Pioneer Plaque

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The technology we are trying to convey to the aliens are GIFs, which is a file in which multiple images are placed in order to create a short looping animation. To do this we decided to orient the images on the plaque in such a way that they could be read in any direction, and we did this because the heptapods have radial symmetry and multiple eyes throughout their body. We wanted the image to convey that it is a small looping animation and to do this we used dots to show motions. We used a ball falling since gravity, while it varies in intensity across the universe, is everywhere. Because of this, falling is a principle of physics that all beings should be able to understand.

 

The first thing we did was break the animation into multiple frames and then connect them to the central image using lines. We considered using arrows to depict direction, but we felt that it was very human oriented, so we opted for using dots instead. To depict motion, we showed the ball taking the place of the dots as it falls. We then put dots in between each frame to indicate that they are connected and feed into one another. Since the Heptapods read everything at once it was important for them to be able to take in the whole image at once, in order for them to discern what the meaning of the image was. It is for this reason that we did not put anything in a straight line because the anatomy of their bodies does not enable them to be able to easily read in a linear fashion like humans do. We also wanted to display that this technology is electronic, so we decided to depict a screen with the GIF on it. To show that the screen utilized electricity to operate. We depicted a hydrogen atom because it is the simplest and the most common atom throughout the universe with only one proton and one electron. They would almost certainly be familiar with this atom especially if they are as advanced as they seem in the reading. We zoomed in on the electron in order to emphasize its importance then we showed the electrons being fed into the computer to depict power being put into a screen. We used electrons because they are negatively charged and the natural electricity in the universe comes from negative ions. Therefore it is likely they would be able to understand that we power our devices by taking advantage of the energy of negatively charged ions, because they would have experienced similar electrical phenomena in space.