Analog SFF, July-August 2008

by Dell Magazine Authors

  “It will take many hours,” said Katya. “Will our friends wait for us?”

  “Don't think about it,” said Neville.

  Colin, aware again of the hum, did think about it. In the rush to communicate, he'd almost forgotten the monumental significance of the event. And he wasn't really interested in talking to this alien presence about physics, or even mathematics. He wanted to discuss important things with them.

  * * * *

  Late that evening the Farcast lab lay strewn with empty pizza boxes reflecting bright from the ceiling fluorescents. The air held a rich amalgam of aromas: pizza, people working hard in close quarters, and the incense-like smell of Katya's rosin-core solder. The soft hum persisted—ubiquitous, constant, uninterrupted by chirps for many hours.

  The programming had gone well; now, rather than receiving and displaying dots and dashes, they could display words—that is, after they had deduced them and stored them in the program's dictionary.

  “All right,” said Neville, “I'll send ‘acknowledged’ and ‘over.’ Agreed?”

  All agreed and Neville made the transmission.

  Almost instantly, came the reply:

  acknowledged 5—3 -. 2 over

  “Ah,” said Neville. “Now we learn arithmetic. Dash dot must be plus, and dash dash represents equals.”

  “Or maybe,” said Colin, “dash dash means minus and dash dot means equals.”

  Neville stared at the monitor. “Good point,” he said after a few seconds. “Let's hope they'll clarify it for us.”

  “Interesting that the response came so fast,” said Bing. “Maybe we're important. Maybe they have a person, creature, whatever, watching our transmissions full time.”

  “Unless,” said Colin, “this is all CAI, Computer Assisted Instruction.”

  Neville chuckled and then again sent the “acknowledged,” “over” pair. Once again, the response was quick.

  acknowledged .-.—3 -. 2 -. 1 over

  “What's this?” said Neville.

  “They're testing us, I think,” said Bing. “Dot dash dot might be a question mark.”

  “Testing? Are they, indeed?” Neville stared at the screen. “Looks like they've done this before. They're telling us that dash dot can't mean equals.” He glanced over his shoulder at Colin. “Yes?”

  “Yes,” said Colin. “So it seems.”

  Neville entered “acknowledged 6 over.”

  acknowledged .-.—3 -. 1 over

  “Seems you were right, Bing,” Neville entered “question mark,” “plus,” and “equals” into the dictionary definition table. Then he entered “acknowledged 4 over.”

  acknowledged—= 3 .- 3 over

  “I guess you passed the test,” said Bing.

  Neville nodded. “And now we know minus and zero,” he said as he entered the new symbols into the dictionary. “Good progress.” He keyed the usual reply.

  acknowledged 1 0 = 6 + 7 over

  “What's this?” said Neville. “Ah.” He turned to Colin. “You were right,” he said in an astonished voice. “Our Little Green Men have a base thirteen number system.”

  “Apparently.” Colin was astonished as well, but tried not to show it. It's good for these physicists to know humility from time to time. He smiled. “And it does show that, to some degree, the ... the LGM think the way we do.”

  “Oh,” said Neville, “I wouldn't be so quick to anthropomorphize them.”

  “The anthropomorphic rather than anthropic principle, maybe,” said Bing, lightly.

  Colin shot him a glance before answering Neville. “At any rate, I think it means it's likely we'll be able to comprehend their thought processes.”

  “Maybe so. Maybe so.” Neville keyed the reply.

  acknowledged ? = 8 + 9 over

  Neville turned to the others. “More tests on simple arithmetic. Sort of tedious after all the excitement.” He whipped off his glasses and rubbed his forehead. “We can probably be more productive in shifts. Why don't you guys go out for some real food? I'll carry on here until you get back. Then, I'll grab a late dinner.”

  Bing, Colin, and Katya agreed and headed for the door.

  “Oh,” Neville called after. “And bring back some tea for me, if you would. English Breakfast, milk, no sugar.”

  * * * *

  In a booth in Tom's Restaurant, an all-night eatery just around the corner from the institute, Colin, Bing, and Katya waited for their food.

