With the Falcon Heavy launch a couple of days ago, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk took the chance to build up some hype for space exploration endeavours, by attempting an entertaining stunt. And with it, he decided to slip in a few easter eggs as well.
SpaceX
When rockets are tested, scientists usually use a ¡°mass simulator¡±, something along the lines of a large concrete block that can simulate how carrying a heavy payload would affect the rocket¡¯s performance. For SpaceX¡¯s launch, Musk decided to forgo a boring old block and instead put his cherry-red Tesla Roadster atop the rocket. And in it were a few nods to a few great characters from modern times.
First of all, the dummy in the front seat of the car was named Starman, a reference to the David Bowie¡¯s song of the same name. In addition, on the dashboard was a little red model car, with another tiny dummy inside it, just as a meta joke.
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But the easter eggs go beyond that. For all you eagle-eyed viewers, Musk also included a poster on the dashboard with the simple phrase ¡°Don¡¯t Panic¡±. That¡¯s a nod to ¡®The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy¡¯ a comedy science fiction book by renowned author Douglas Adams. Don¡¯t panic is a common phrase in the book parroted whenever the lead character, a regular human, has to contend with aliens or phenomenon that challenge his beliefs.?
Lastly, and perhaps most important, was a digital ¡°book¡± in the Tesla¡¯s glove compartment. SpaceX actually had a tiny optical disk put into the car¡¯s box, encoded with the entirety of Isaac Asimov¡¯s ¡®Foundation¡¯ series. Asimov was 20th century writer and professor known for his science fiction works, particularly ¡®Encyclopedia Galactica, a hypothetical encyclopedia containing all the knowledge accumulated by a galaxy-spanning civilization.
Arch Mission Foundation
This wasn¡¯t just any optical disk either. Called an Arch (pronounced ¡°ark") its a slice of quartz silica glass that¡¯s been written with a femtosecond laser as 20 nanometre gratings. That¡¯s a very technical way of saying the disk has a theoretical capacity of about 360TB, and can survive without its data being corrupted for over 14 billion years.
¡°Each dot encodes 8 bits in 5 dimensions of light,¡± the Arch Mission group said. ¡°No other medium offers this kind of data capacity and durability.¡±
SpaceX has intended the Tesla, and it¡¯s cargo, to be a sort of time capsule from Earth for possible future civilizations. However, they¡¯ve not really specified how any future human or alien civilization would be able to read this data.
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SpaceX
The hope is that, if the disk is ever retrieved, the recipients will be able to decode it and build a computer to read it ¡°Beyond the visual layer, we also are encoding higher resolution data for audiences with access to lasers and computer-based digital technology,¡± Arch Mission writes. ¡°Here we can store truly big datasets, but it is more difficult for a recipient to access this data. To facilitate this, on the visual layers above this layer, we will include instructions for how to access and decode digital data, and if necessary how to build a computer and laser to do so.¡±
This attempt is reminiscent of the 1977 Voyager 1 mission, sent to the outer edge of our solar system. It carries a visual and audio representation of human civilization through the ages stored on Carl Sagan¡¯s ¡°Golden Record¡±. In the same way, the Arch Mission plans to launch more such time capsules in the years to come.
And maybe one day, someone will finally intercept it and read our message in a bottle.