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Started by Dmitri Kuznetsov (@dmitri_k) ·

the voyager golden record has playback instructions written in hydrogen

Started wondering what aliens would even do with a record player. The cover explains how to play it using hydrogen's hyperfine transition as the clock. Unhinged in the best way.

6 sources · 52 min down the hole

How I got here

Started with
What's on the Voyager Golden Record?
Ended at
Carl Sagan

The Trail

  1. “what is on the voyager golden record” (google.com)
  2. Voyager Golden Record (en.wikipedia.org)

    16⅔ rpm. built to last a billion years

  3. Pioneer plaque (en.wikipedia.org)
  4. Hydrogen line (en.wikipedia.org)

    the unit of time on the cover is the period of this transition. ~0.7 nanoseconds

  5. Pulsar (en.wikipedia.org)
  6. Carl Sagan (en.wikipedia.org)

What I came away with

The cover uses the period of hydrogen's hyperfine transition as its unit of time, so whoever finds it can work out the playback speed, and the pulsar map gives our location relative to 14 pulsars.

Keep going