  “Without set of common referents,” said Katya, “I not see how we really can communicate with aliens.”

  “I assume that if our friends really exist,” said Colin, “they've probably done this before. We'll just have to let them take the lead.”

  “Unless,” said Katya, “technological civilizations very rare and we their first.”

  Colin nodded. “The blind leading the blind,” he said, thoughtfully. “I hope not.”

  Bing sighed. “And if they're in another universe, we won't even have a common language of particle properties to help us. I can't see how we could hope to learn any physics from them in that case.” He turned to Colin. “It must be even worse for mathematics, a human-created rather than nature-created discipline.”

  “To the contrary,” said Colin. “Not that I believe in these multiple universes, but—”

  “We not believe, either,” said Katya. “It is hypothesis. Theory.”

  “Fine,” said Colin. “But, even in your hypothetical other universe, I'd expect mathematics to be more—if I may modify a superlative—more universal than physics.” He was conscious of raising his head—angling his nose to an arrogant height. He self-consciously lowered it again. “I look forward to discovering their mathematics—wherever they are. And I think we could find something of a shared language based on number.”

  “To what end?” said Bing.

  “Well, for example, I would like to know if they've managed to prove Goldbach's Conjecture.”

  “I more am interested in real world,” said Katya. “Physics.”

  Bing tapped the top of his water glass with a spoon, exciting standing waves on the surface of the water. “Yes,” he said with a sigh, and staring morosely at the waves. “There is so much we could probably learn from them—if only we had the language.”

  Colin nodded. “Most interesting to me though, would be their philosophy.” Bing smiled, softly. “Belief in God?”

  “Why not?” said Colin, defensively. “It's an important question.”

  “I not believe existence of God is important question,” said Katya.

  “Me neither,” said Bing.

  “What?” Colin swiveled to glare at Bing. The man was like a child. Most physicists were like children. “How can you say that? It's the most important question.”

  “But not to you, surely,” said Bing. “You already believe you know the answer.”

  The comment hit home. Colin never could expunge a tiny twinge of doubt. When, as a boy, his mother had been taken from him, he couldn't accept that it was the will of God. God couldn't be that mean. He remembered the hospital room and the hum of the heart monitor—and how he felt when the hum stopped. The overwhelming loss. The silence. He felt himself begin to sweat.

  “More important question is,” said Katya, looking on him with an expression of compassion, “where is food?” She smiled genially—Colin realized Katya was trying to lighten the mood, to ease the pain she'd somehow detected—then Katya waved toward an approaching waiter. “Easy answer. Here comes food now.”

  Colin smiled. This Katya has a true soul.

  “It's not an important question to me,” said Bing as the waiter placed a platter of fries and a cheeseburger in front of him. “Because I can't believe in a god so small-minded that he'd send someone to hell just because the guy didn't believe in him.”

  The waiter gave him a funny look and hurriedly moved more plates to the table.

  Bing picked up a French fry and pointed at Colin with it. “And anyway, isn't it more hon
orable to do good things in the world because it's the right thing to do, rather than to do them because if you don't you'd wind up as toast?”

  “That's not the way faith works,” Colin said in a louder voice than he'd intended. “God is ... the compass for the world.”

  The waiter took her tray and hurried away.

  “Dear God, if there is a god,” said Katya, her face and voice showing gentle amusement, “thank you for food"—she picked up a fork—"and thank you for restaurant.”

  Colin forced a smile, but inwardly, he fumed—convinced that Bing's atheism was easy, not struggled with, a physicist's limited view of the universe. Colin couldn't help feeling superior; his belief came with constant effort, constant questioning.

  Obliquely, Colin glanced at his dining companions bantering with each other like kids. He gestured at the two of them with a fork. “You guys are more alien to me,” he said, “than even our LGM.”

  Katya raised her eyebrows and turned to Bing. “I think I am insulted,” she said with an expression of mock hurt.

  “No, Katya,” said Bing, lightly. “I'm sure it was meant as a compliment. That's the way I take it, anyway.”

