Imagine. You're calling someone, but he's not at home. The only thing you're getting is his answering machine. What's more, you learn that he won't be back for a million years. Will you leave him a message?

Suppose the guy you're calling is mankind - the generation in a million years from now. Earth will still be habitable then, and thus in all likelihood an intelligent species will still live on earth. Whether they're human or not, they might be interested in a message from you.

Suppose we had a server to store about 10 KB of data for everyone of the 6.5 billion people living on earth today, and we had some means to store that data for a million years. Would you be interested in leaving some trace in time, in form of a text message, a sort of personal manifesto or an overview of your personal philosophy, to be read in a million years? And shall your message also be publicly visible to all generations inbetween? Please take a minute to fill in the poll.

Would you leave a million years message? single choice
	No, and I think this is a bad idea,
	No, but I think this is a good idea.
	Yes, I would leave a private message.
	Yes, I would leave a public message.
Votes accepted starting: 04/08/06 10:53
View Results

wow answering machines last that long

i said yes,i would leave a private message.

what do you mean with a private message?
to your grand grand grand .... grand..
...
...
..grand daughter?

Its funny how people feel that they have to leave some legacy of their existance. As if being dead is not so bad as long as someone remembers you...

Definitely public for private makes no sense in a million years.
But what to say, what to say?

Option 1
Leave about two minutes of heavy breathing just to mess with future-kind:

"Facinating, Xynoplex456... this message has a new language. We must decipher!"
"Yes, Grtoflex678, and we will not rest until we figure out what this means!"

Option 2
"Call me back when you can"

Option 3
"Is this Dave? Is Dave home?"

Option 4
"Ooops, sorry, wrong number."

I'd choose the public message. Content: "Hi all, I'm a homo sapiens sapiens, the species that lived on earth long before you. Yeah, we were just too dumb to survive, killing each other was just more fun than living in together in peace. Have a nice life, maybe we see each other when you're dead too "

"So.... When will A7 come out?"

"do you know when Duke Nukem Forever will be released?"

with them replying:

when its done...

A digital time capsule? Sounds like something that could be possible with data banks of flashcard type storage cababilities in a special indestructable library.

10kb is not a lot of space though jcl . I would leave one of my favorite systems of philosophy that I created in a single scanned image. I already have a document suitable for this. If allowed more space I would leave the best of my writings and artwork.

there are actually these attempts, scientists print data on glastubes, and
store them in underground salt-mines.
This is ment to save works of literature and science for future generations.

lol ROMAC... your message made me laugh

That is interesting Damocles, I wonder what else they are storing down there...

I wonder if we kryogenic froze a pizza it would still be good to eat in a million years? Maybe if we froze some McDonalds food and left it for the future to study someone will find out what is actually in that stuff.

I voted to stay on Topic but something off topic.... I would bet those McDonalds Cheese Burgers would taste mighty delicious after a million years.

-Paul.

...with all these chemicals and taste-enhancers in it...
And statements: "McDonalds made me vote for Bush"

Id leave the message as public so the guy will have it thro generations. if I'd left it as private, it could be deleted or so. ^^ anyways

I quess as if I'd be pizzaman, I wouldn't be happy..

my public message:

"People, neither belive in bush nor voting for him. i think he's a copy of a very stupid german dictator who acted in a comperable way."

or:

"People, i think, stalker is gonna be made by 3D Realms"

btw: 3d realms is gonna pulish duke nukem forever

"50 Million people are going to die!!!"

(12 monkeys)

Hi, Rigoletto here, would be nice if you could take me to a trip into your time.
Please send a time machine to:

30.04.2006, 12:00am
9° 21' O
52° 06' N

Beacon would be nice, entrance access is "timetrip", to prevent visits unexpectedly.

@Rigoletto: you got in there and posted my post before me. oh well.

I would leave the following message to the millionth generation:

"Congratulations on not following the path of my people. Gone and far behind you, though we may be, you must remember that a species devided is a species that is doomed to extinction.

