The tree · Contact Clause · Happens to the world · Plays out over the whole window
A message from elsewhere is understood
Knowledge enters human understanding whose provenance is demonstrably not human and not human-built. The dream in its most beautiful form, kept on the board by the founding rule.
The test: what counts as it having happened
A verified non-human signal, whose source is placed beyond plausible human technological reach by at least two independent physical observations recorded in the peer-reviewed literature, is decoded into information that human researchers apply to produce a novel peer-reviewed result, with the decoding independently reproduced.
Settled by: The peer-reviewed record: the provenance observations, the decoding, and the result that applies it
The odds, by how long I live
| baselineto 2071 ± 8 | moderateto 2080 | strongto 2095 | radicalto 2136 | openno deadline |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4% | 5% | 8% | 15% | 25% |
Each column is a different guess at how long I live, from current trends (baseline) to open-ended. The number is the chance this happens before that deadline, assuming everything it depends on happens first. As of September 19th, 2026.
Why these numbers: Given a detection, most detections would be a signature rather than a message, decoding may be impossible, and a decoded message would still have to teach us something we could publish; the first estimate assumed a message.
What this one is worth
Nothing. The headline number does not rest on this step at any remove, so however it turns out, the chance that I live and work off Earth does not change. That is not a judgement that it does not matter. It is what the tree says: this step feeds a tier above the one the headline asks about, or sits beside the equation rather than in it.
What the ledger says about this step
- The Contact Clause's two top rungs were renamed for the event each criterion tests: a message from elsewhere is understood, and a real exchange with a machine mind 2026-09-25 The tree itself changed
- The fourth rung, Communion, came down and became a checkable test: a decoded signal applied to a new result 2026-09-20 Changed my mind
How it could happen, and where physics would have to give way
Long shots stay in the tree on purpose, because they make the goal vivid. The rule is that each one has to be written plausibly all the way to the edge of the impossible, naming how it would work and exactly where it would break.
The mechanism: A confirmed detection (C3) turns out to carry structure, the structure is decoded, the decoding is reproduced by a second team, and the decoded content is applied by human researchers to produce a result they could not otherwise have reached, the way a message with a proof in it could be checked. Each of those is a recognisable step from the one before.
The breaking point: Nothing to decode has ever been received, and no decoding of a non-human signal has ever been attempted for real. Provenance is now a positive test (two independent observations placing the source beyond human reach) rather than a proof of a negative, but both the detection and the decoding would have to be invented.
The last 3 checks
Once a week the tree is read against the news, node by node, against the test above. Open a line to see what that week held. Every check ever made on this node is on the Radar page.
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2026-11-01 Nothing new
No verified non-human signal exists to decode. The 'decoded' coverage found concerns the 2023 simulated Mars-orbiter signal.
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2026-10-04 Nothing new
No verified non-human signal exists to decode; the only decoding story is the 2023 SETI Institute Sign in Space art project simulation.
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2026-09-19 Nothing new
No claim of received and understood knowledge of non-human, non-human-built origin appeared in the window; only administrative news, an overhaul of the International Academy of Astronautics' post-detection protocol between June and August 2026, and continued absence of evidence per NASA and the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office.
Revisions
| Date | Field | From | To | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-09-19 | resolution | 'a body of knowledge is received and understood by humans whose origin is established ... as neither human nor produced by any human-built system' | a verified non-human signal, placed beyond plausible human technological reach by at least two independent physical observations, decoded into information that human researchers apply to produce a novel peer-reviewed result, with the decoding independently reproduced | Step 27 outside-model review, items 25 and 94 (docs/reviews/2026-09-19-rulings.md): 'understood by humans' was subjective and the provenance clause proved a negative; the decoding-and-application test is checkable and the location test is positive. Mechanism and breaking point updated to match. Decided September 19th, 2026. |
| 2026-09-19 | probability | 0.10 / 0.12 / 0.18 / 0.30 / 0.40 | 0.04 / 0.05 / 0.08 / 0.15 / 0.25 | Step 27 outside-model review, item 28 (docs/reviews/2026-09-19-rulings.md): given C3, a detection is overwhelmingly likely to be incidental and decoding may be impossible; the first estimate assumed a message. Moved partway toward the reviewer. Decided September 19th, 2026. |
| 2026-09-25 | name | Communion | A message from elsewhere is understood | Decided September 25th, 2026 while editing the intro essay: the label should name the event the criterion tests, not a feeling, and communion carries a religious ring. Words only; criterion, probabilities and dependencies unchanged. |
Think this estimate is wrong?
Here's how to tell me, and
what happens next.
The record itself is data/C-contact.toml in the public repository.