> personally it seems strange they wouldn't send a simple probe
If we detected something we thought was intelligent life, could we send a probe like you describe? Our nearest star is 4 light years away.
If we detected something we thought was intelligent life, could we send a probe like you describe? Our nearest star is 4 light years away.
If we actually wanted to aim a probe at another star system, I think that's probably within our technical grasp, but again we don't have any real way to get there in a reasonable timescale, or send data back once we're there. Not much use sending a probe 4 light years if the transmitter isn't powerful enough to send a signal back, and a transmitter that powerful would probably be too large to fit on a probe we could currently launch.
Perhaps lasers could be used, but you'd still need a fairly powerful one, and then you have to worry about interstellar absorption of the signal if you go through a dust "cloud". I guess with a laser you're also really pinpointing where you're sending information to, if you care about that.
[edit: huh, shakezula and I think alike :)]
And that's only if we're lucky enough to find life next door.