Binary Code on Barbie's Laptop

It spells “Barbie” — repeatedly, in ASCII code.

B-a-r-b-i-e

The screen shows six full lines of code — three copies of these two lines:

01000010 01100001 01110010
01100010 01101001 01100101

Those happen to be six ASCII character codes, written in binary:

01000010 = B
01100001 = a
01110010 = r
01100010 = b
01101001 = i
01100101 = e

I’ve overlaid the characters on the screen so you can see the correspondence better:

Barbie's Laptop Overlaid with Corresponding ASCII Characters

(Now if instead those were numbers encoded in IEEE floating-point I’d have been really impressed .)

By Rick Regan (Copyright © 2008-2012 Exploring Binary)

Barbie Goes Binary

My Custom Binary-Themed Calendar For 2010

Here are thumbnail images of each month:

January 2010

February 2010

March 2010

April 2010

May 2010

June 2010

July 2010

August 2010

September 2010

October 2010

November 2010

December 2010

This is my personal calendar — it’s not for sale!

(Courtesy Stock.XCHNG, Dreamstime, Morguefile, and shutterfly.)

By Rick Regan (Copyright © 2008-2012 Exploring Binary)

My Custom Binary Themed Calendar for 2010

Pioneer 10 Plaque (click image for higher resolution).

Disclaimer: I’m a computer scientist, not a physicist or astronomer.

Binary Encoding

The binary information in the diagram is encoded as groups of vertical strokes (|) and horizontal strokes (—). | means 1, and — means 0. For example, |—|— is 1010. Each group of strokes represents a binary integer, and there are binary integers associated with three entities: pulsars, planets, and people. I’ve annotated the original diagram and highlighted their encodings in gray:

Annotated Pioneer 10 Plaque (click image for higher resolution).

Hydrogen As a Yardstick

The hydrogen atom, indicated by the two circles at the top left of the diagram, serves as a universal reference for time and distance. Specifically, the atom’s hyperfine transition, which is about 1420 MHz, is the base of measure. A frequency of 1420 MHz gives a period of about 7.04 * 10^-10 seconds, and a wavelength of about 8.3 inches. These numbers are implied as units in other parts of the diagram.

Pulsars

There are 14 radial lines in the diagram, representing the positions of 14 pulsars relative to the sun. Pulsars emit radio waves at a different frequencies, which helps identify them. The waves emanate across much of the galaxy, so presumably an alien culture could detect them and locate our solar system. Also, since a pulsar’s frequency decreases with time, aliens could use that to determine when the spacecraft was launched.

Each pulsar line is labeled with an encoded binary integer, which is read in the direction of the gray arrows I’ve drawn. Starting at the unlabeled line (appearing at 3:00 in the diagram) and heading clockwise, those numbers and their decimal equivalents are:

These numbers represent the period of the pulsar’s radiation, counted in units of 7.04 * 10^-10 seconds. Multiply each integer by 7.04 * 10^-10 to get the period.

Planets

The binary code for each planet indicates its average distance from the sun. (Pluto is included because it was still considered a planet in 1972.) The distances are relative to Mercury’s distance from the sun, which is given as 10 units. For example, Saturn is 24.7 times farther from the sun than Mercury. Confusingly, the wavelength derived from the hydrogen atom plays no role in these values.

People

The height of the woman in the diagram is encoded by the |— — —, which is 1000, or 8 in decimal (nevermind that it’s written from the bottom up and one of the horizontal strokes has a defect in it). If you multiply this by the reference unit of length, 8.3 inches, you get the height of the woman — about 5 feet, 6 inches.

Commentary

Will aliens know how to read binary code? Will they know that the binary code represents binary integers? Will they understand that the units of distance and time associated with those integers, in most cases, are derived from properties of the hydrogen atom? Will they make numerous other assumptions required to understand that plaque? Not likely. But the scientists wanted to make an attempt at communication, and having chosen binary is a testament to its simplicity and universality.

Other References

1. A funny, yet informative, article about the plaque.
2. Details on the science of pulsars.
3. The Pioneer 11, also known as Pioneer G, was launched in 1973, with the same plaque.

(Images courtesy of NASA).

By Rick Regan (Copyright © 2008-2012 Exploring Binary)

Binary Code on the Pioneer 10 Spacecraft

1. “bye’ nuh ree” (rhymes with “winery”)
2. “bye’ nairy” (flows like the words “bye Mary”)

I use the second pronunciation, as do most people I’ve heard say the word. But as it turns out, according to someone I contacted at Merriam-Webster, the first pronunciation is more popular. In fact, the second pronunciation has been added to the dictionary only in the last 20 years or so.

Here’s an example of the first pronunciation, from an exchange in the movie “Star Wars IV: A New Hope”:

Uncle Owen:

“What I really need is a droid who understands the binary language of moisture vaporators.”

C-3PO:

“Vaporators! Sir, my first job was programming binary load lifters, very similar to your vaporators in most respects.”

So how do you pronounce binary — (1) “bye’ nuh ree”, like Uncle Owen and C-3PO, or (2) “bye’ nairy”, like me? Please let us know in the comments.

By Rick Regan (Copyright © 2008-2012 Exploring Binary)

How Do You Pronounce “Binary”?