Re: Mersenne: mersennes for exocivilizations

[Joth Tupper]

One problem that seems hidden in transmitting a large Mersenne numbers is
the difficulty in decoding a very long string
of binary 1's.  Apart from a constant signal being non-random, how does a
receiver know when it starts and stops?  And
how do they guess how to parse it.  

I hate to paraphrase a comic, but compared to a Cobol core-dump, Joan
Rivers', "Can we talk?" is easily understood.

Sending Mersennes looks like a singularly difficult way to get somebody's
attention.

Joth Tupper

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