Bill Nye's Answer to the Fermi Paradox

[SeattleVet]

31. Not as simple as just tuning to the specific frequency, but to be able to decode the information.

Just tuning to an AM radio station's frequency using an FM receiver, or one that decodes digital data or some other mode of transmission will get you very little useful information content. Even knowing that there is some type of actual information encoded in a signal may not help, unless you are able to extrapolate a solution to the encoding method from the signal itself.

Then you have signals with multiple types of information layered in it, like the older analog TV signals. There were separate carrier frequencies for video and audio, and additional frequencies used for some other information. For example, when I was stationed in Germany we could use our American TV sets to watch German TV broadcasts. However, if we wanted to also be able to listen to the German audio, which was on a different carrier intermediate frequency than American TV, you had to buy a circuit board and incorporate it into the audio stage of your receiver to modify the received signal into one that the American TV could use.