Remember in an earlier SETI discussion that involved a posted news item about an art exhibit from an artist who claimed to have made his work from deciphered radio signals from an intelligence in deep space? The artist also claimed that aliens would send their art into space to communicate with others rather than math and science.

At first, having been weaned on the explanations of scientists regarding SETI parameters for years, the idea seemed counterintuitive, for how and why would one alien culture expect another alien culture to understand – to say nothing of appreciate – something as potentially abstract and subjective as art. You gotta a least get their attention with prime numbers of something like that.

But here’s my thought: If you are already advanced enough to detect signals from ETI, you should be able to figure out the difference between natural and artificial cosmic signals. Not that making it easier to detect and understand such signals wouldn’t hurt, of course, but if you are aware and agreeable to the idea of intelligent life elsewhere and are technologically capable of conducting such a search, then you may not need to dispense or require the elementary steps of establishing detection and contact. You may already be ready to graduate from preschool and appreciate e the finer and more sophisticated aspects.
What were among the first signs of a conscious intelligence in our distant ancestral humans: Their detailed cave paintings and the way they made their stone tools. In other words, ART. Not their science or their math (of which they likely had very little of either), but their art.

So maybe an ETI wouldn’t get a Jackson Pollock or some abstract sculpture, but then again the idea of art is to make you think and look beyond the surface appearances of things. It also says a lot about the artist and where they came from.

If you are an advanced ETI, maybe that is the way you know that the guy on the other line is also near, at, or beyond your level: Not by the amount of math they know (which any Artilect could do in its sleep, if it ever does sleep), but what their idea of art is like. Maybe certain ETI are long past the basic Hello phases and are now sharing their art across the stars while looking for new works all time.

Perhaps this idea is no more plausible than the possibility some have suggested that ETI are piping music across the galaxy. But it is a very pleasant thought, and displaying art and music in such a manner would surely be a sign of a civilization that is not only technologically advanced but culturally sophisticated as well (and perhaps peaceful to boot).

Plus it is a nice way to start a conversation.