Technical knowledge transfer

[IrishEyes]

I have to go with FT's ESP on this one. Well... sort of, .....seems that even ESP would require some symbolic references. What you are claiming is that you can send me substantial information without using ANY symbols at all. Do it. Post a completely blank reply to this post and let's see if I understand what you are trying to convey.

 

Ok, here it comes...

[Uncle Martin]

Originally posted by: IrishEyes

Ok, here it comes...

 

Oooooohhh, baby!!! I'm shocked yet delighted. Yowza!!!

 

 

Addendum; Did I get any of it correct? My hunch is that we just disproved Frank's assertion.

[FrankM]

Originally posted by: Uncle Martin07/05/2004 01:31 PM

 

 

I may not understand you correctly, but it sure seems to me that three adjoining or

non-adjoining lines qualify as symbols.

I don't think a line can qualify as a "symbol" unless it is used exclusively in some kind of context. I can

present mathematical/technical information with three non-adjoining lines, but much more complex

information if I join three lines. If the three adjoining lines create what we define as a triangle, it is not

a symbol in itself, but it may become a symbol in context if it is always used the same way.

 

We use a single vertical line to designate "one" (Arabic system). A single horizontal line represents

"five" in Mayan numerals and a single dot their "one". Its a matter of context or definition.

 

A single line placed on a rock would be a mark, but if the mark had magnitude and direction it might

transfer information, if I could decipher the significance of the magnitude and direction. If I moved the

rock to a different location the information might be meaningless although the mark did not change.

[FrankM]

Communicatiing with someone at a distance requires a "common protocol" (language or signaling method),

and once out-of-sight the interface medium and its transmission methods become an issue.

Originally posted by: Freethinker

It is fairly easy to identify an "intellegent" signal from the background noise. Bandwidth distribution

alone would be a major clue.

The statement above is no longer valid based upon new technology now being developed for communications

and other uses. Put "UWB" into your favorite search tool and you will see the direction all of our various

forms of communicating at a distance is heading. UltraWideBand is unique as it appears as "noise", and is

typically buried in the noise level.

 

The primary patent holder for UWB is Time Domain, but their web site doesn't tell you much.

There are plenty of web sites that describe the technology, uwb.org being just one.

 

As far as receiving communications off planet, I think the musings of Don Lancaster pretty much tell us how far

behind the curve SETI could be, Muse135.pdf, at the end of the first article on page 3.

 

"There’s a side effect to pulse radio that raises serious SETI exploration

questions. We are just beginning to learn that efficient communication is

real hard to tell from low levels of noise. Supposedly smart civilizations

probably have stopped blasting narrow spectrum radio power into

space. Two predictions: (a) today’s SETI searches, while admirable, are

looking for the wrong signals in the wrong way in the wrong places; and

(B) an extremely small but horribly significant portion of what seems to

be extragalactic noise is in fact intelligent communications."

 

He discusses more on SETI in his muse139.pdf article, at tinaja

 

Remember, the first artificial electromagnetic signal was generated and detected by Heinrich Hertz in 1887,

thus we have just a little over one hundred years using it as a communication medium.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: FrankM

Originally posted by: Freethinker

 

It is fairly easy to identify an "intellegent" signal from the background noise. Bandwidth distribution alone would be a major clue.

The statement above is no longer valid based upon new technology now being developed for communications and other uses. Put "UWB" into your favorite search tool and you will see the direction all of our various forms of communicating at a distance is heading. UltraWideBand is unique as it appears as "noise", and is typically buried in the noise level.

UWB is still "intellegence". The suggestion that it "is typically buried in the noise level" is only relevant to existing RF transmissions in that it theoretically can be broadcast with-in an active frequency band without interferring with that existing signal. The receiver would think the UWB is background noise because of it's wide bandwidth related to the existing channels bandwidth.

 

Thus while it would be harder to detect as a technique if used by some alien intellegence, it would be because it is a short duration transmition, not because it could not be indentified as "intellegence".

 

In fact, if received, it would be easier to identify as "intellegence" because regular RF transmissions can be confused with natural RF sources (e.g. Pulsars) because of it being repetitive.

 

It would however be harder to detect because of the short duration. All current detection proceedures require verification over an extended period of time. Thus the comment RE SETI not being designed to detect such signals is correct.

