HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The Voyager Golden Records are two
phonograph records A phonograph record (also known as a gramophone record, especially in British English), or simply a record, is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove. The groove usually starts nea ...
that were included aboard both Voyager spacecraft launched in 1977. The records contain sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth, and are intended for any 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 who may find them. The records are a time capsule. Although neither Voyager spacecraft is heading toward any particular star, ''
Voyager 1 ''Voyager 1'' is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. Launched 16 days after its twin '' Voyager 2'', ''V ...
'' will pass within 1.6
light-year A light-year, alternatively spelled light year, is a large unit of length used to express astronomical distance, astronomical distances and is equivalent to about 9.46 Orders of magnitude (numbers)#1012, trillion kilometers (), or 5.88  ...
s' distance of the star
Gliese 445 Gliese 445 (Gl 445 or AC +79 3888) is an M-type main sequence star in the northern part of the constellation Camelopardalis. Location It is currently 17.1 light-years from Earth and has an apparent magnitude of 10.8. It is visible f ...
, currently in the constellation
Camelopardalis Camelopardalis is a large but faint constellation of the northern sky representing a giraffe. The constellation was introduced in 1612 or 1613 by Petrus Plancius. Some older astronomy books give Camelopardalus or Camelopardus as alternative fo ...
, in about 40,000 years.
Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on ex ...
noted that "The spacecraft will be encountered and the record played only if there are advanced space-faring
civilization A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system). ...
s in interstellar space, but the launching of this 'bottle' into the cosmic 'ocean' says something very hopeful about life on this planet."


Background

The ''
Voyager 1 ''Voyager 1'' is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. Launched 16 days after its twin '' Voyager 2'', ''V ...
'' probe is currently the farthest human-made object from
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 sur ...
. Both ''Voyager 1'' and ''Voyager 2'' have reached interstellar space, the region between stars where the galactic plasma is present. Like their predecessors ''
Pioneer 10 ''Pioneer 10'' (originally designated Pioneer F) is an American space probe, launched in 1972 and weighing , that completed the first mission to the planet Jupiter. Thereafter, ''Pioneer 10'' became the first of five artificial objects to ac ...
'' and '' 11'', which featured a simple plaque, both ''Voyager 1'' and ''
Voyager 2 ''Voyager 2'' is a space probe launched by NASA on August 20, 1977, to study the outer planets and interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. As a part of the Voyager program, it was launched 16 days before its twin, '' Voyager 1'', ...
'' were launched by
NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeedin ...
with a message aboard—a kind of time capsule, intended to communicate to extraterrestrials a story of the world of
human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, cultu ...
s on Earth.


