Posthuman Blues

Despite SETI's good intentions, we have no way of knowing what an alien transmission might hold in store for us. This calls SETI's international protocol into question. In the event that we receive an impartial beacon consisting of prime numbers or a digital schematic of the aliens' domain within the galactic disk, there would be little problem democratizing the transmission. On the other hand, what if the extraterrestrials sent a more ambitious message our way? Instead of sending us a series of conspicuous beeps, an alien civilization might feel inclined to help emerging civilizations by supplying "blueprints" for new technologies, offering new paradigms for communication, energy extraction, medicine, or even artistic expression.

Conceivably, any message encompassing unknown technologies would fall under the domain of national security. Suppose an ET message contained a coherent primer for extracting the fabled zero-point energy of the vacuum. Few would argue that a global, utopian society would eagerly accept such wisdom. But the Earth of the 21st century is far from utopian; the nation in possession of such knowledge would stand to benefit enormously in both economic and military spheres. SETI's protocol sounds completely just, but it naively assumes that incoming signals from faraway civilizations will be little more than cosmic Hallmark Greetings of no possible strategic importance. Would the United States openly share information leading to new energy sources to, say, Iraq or North Korea if it could be used to create new and more destructive weapons?