All empires fail, and ours was no acception. They fail for the same reasons, and will always fail. So never allow yourselves to regress to imperialism.

Should you find yourselves on the brink of destruction, and even if not, do as we have and survive compendiums of your knowledge.. that it is not lost to the next civilization as the majority of knowledge from our ancestry was lost to us.

It is by retaining the knowledge that we gain, and teaching of our errors to our succeeding generations that we will break the cycle of ascending, self destruction, and regression.

As our knowledge is passed to you, so must you pass it to the generations of your distant future, that what happens to us befalls no one else and our species lives until it's extinction cannot be avoided."

The password is "Sw0rdf1sh", not "Swordfish"

Edit: I really like Rigoletto's

"I licked the speaker your hearing this message from, wet willy "

I dont know how they would say however... Further more this would be stupid if they dont have a speaker agenst their ear.

"hey i was just calling about the problem your having with the sink. do you want me to come over now or would 1 million years be good for you?" i think they chose 1 million years. ps WOW this is old post i just think its kind of fun

Nah, I remember "Dave".(Good one fastlane)

"Has Tusk shown up yet???"

I'd be interested in leaving a message. But I really have no idea what I'd put.

It would have to be something smart and inspiring.

[on the mankind answering server] "Dave? Who's Dave? What? He's located 5.6 MB behind me? Ask him to call me back on this number would you? Thanx!"

I would leave the following message : "A sphincter says what?"

I'd say, "tag you're it"

for resurrecting this thread..

Yea, yea, I know, but c'mon, that was hilarious

My message to the future, and a warning until then.

Do you run on electricity? Congratulations, it was only
a matter of time. Ack.

You dont? The secret is to BANG THE ROCKS TOGETHER guys.

"No, Dave is outside. Can I take a message?"
*ERROR, Message System Ram sharing violation. Memory location shared with Pod Bay Doors*
Resolving: Pod Bay Doors disabled.
"Please record your message at the beep." *BEEP*

10kb is actually a fair amount of space.. about 2048 words. That's enough space for a -very breif- recount of human history. Alternatively, you could fit a 100x100 8-bit colour image in that space.

What would you write in such a 2048 word history then??

I'm sure you are aware of this, but even if you would take mankind's technological advancement as the main focus, there's no way you could fit everything into just 2048 words.

hmm.. I guess so..

What about a colour image? you might have a picture of the earth before the plate tectonics moved the continents to their 1000000-years-from-now positions:

That image is in 8-bit,100x100 image.

But since it's compressed, it's only 6.9KB. So you could add a caption:


The way it was, when we were there.

Hmmm....

"Please reconstitute my DNA."

or maybe

"Here is my recipe for Cuban Black Bean Soup. Please enjoy the taste and the musical accompaniment."

Seriously I'd love to leave a thought provoking message but I have to believe that any intelligent race that survived that long would find 99% of our culture very strange.

*if you get this, i was right. if not, it doesnt matter anyway*

edit: heck, even i find american culture strange. and im not that old or intelligent.
on the other hand, i find people strange too.. in general...

Back to the subject:
No, i won't put a message because when he arrives i'll be dead then.

I'd leave a public message, there is no reason for leaving a private message since my grand^10sons/daughters would only be interested in a more detailed explanation of my person. Therefore, 10 kb are not sufficient.

Here's my public message:

"I'm lookin' for a tap and die, and some WD-40!"

What message would be so important that everyone (ie. mankind) should know about in a far far future from now?

Even without knowing the exact future setting I think very little would make actual sense.

What's bad and is likely to never change and hence would be worth mentioning?

"The answer to the reason of life, the universe and everything is..." *stop*

And let them try to "reconstruct" the ending of the message, even though there is none.

Wow, this thread is anticque. I think that if we wait long enough, this thread would still exist in a million years, and there would be no need to leave a message

Worse yet, we might have totally forgotten what an 'Answering machine' is by then because communication will have changed even more than it has for us now in the last century or so.

Its funny how people feel that they have to leave some legacy of their existance. As if being dead is not so bad as long as someone remembers you...