Contents

The contents of the record were selected for NASA by a committee chaired by
Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on ex ...
of
Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...
. The selection of content for the record took almost a year. Sagan and his associates assembled 115 images and a variety of natural sounds, such as those made by surf, wind, thunder and animals (including the songs of
birds Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...
and
whales Whales are a widely distributed and diverse group of fully aquatic placental marine mammals. As an informal and colloquial grouping, they correspond to large members of the infraorder Cetacea, i.e. all cetaceans apart from dolphins and ...
). To this they added audio content to represent humanity: spoken greetings in 55 ancient and modern languages, including a spoken greeting in English by U.N.
Secretary-General Secretary is a title often used in organizations to indicate a person having a certain amount of authority, power, or importance in the organization. Secretaries announce important events and communicate to the organization. The term is derived ...
Kurt Waldheim and a greeting by Sagan's six-year-old son, Nick; other human sounds, like footsteps and laughter (Sagan's); the inspirational message '' Per aspera ad astra'' in
Morse code Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one ...
; and musical selections from different cultures and eras. The record also includes a printed message from U.S. president
Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he previously served as th ...
. The collection of images includes many photographs and diagrams both in black and white, and color. The first images are of scientific interest, showing mathematical and physical quantities, the
Solar System The Solar System Capitalization 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 ...
and its planets, DNA, and human
anatomy Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having i ...
and
reproduction Reproduction (or procreation or breeding) is the biological process by which new individual organisms – "offspring" – are produced from their "parent" or parents. Reproduction is a fundamental feature of all known life; each individual or ...
. Care was taken to include not only pictures of humanity, but also some of animals, insects, plants and landscapes. Images of humanity depict a broad range of cultures. These images show food, architecture, and humans in portraits as well as going about their day-to-day lives. Many pictures are annotated with one or more indications of scales of time, size, or mass. Some images contain indications of
chemical composition A chemical composition specifies the identity, arrangement, and ratio of the elements making up a compound. Chemical formulas can be used to describe the relative amounts of elements present in a compound. For example, the chemical formula for ...
. All measures used on the pictures are defined in the first few images using physical references that are likely to be consistent anywhere in the
universe The universe is all of space and time and their contents, including planets, stars, galaxies, and all other forms of matter and energy. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological description of the development of the univers ...
. The musical selection is also varied, featuring works by composers such as J.S. Bach (interpreted by Glenn Gould),
Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition r ...
,
Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classic ...
(played by the Budapest String Quartet), and Stravinsky. The disc also includes music by Guan Pinghu,
Blind Willie Johnson Blind Willie Johnson (January 25, 1897 – September 18, 1945) was an American gospel blues singer, guitarist and evangelist. His landmark recordings completed between 1927 and 1930—thirty songs in total—display a combination of powerful "c ...
, Chuck Berry, Kesarbai Kerkar, Valya Balkanska, and electronic composer
Laurie Spiegel Laurie Spiegel (born September 20, 1945) is an American composer. She has worked at Bell Laboratories, in computer graphics, and is known primarily for her electronic-music compositions and her algorithmic composition software '' Music Mouse''. ...
, as well as
Azerbaijani folk music Azerbaijani folk music ( Azerbaijani: ''Azərbaycan Xalq Musiqisi'') combines the distinct cultural values of all civilisations that have lived in Azerbaijan and Iranian Azerbaijan region. Apart from the common music found all-around Azerbaijan, ...
( Mugham) by oboe player Kamil Jalilov. The inclusion of Berry's " Johnny B. Goode" was controversial, with some claiming that rock music was "adolescent", to which Sagan replied, "There are a lot of adolescents on the planet." The selection of music for the record was completed by a team composed of Carl Sagan as project director, Linda Salzman Sagan, Frank Drake,
Alan Lomax Alan Lomax (; January 31, 1915 – July 19, 2002) was an American ethnomusicologist, best known for his numerous field recordings of folk music of the 20th century. He was also a musician himself, as well as a folklorist, archivist, writer, s ...
,
Ann Druyan Ann Druyan ( ; born June 13, 1949) is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning American documentary producer and director specializing in the communication of science. She co-wrote the 1980 PBS documentary series ''Cosmos'', hosted by Carl Sagan, w ...
as creative director, artist Jon Lomberg, ethnomusicologist Robert E. Brown, Timothy Ferris as producer, and Jimmy Iovine as sound engineer. It also included the sounds of humpbacked whales from the 1970 album by Roger Payne, '' Songs of the Humpback Whale''. The Golden Record also carries an hour-long recording of the brainwaves of Ann Druyan. During the recording of the brainwaves, Druyan thought of many topics, including Earth's history, civilizations and the problems they face, and what it was like to fall in love. After NASA had received criticism over the nudity on the Pioneer plaque (line drawings of a naked man and woman), the agency chose not to allow Sagan and his colleagues to include a photograph of a nude man and woman on the record. Instead, only a silhouette of the couple was included. However, the record does contain "Diagram of vertebrate evolution", by Jon Lomberg, with drawings of an anatomically correct naked male and naked female, showing external organs. The person waving on the diagram was also changed: on the Pioneer plaque, the man is waving, while on the "Vertebrate evolution" image, the woman is waving. The pulsar map and hydrogen molecule diagram are shared in common with the Pioneer plaque. The 115 images are encoded in analogue form and composed of 512 vertical lines. The remainder of the record is audio, designed to be played at revolutions per minute. Jimmy Iovine, who was still early in his career as a music producer, served as sound engineer for the project at the recommendation of
John Lennon John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer, songwriter, musician and peace activist who achieved worldwide fame as founder, co-songwriter, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of ...
, who was contacted to contribute but was unable to take part. Sagan's team wanted to include the
Beatles The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960, that comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are regarded as the most influential band of all time and were integral to the developm ...
song " Here Comes the Sun" on the record, but the record company EMI, which held the copyrights, declined. In the 1978 book ''Murmurs of Earth'', the failure to secure permission for the song is cited as one of the legal challenges faced by the team compiling the Voyager Golden Record. In the book, Sagan said that the Beatles favoured the idea, but "
hey Hey or Hey! may refer to: Music * Hey (band), a Polish rock band Albums * ''Hey'' (Andreas Bourani album) or the title song (see below), 2014 * ''Hey!'' (Julio Iglesias album) or the title song, 1980 * ''Hey!'' (Jullie album) or the title ...
did not own the copyright, and the legal status of the piece seemed too murky to risk." When asked about the obstacle presented by EMI with regard to "Here Comes the Sun", despite the artists' wishes, Ann Druyan said in 2015: "Yeah, that was one of those cases of having to see the tragedy of our planet. Here's a chance to send a piece of music into the distant future and distant time, and to give it this kind of immortality, and they're worried about money ... we got this telegram rom EMIsaying that it will be $50,000 per record for two records, and the entire Voyager record cost $18,000 to produce." However, this was denied in 2017 by Timothy Ferris; in his recollection, "Here Comes the Sun" was never considered for inclusion. In July 2015, NASA uploaded the audio contents of the record to the audio streaming service
SoundCloud SoundCloud is an online audio distribution platform and music sharing website that enables its users to upload, promote, and share audio. Founded in 2007 by Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud is one of the largest music streaming se ...
.