 

But even the short duration pulse of UWB would be generated regularly because new data is always being transmitted. The frequency distribution would be fairly constant. It is just a matter of changing HOW we determine whether it is an intellegent signal or not.

 

Perhaps an even greater threat to detection is seen by our move from terrestrial transmission to transmission over wire or fiber.

[FrankM]

It is easy to transfer technical knowledge using just a few lines. The examples shown in the following URL

represent three different "knowledge sets". The only requirement is that the order of lines be retained,

but it does not make any difference whether the lines are vertical or horizontal, or whether the short line

starts on the top, bottom, right or left.

 

In real life the last set of three lines would be presented to scale, but I cannot assure the scale will be

preserved on different browsers or monitors, so I gave the shortest line value.

 

Knowledge

 

Scientists have identified a number of "Absolute Dimensional Values" (ADV) that pertain to our

physical world, and some of these are easy to present with a series of "scaled" lines, others with

proportional representations. These ADVs are universal and could be presented the same way

in another galaxy and understood.

 

I guess IrishEyes would call it a type of open cryptography, the contents being completely undecipherable

to the mathematically and technically challenged. If the three line sets had been found inscribed on a wall

in an ancient Egyptian tomb 150 years ago, the mathematical sets would have been deciphered but the

last set would have been meaningless to even the best scientists of that day.

[Uncle Martin]

This is interesting, however it is still symbolic. Tell us what the lines mean please. I've had enough riddles.

[FrankM]

If the top two lines were etched in rock, the small line would be proportional to the longer line

1 to 3.1415. I put the short line image in the page as 10% and the long line as 31.415%, but I

cannot assure linearity in web page display.

 

The 9 line set indicates the Fibonacci Series, such as would fit on a web page. Don't have any way

to represent zero with a line, but I don't think that is necessary to illustrate knowledge of the series.

 

The bottom three line set indicates a 1/4 a 1/2 and a full wavelength. The full wavelength value would be

21.106 cm, the Larmor wavelength for neutral hydrogen. It is not identified as a constant by NIST, but it

is a universal value, everywhere. If you recognize the full wavelength value you would then know that

the lines indicate the incriber is knowledgeable of wave theory and has the ability to detect the

electromagnetic emission of a fundamental part of the structure of matter. If you could not find the

devices that detected the emission, at least you would know they existed at one time.

 

I reiterate, a considerable amount of knowledge can be transferred by using just lines. I can illustrate

with a simple triangle that the inscriber knows the speed of light, but you have to know this as well. You

have had to reach the equivalent level of mathematical and scientific knowledge before you would

recognize the information. It is easy to find things that we already know in a set of lines. If a line set

contained "new" knowledge beyond our current discovery, it would require exceptional observation

to extrapolate beyond the known. It can be done.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: FrankM

When mathematical and scientific information is discussed on this forum, it is generally provided in textual and symbolic form. I recognize that our mathematics and scientific theory has been developed over an extended period of time that included many languages and numeric systems. The symbolic system we use to present mathematical and scientific information requires the use of references to know exactly what is meant.

...

Can complex mathematical and scientific concepts be presented without a textual reference or a symbolic language? Once you think about it, I am sure one or more methods will come to mind.

Originally posted by: FrankM

If the top two lines were etched in rock, the small line would be proportional to the longer line

Thus each line is symbolic of something. You have developed a "symbolic language".

I reiterate, a considerable amount of knowledge can be transferred by using just lines.

Yes but each line is SYMBOLIC of something.

 

Thus you have not answered your own first post that started this thread.

[FrankM]

Thus each line is symbolic of something. You have developed a "symbolic language".

 

The three examples do not have a common defined base, so it is difficult to consider them together

as a language. The last example has an absolute base because of the value used, and if I displayed

all of the examples, using the absolute value as the base reference, then the three examples as a group

could qualify as a symbolic language. I really didn't develop anything, as several years ago I had found

someone else had used an architectural diagram, using specific dimension groups, to pass along

technical information on a couple of subjects. I guess you could call that a type of steganography. I

have been curious if anyone else had ever run across a similar method of displaying technical

information using just lines, thus the subject.