  Colin gave in; he couldn't help laughing. “Hopeless!” he muttered under his breath.

  * * * *

  Neville leaned back and took a sip of his English Breakfast tea through the little hole of the paper-cup cover. “They've taught me their multiplication and division signs and also decimals,” he said in a tired voice. “Or should I call them thirteenimals, perhaps?” He took a second sip. “So far, very conventional arithmetic. I'd expected something more ... more alien.”

  “Where are we now?” said Bing.

  Neville nodded toward the monitor. “See for yourself.”

  The last line of text on the screen showed:

  delay woof 100

  “That 100 is 169 in decimal,” said Neville, “a delay of almost forty-five minutes.”

  “I wonder why?” said Bing.

  “We'll know soon enough.” Neville glanced at the time display at the lower right of the monitor. “In about ten minutes.”

  “Maybe their sense of time is different,” said Katya. “Maybe they need more time than we to think.”

  “Interesting idea,” said Neville.

  Ten minutes later, the hum was interrupted by a burst of chirps. The monitor showed:

  * * * *

  * * * *

  “Whoa!” said Bing. “What's this?”

  “I think,” said Katya, her eyes on the screen, “maybe they send raster.”

  “Yes.” Neville slapped the desktop. “You're right. Acknowledged here should be a carriage return.” He turned to Bing. “Can you get this back from disk and modify its output—sending it to the screen as well as the printer?”

  “Easy.” While Neville stood and stretched, Bing replaced him at the keyboard.

  After a few minutes, Bing blew out a breath. “This should do it,” he said, hitting the Enter key. The screen cleared and then displayed:

  * * * *

  * * * *

  over

  Bing stood and stepped to the side.

  “Gentleman,” said Neville, sitting again at the console. “To the resolution limit of the data, I declare this a circle.”

  “Thirty-nine by thirty-nine pixels,” said Colin, having counted them.

  Neville glanced around. “All right then,” he said. “Let's see what else they have for us.” He entered “acknowledged” and “over.” The monitor showed another jumble of dots and dashes with carriage returns, and the line printer spewed paper at a furious rate, littering the floor with an ever-growing pyramid of paper.

  “Perhaps a finer raster.” Neville turned to Bing. “Yes?”

  “Yes.” He leaned in over the keyboard. “I'll switch the display from text to graphics mode.”

  As Bing keyed the changes, Neville said, “May as well turn off the printer also. No need to waste any more trees.”

  Bing nodded. After a minute or so, he said, “Done! I'll redisplay from disk.” He pushed a button with a flourish and the monitor displayed another circle, this time at a high resolution. “Over” appeared at the bottom of the screen. This circle looked perfect. Bing again relinquished the chair to Neville.

  “I always think there is something mystical about circle,” said Katya.

  Colin nodded; he'd felt that way as well. “My guess,” he said, peering at the perfection on the monitor, “is that the raster is 2197 by 2197. 1000 by 1000 base 13.”

  “Could be,” said Bing, staring at the screen. “Close to that, at any rate.”

  “Fine, then,” said Neville. “Next!” He keyed “acknowledged” and “over.”

  A flurry of raster images scrolled up the screen faster than the eye could follow. They seemed to be a sequence of circles: smaller to larger and then to smaller again, terminating as usual with “over.”

  Once more, Bing replaced Neville at the keyboard. He called up the set of images from disk and displayed them one by one—giving something of the effect of a circle coming close and then receding.

  “Any thoughts?” said Neville.

  “Da,” said Katya, after a few seconds. “It look like it is maybe representation of sphere.”

  “I concur.” Neville looked to Bing and Colin. “Do you agree?”

  “Yes.”

  “Definitely.”

  “Right,” said Neville. He entered “CR over.”

  Another rush of circle-like raster images danced up the monitor screen. They kept coming and Colin wondered if they'd ever stop. After almost a minute of dizzying scrolling, Bing, by unspoken, tacit agreement, replaced Neville once more at the keyboard.

