Lincos (an abbreviation of the

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

phrase ''lingua cosmica'') is a

constructed language A constructed language (sometimes called a conlang) is a language whose phonology, grammar, and vocabulary, instead of having developed naturally, are consciously devised for some purpose, which may include being devised for a work of fiction. ...

first described in 1960 by Dr.

Hans Freudenthal Hans Freudenthal (17 September 1905 – 13 October 1990) was a Jewish-German-born Dutch mathematician. He made substantial contributions to algebraic topology and also took an interest in literature, philosophy, history and mathematics education ...

in his book ''Lincos: Design of a Language for Cosmic Intercourse, Part 1''. It is a language designed to be understandable by any possible intelligent

extraterrestrial life Extraterrestrial life, colloquially referred to as alien life, is life that may occur outside Earth and which did not originate on Earth. No extraterrestrial life has yet been conclusively detected, although efforts are underway. Such life might ...

form, for use in interstellar

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

transmissions. Freudenthal considered that such a language should be easily understood by beings not acquainted with any

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

ling

syntax In linguistics, syntax () is the study of how words and morphemes combine to form larger units such as phrases and sentences. Central concerns of syntax include word order, grammatical relations, hierarchical sentence structure ( constituency) ...

or language. Lincos was designed to be capable of encapsulating "the whole bulk of our knowledge".

Concepts and range

The Lincos "

dictionary A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies ...

" is intended to be transmitted first before any additional messages. It teaches natural numbers by a series of repeated pulses, separated by pauses. It then teaches >, <, =, +, -, by examples such as . . . . . > . . . More of a pause than he shows around > would be needed to show an alien that > is a new separate symbol. Otherwise, an alien might think that the whole pattern is a new symbol of unknown meaning. Having introduced =, he shows unary notation for numbers . = 1, . . = 2 and so on. He goes on to multiplication, division, variables and constants, then

propositional logic Propositional calculus is a branch of logic. It is also called propositional logic, statement logic, sentential calculus, sentential logic, or sometimes zeroth-order logic. It deals with propositions (which can be true or false) and relations b ...

set theory Set theory is the branch of mathematical logic that studies sets, which can be informally described as collections of objects. Although objects of any kind can be collected into a set, set theory, as a branch of mathematics, is mostly conce ...

, and

first-order logic First-order logic—also known as predicate logic, quantificational logic, and first-order predicate calculus—is a collection of formal systems used in mathematics, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science. First-order logic uses quantifie ...

. He tries to introduce questions by leaving mathematical expressions unsolved (e.g., ? x x + 101 = 11). The next section of the Lincos dictionary introduces a word for

second The second (symbol: s) is the unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), historically defined as of a day – this factor derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes and finally to 60 seconds ...

, "Sec," by playing pulses of various lengths, followed by Sec, and the number of seconds, "until the receiver may be expected to remark that the numbers... are proportional to the durations", thus teaching both that Sec is a unit of time, and exactly how long it is. He then introduces means for measuring durations, referring to moments in time, and talking about past and future events. The third section is perhaps the most complex, and attempts to convey the concepts and language necessary to describe behavior and conversation between individuals. It uses examples to introduce actors speaking to each other, asking questions, disapproving, quoting other people, knowing and wanting things, promising, and playing. The first steps (since he has introduced sets of numbers and questions) are to introduce some new symbols (distinctive patterns of pulses), say they are NOT numbers, and transmit sequences showing two of these new symbols separated by the word "Inq", and followed by a question about an equation, then the symbols reversed, followed by the answer (example below). He expects that after many repetitions, the recipient will decide these new symbols are entities asking and answering the questions, rather than some other context for the questions. Finally, the fourth section describes the concepts and language relating to

mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different elementar ...

space Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider ...

, and

motion In physics, motion is the phenomenon in which an object changes its position with respect to time. Motion is mathematically described in terms of displacement, distance, velocity, acceleration, speed and frame of reference to an observer and mea ...

. This last section goes so far as to describe physical features of human beings and of the

Solar System The Solar SystemCapitalization of the name varies. The International Astronomical Union, the authoritative body regarding astronomical nomenclature, specifies capitalizing the names of all individual astronomical objects but uses mixed "Solar S ...

. A second book was planned but never written that would have added four more sections to the dictionary: "Matter"; "Earth"; "Life"; and "Behavior 2". Other researchers have since extended the language somewhat on their own. One example is

CosmicOS CosmicOS is a self-contained message designed to be understood primarily by treating it as a computer program and executing it. It is inspired by Hans Freudenthal's Lincos (language), Lincos and resembles the programming language Scheme (programm ...

. Another is a second-generation ''Lingua Cosmica'' developed by the Dutch-Swedish astronomer and mathematician

Alexander Ollongren Alexander Ollongren (born November 9, 1928) is a professor emeritus at Leiden University. He serves on the Advisory Council of METI (Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence). Personal life Alexander Ollongren was born on November 9, 1928 on a ...

Leiden University Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; nl, Universiteit Leiden) is a Public university, public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. The university was founded as a Protestant university in 1575 by William the Silent, William, Prince o ...