 

I made the following statement earlier,

I don't think a line can qualify as a "symbol" unless it is used exclusively in some kind of context.

but I can see where a line, made anywhere intentionally, would have a symbolic meaning to the maker,

even if the only purpose of the line was just to draw a line.

[Tormod]

Frank, this is a very interesting topic. It reminds me of the SETI project where they sent the message to the stars containing basic information about our knowledge.

 

I still maintain that for communication with ET this sort of thing is purely hypothetical. But it seems to me your point is not ET, rather the semantics of knowledge and how low-level it is possible to get and still convey meaningful knowledge.

 

However, I would argue that the very word "knowledge" plays a key role here, as it is impossible to get away from semantics. As you say, I would have to *know* that there is such things as a fibonacci series or wavelengths of elements. Without this knowledge the lines become utterly incomprehensible and I would view them as nice lines but nothing else.

 

As human beings we tend to look for patterns in things. This is probably becuase our brain is wired that way, it is a survival instinct. So when studying the lines I tried to figure out what they meant, but I still couldn't because the context was lost on me. Yet if we discussed this in a pub over a beer I'd probably be able to grasp it because you could provide hints etc.

 

So when we talk about "technology transfer" (the title of this thread) I would like to ask, "what purpose does this play" and "what would be the minimum requirements for a set of symbols which are supposed to convey knowledge".

 

Can these questions be answered or is it meaningless?

[Tormod]

The reason I ask is because I remember this discussion coming up when I took a linguistics class at the University of Oslo. There was a lot of talk about how to reduce a message from a meaningful essay down to a blurb which contained the bare essentials, yet still conveyed the basic information ("fractals" comes to mind).

 

Here is an interesting presentation about something called OntoMorph, "A Translation System for Symbolic Knowledge":

http://www.isi.edu/~hans/ontomorph/presentation/ontomorph.html

 

It is not directly related to physics, but it is about the symbolic meaning of text, and how to reduce/translate things back and forth from text to symbols and back.

[FrankM]

Can mathematical/scientific knowlege be preserved independent of a language?

 

I agree it is a matter of semantics. We use symbols, such as these Latin characters, to communicate

concepts. My three line sets had no common basis, but they had numeric/size relationships. Any

intelligence species would recognize the size relationships, but the numeric equivalents would be

meaningless if they hadn't already developed the associated math and science.

 

I remember reading about a linguistics translation contest and it came up as the second item in a search.

 

This points out how two different languages (symbol systems) can be translated using currently

available computer technology. In the contest case, they already had the advantage of knowing

what the symbol groups meant in both languages.

 

In my three line groups, you didn't have to know what the individuals lines meant, but you could

deduce a particular lines meaning by association. It is easier to transfer basic mathematical and

scientific concepts using a few lines than in trying to transfer the meaning of a word that is essentially

abstract, such as the word "communicate". I found it quite interesting how much I knew about the

scientific level of the individuals that encoded information in a set of dimensions, but I also found I

was unable to decipher (understand) some of the encoded information. Probably a limitation in

my scientific knowledge.

 

Trying to transfer knowlege at a distance and out of sight is considerably more difficult, especially

if you don't know who you are communicating with.

[TeleMad]

How about we start with the most fundamental rules of science. FrankM, pretend we are aliens and communicate to us Newton's three laws of motion using your "non symbolic" lines.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: TeleMad

How about we start with the most fundamental rules of science. FrankM, pretend we are aliens and communicate to us Newton's three laws of motion using your "non symbolic" lines.

 

First one

.

[TeleMad]

Which in the absence of context means what? A proportionality of 1 to 300 (or thereabouts). How is that Newton's first law? Maybe it is trying to communicate the difference in size between an elephant and the Empire State Building? Maybe it's trying to communicate the difference in the rate of a person walking and a jet airplane flying? Who knows? Tell you what....take your symbolic representation and post it any thread - even an English speaking physics thread - with no context and see what percentage of the people understand it to be Newton's first law.

 

Fact is, one must already know what information is trying to be conveyed in order to understand what those symbols attempt to communicate: the "non symbols" themselves don't do the trick.

[TeleMad]

Here you go, what is this set of three lines trying to communicate?

 

___

___

___

 

Really tough when you dont' already know what's trying to be said, huh.