  When the scrolling finally stopped, Colin felt dizzy from having watched it. He sat. Neville and Katya did as well.

  “This,” said Bing, with emphasis, “might take a little longer.”

  * * * *

  More than an hour later, very late into the night, Bing sat up straight from the keyboard and stretched. “It's a raster of rasters of rasters,” he said in a weary voice. “A sequence of spheres.” He splayed his fingers over the keyboard before resting them on the home-keys. “Here, I'll show you—sphere by sphere.”

  After the demonstration, Neville said, “A sequence of spheres small to large and then to small again. I wonder what it means.”

  “Maybe is something about time,” said Katya. “A movie. Sphere come close then go away.”

  “But why?” said Neville. “What could they be trying to—”

  Bing gasped.

  Neville turned to him. “What?”

  “That's not a time evolution,” said Bing at a whisper. “I'm pretty sure it's—”

  Katya gasped as well. “You are right, Bing,” she said almost as softly. “That is only answer.”

  Neville looked at the monitor where only a dot showed in the middle of the screen and a question mark and “over” at the bottom. “My God!” he said in a loud whisper. “Intellectually, I knew this was possible, but I didn't really believe it.”

  “What?” said Colin, his speaking voice sounding loud in the lab, which, save for the pervasive hum, was otherwise silent. “What's going on?”

  “It's not a time evolution,” Bing repeated. “It's a representation of a 4-dimensional sphere.”

  Instantly, Colin saw the truth in the statement—and he knew he would have deduced it himself had it not been unwelcome news. It meant they were communicating with beings from a world of four space dimensions—from another universe. And that meant the megaverse was real and not just some theory of a deranged string theorist. That in turn meant the anthropic argument was moot. We are not necessarily in Leibniz's best of all possible worlds—not even the best of all possible universes.

  Stunned, he became aware of the sound of speech.

  “Four space and one time dimension—at the minimum,” said Bing in a voice filled with awe. “From another pocket universe. Susskind was right.” He s
hook his head slowly, as if trying to clear it of disbelief. “That certainly explains the clean, non-stochastic data.” He stood. Everyone stood. To Colin, the standing seemed almost an act of reverence.

  Neville pointed to the question mark at the bottom of the screen. “It's our turn again.” He rubbed his chin. “They're asking for our dimensionality, I presume.” He looked from face to face. “Agreed?”

  No one had any other explanation.

  “I can pull up their 3-sphere off the disk and send it back to them,” said Bing. “It'll just take a minute.”

  “Excellent!” said Neville.

  Bing sat and leaned in over his keyboard, engaging in a flurry of programming. His energy contrasted with the overall air of happy exhaustion. A minute or so later, he looked up over his shoulder at Neville. “Just give the word.”

  “The word!” said Neville with a smile.

  With an exaggerated motion, Bing hit “enter.”

  Again, a sequence of rasterized circles scrolled off the screen—this time in green, a transmitted rather than received data stream—ending with “over.”

  “Their turn,” said Bing.

  Neville nodded.

  In silence, the four stared at the monitor screen—and waited.

  For a long couple of minutes, they waited. Then the screen scrolled up a line and displayed at the bottom:

  delay woof 200

  “Oh, no!” Bing cried out. “Now an hour and a half delay. Why the hell do they need to take so long?”

  “I do not like to wait either.” Katya rubbed her eyes and suppressed a yawn.

  “Once more,” said Neville, his eyes locked on the message, “it looks like maybe we've given them something to think on.”

  “I could really use a nap,” said Bing. “I wish I'd kept my sleeping bag in my office.” Colin checked his watch. “It's nearly dawn.”

  “I'm wiped!” Bing said with a long breath. “Adrenaline has its limits.”

  “Now that you've mentioned it"—Neville also suppressed the contagious yawn—"I'm not exactly ready to run a marathon either.” He brightened. “Why don't we go down to Tom's for an early breakfast? We have the time. We have a lot of time.”

  Bing and Katya murmured their approval of the idea and started toward the door, but Colin said, “I think, if you don't object, I'll stay here and mind the store.”