
- Vince
Re: Vince's Reply to Comment on the Wow Signal
To the public reading this article and Vince's comment, consider that there are two categories of people with which one cannot have a rational or reasonable argument: liars and the verifiably stupid! Stupid is stupid no matter how pedantic or literate it may be. Is Vince a techno-babble anthropocentric, divine-design, God-squad science-site patroller, foreclosing ideologically on probability and reality undesirable or incompatible with his indoctrination and religious text? With the discovery of so much H2O throughout our galaxy and of many stars (planetary system heater, light and energy sources) similar to our own in our galaxy and the common presence of planetary systems associated with stars of all kinds and the universal distribution of the same chemical elements and compounds as pervade and permeate our own solar system, planet and galaxy, just add the already existing time factor and the omnipresent processes of evolution to this mix for genesis and development of highly evolved life forms, and it is a common-sense inevitable fact to our space science and objective and critical science-minded thinkers that an abundance of life forms, even advanced life forms, must exist and will be proven to exist as our technology for detecting and observing them, if not communicating with some of them, sufficiently advances -- our space science and technology are in their infancy (less than one hundred years ago we did not have electrical lights, toilets, cars, airplanes, refrigerators, radio, stereo systems, TV, vaccines, nuclear power, space satellites and spacecraft, computers, cell phones, etc.). Indeed the concept of our species as being singularly technological or intellectual is based on sheer ignorance, as our other hominid ancestors, progenitors and relatives, including the extinct Neanderthals (with an average substantially larger brain size than that of modern humans and that did and made everything as our species except for draw and make painting while our different versions of homo sapiens co-existed as recently as 30,000 years ago), were systematic technology innovators and inventors, and there are other creative and low-tech species on our planet, far behind humans in the sophistication of their products, like honeybees, various ant species, spiders, beavers, squirrels, birds, gorillas, chimpanzees, etc., but more advanced than most other species in this regard and in some instances perhaps on the path to higher technological evolution that we cannot grasp.
Advanced civilizations may have already closely observed our planet and deemed it unsuitable for contact, due to our recent past's technological inferiority, and found it impractical to travel here given the extreme distance and time costs to get here and return home and given more practical or nearby other ET travel options in their own vicinities. Clusters of highly advanced, nearby civilizations may be abuzz in contacts among themselves.
Also and again, within our own solar system the environmental conditions on the subsurface of Mars (which belches or radiates methane gas, often associated with life, from its ground), Ceres, especially Europa, Enceladus and possibly even Titan are credible to very serious extraterrestrial prospects for life as we know and don't know it, as in the case of Titan.
We are absolutely not alone nor nature's best. I do say that there is an infinitely greater chance of abundant ET intelligent life within our galaxy than there is the deity or deities of any human scriptures, which is not to say that there is no G/god as we don't recognize or don't know (fully) it, akin to nature or levels of nature, with a higher nature.
Ignoring the ad hominem....
While a fascinating post, like the other responses here which parallel the same thinking, it doesn't address the problems which are ubiquitous. You are great at laying down a hypothesis, but horrible at testing it...
It needs to be noted that even on earth, the one system that is guaranteed to contain all the factors necessary for the emergence of life, it has happened exactly once in the 3.8 Billion years. And we know this to a high probability, no matter where we look we find the same conserved information scaffold and within that, the same conserved genes.
Where, is the alternative life? You posit that given the "discovery of so much H2O" and the similar stars (I assume you're pointing to main sequence stars), life must be everywhere.... fine. But, then prove the hypothesis by showing where disparate life has been formed.
Where is the evidence that even here the creation of life wasn't a one-off event? Or do you propose that nature is so bland that Schrodinger's "aperiodic crystals" can only be embodied in B-DNA, with the same exact RNA precursors?
At what point will you stop waxing on about how big and how perfect the conditions must be for life to emerge (and "Clusters of highly advanced, nearby civilizations" at that!) all across the universe and finally ask yourself where are they?
Can you honestly believe that even a few of these advanced civilizations have emerged in our MW galaxy and done it without a trace? Did they not advance along the same EM spectrum as we did? We have been an industrial civilization for ~200 years and our energy usage has exponentially increased, nor will it stop increasing. Given our relatively late arrival, how can we not look upwards and see the narrowband transmissions of a single civilization that has advanced beyond us on the Kardashev scale....
And believing that, without any evidence, is even more ridiculous than believing some bullshit sacred text.
- Vince