And bizarrely it relies on a record player 14 BILLION miles away in space.
The record player is strapped to the side of record-breaking satellite Voyager one, which launched in 1977 and is now the farthest-flung probe ever launched from planet Earth.
In the pre-CD days of the 1970’s analogue records were at the cutting edge of stable audio technology – and this was the media NASA chose to convey a message to aliens from planet Earth.
The record is cast from gold and will last for an astonishing 1 BILLION years – long after human beings have either died out or morphed into an entirely different creature.
The record is accompanied by diagrams indicating important knowledge about life on Earth.
NASA scientists had to invent a cosmological language which could be comprehended by beings in any corner of the universe – and they chose hydrogen, the universe’s most prevalent element.
The main diagram explains the transition between the two lowest states of hydrogen.
This transition gives of radiation and the wavelength of that radiation is 0.7 nanoseconds – a universal constant.
This measure is used for the rest of the diagrams.
More understandably to humans there is also an LP record and basic tonearm and record player.
Any alien species deciphering the instructions on how to use it will hear:
A train
A car
Sheep being herded
A blacksmith working
A dog barking
Wind, rain and surf
Frogs
Crickets
A kiss
A baby crying
A human heartbeat.
Cleverer aliens will hopefully workout the instructions to decode the 116 images captured in analogue form. These include pictures of humans, landscapes and where Earth is in the solar system.
Scientist Carl Sagan, who’s idea the record was, said: “It is impossible to say whether Voyager will ever find life, but if it does it would be impolite not to say hello.”