, using

constructive logic Intuitionistic logic, sometimes more generally called constructive logic, refers to systems of symbolic logic that differ from the systems used for classical logic by more closely mirroring the notion of constructive proof. In particular, systems o ...

. Freudenthal's book on Lincos discusses it with many technical words from linguistic and logical theory, usually without defining them, which may have reduced its general interest, though the main chapters can be understood without these technical terms: appellatives, binding, formalization, function, lexicology, logistical, ostensive, quasi-general, semantics, syntax, variables, etc.

Use

For decades, no actual transmissions were made using Lincos; it remained largely a theoretical exercise, until

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

astrophysicists

Yvan Dutil Yvan Dutil, born April 6, 1970, is a Canadian astrophysicist. He is a member of the Bioastronomy Commission of the International Astronomical Union and of the International Academy of Astronautics's Permanent Committee on the Search for Extra-T ...

and

Stéphane Dumas Stéphane Louis André Dumas (14 September 1978) is a French basketball coach and former player who played as a point guard. He is currently the assistant basketball coach for CB Gran Canaria, Gran Canaria of the Liga ACB, alongside Spaniard :es: ...

, working at the Canadian Defense Research Establishment, created a noise-resistant coding system for messages aimed at communicating with extraterrestrial civilizations. In 1999, the astrophysicists encoded a message in Lincos and used the

Yevpatoria RT-70 radio telescope The Yevpatoria RT-70 radio telescope (P-2500, RT-70) is an RT-70 radio telescope and planetary radar at the Center for Deep Space Communications, Yevpatoria, Crimea. In the scientific literature is often called Evpatoria Planetary Radar (EPR). ...

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

to beam it towards close stars. This is known as

Cosmic Call Cosmic commonly refers to: * The cosmos, a concept of the universe Cosmic may also refer to: Media * ''Cosmic'' (album), an album by Bazzi * Afro/Cosmic music * "Cosmic", a song by Kylie Minogue from the album '' X'' * CosM.i.C, a member of ...

. The experiment was repeated (using other close stars as target) in 2003. The message was a series of pages describing some basic mathematics, physics and astronomy. The Dutil–Dumas experiment was promoted by an organization called ''Encounter 2001''. Some

researchers Research is " creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular attentiveness ...

have explored the similar issues in communicating with intelligent animals such as

cetacea Cetacea (; , ) is an infraorder of aquatic mammals that includes whales, dolphins, and porpoises. Key characteristics are their fully aquatic lifestyle, streamlined body shape, often large size and exclusively carnivorous diet. They propel them ...

ns. Lincos messages (even if sent by pulses of sound rather than radio) are complex and need to reach the most patient, logically oriented members of the target species. A far simpler approach aimed at average members of a species can cover numbers, >, <, =, +, -, and time.

Examples

An example of Lincos from section 3 of Freudenthal's book, showing one individual asking another individual questions: Note the difference between "good" and "bad" as compared to "true" and "false"; 10/4 is a true answer to the question, so ''Ver'' ("true") would be a valid response, but since it wasn't reduced to lowest terms, it wasn't what Ha wanted and so he responded ''Mal'' ("bad") instead. The book separately teaches Ver and Fal for true and false. Another example, showing meta-conversation:

Popular culture

In the motion picture ''

Contact Contact may refer to: Interaction Physical interaction * Contact (geology), a common geological feature * Contact lens or contact, a lens placed on the eye * Contact sport, a sport in which players make contact with other players or objects * ...

'' (1997),

SETI The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) is a collective term for scientific searches for intelligent extraterrestrial life, for example, monitoring electromagnetic radiation for signs of transmissions from civilizations on other p ...

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, g ...

s receive a

transmission from space that has a Lincos-like dictionary embedded in the message. In the

Stanisław Lem Stanisław Herman Lem (; 12 September 1921 – 27 March 2006) was a Polish writer of science fiction and essays on various subjects, including philosophy, futurology, and literary criticism. Many of his science fiction stories are of satirical ...

novel ''His Master's Voice'', Lincos is mentioned together with

Loglan Loglan is a logical constructed language originally designed for linguistic research, particularly for investigating the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis. The language was developed beginning in 1955 by Dr. James Cooke Brown with the goal of making ...

. Olivia, a character in

Asobi Asobase is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Rin Suzukawa. It began serialization on Hakusensha's ''Young Animal Densi'' website in June 2015; it has also been published in ''Young Animal'' since November 2016 and finished in Novembe ...

, was the subject of a classroom rumor that she was fluent in Lincos. In episode 12, season four of '' Star Trek: Discovery'', " Species Ten-C", in an attempt to communicate with the far more advanced species, after receiving mathematical equations in the form of hydrocarbon patterns, Captain Saru suggests that the Ten-C are trying to teach them a "bridge language" like Lincos, which Captain Burnham describes as a language based on math from the "21st-century Earth organization METI" who predicted, "would be helpful in extraplanetary communication".

References

Bibliography

* *

External links

Were it Perfect, Would it Work Better? Survey of a Language for Cosmic Intercourse
(Bruno Bassi) {{Interstellar messages Constructed languages Engineered languages Interstellar messages Knowledge representation languages Search for extraterrestrial intelligence 1960 introductions Constructed languages introduced in the 1960s