Images


Playback

In the upper left-hand corner of the record cover is a drawing of the
phonograph record A phonograph record (also known as a gramophone record, especially in British English), or simply a record, is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove. The groove usually starts near ...
and the stylus carried with it. The stylus is in the correct position to play the record from the beginning. Written around it in binary notation is the correct time of one rotation of the record, 3.6 seconds, expressed in time units of 0.70 billionths of a second, the time period associated with a fundamental transition of the hydrogen atom. The drawing indicates that the record should be played from the outside in. Below this drawing is a side view of the record and stylus, with a binary number giving the time to play one side of the record—about an hour (more precisely, between 53 and 54 minutes). The information in the upper right-hand portion of the cover is designed to show how pictures are to be constructed from the recorded signals. The top drawing shows the typical signal that occurs at the start of a picture. The picture is made from this signal, which traces the picture as a series of vertical lines, similar to analog
television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...
(in which the picture is a series of horizontal lines). Picture lines 1, 2 and 3 are noted in binary numbers, and the duration of one of the "picture lines," about 8 milliseconds, is noted. The drawing immediately below shows how these lines are to be drawn vertically, with staggered "interlace" to give the correct picture rendition. Immediately below this is a drawing of an entire picture raster, showing that there are 512 (29) vertical lines in a complete picture. Immediately below this is a replica of the first picture on the record to permit the recipients to verify that they are decoding the signals correctly. A circle was used in this picture to ensure that the recipients use the correct ratio of horizontal to vertical height in picture reconstruction. Color images were represented by three images in sequence, one each for red, green, and blue components of the image. A color image of the spectrum of the sun was included for calibration purposes. The drawing in the lower left-hand corner of the cover is the pulsar map previously sent as part of the plaques on Pioneers 10 and 11. It shows the location of the Solar System with respect to 14 pulsars, whose precise periods are given. The drawing containing two circles in the lower right-hand corner is a drawing of the
hydrogen atom A hydrogen atom is an atom of the chemical element hydrogen. The electrically neutral atom contains a single positively charged proton and a single negatively charged electron bound to the nucleus by the Coulomb force. Atomic hydrogen cons ...
in its two lowest states, with a connecting line and digit 1 to indicate that the time interval associated with the transition from one state to the other is to be used as the fundamental time scale, both for the time given on the cover and in the decoded pictures.


Manufacturing

Blank records were provided by the Pyral S.A. of Créteil, France. CBS Records contracted the JVC Cutting Center in
Boulder, Colorado Boulder is a home rule city that is the county seat and most populous municipality of Boulder County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 108,250 at the 2020 United States census, making it the 12th most populous city in Colora ...
to cut the lacquer masters which were then sent to the James G. Lee record-processing center in Gardena, California to cut and gold-plate eight Voyager records. After the records were plated they were mounted in aluminum containers and delivered to JPL. The record is constructed of gold-plated copper and is in diameter. The record's cover is
aluminum Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. It ha ...
and electroplated upon it is an ultra-pure sample of the isotope uranium-238. Uranium-238 has a
half-life Half-life (symbol ) is the time required for a quantity (of substance) to reduce to half of its initial value. The term is commonly used in nuclear physics to describe how quickly unstable atoms undergo radioactive decay or how long stable ...
of 4.468 billion years. It is possible (e.g., via
mass spectrometry Mass spectrometry (MS) is an analytical technique that is used to measure the mass-to-charge ratio of ions. The results are presented as a '' mass spectrum'', a plot of intensity as a function of the mass-to-charge ratio. Mass spectrometry is u ...
) that a civilization that encounters the record will be able to use the ratio of remaining uranium to the other elements to determine the age of the record. The records also had the inscription ''"To the makers of music – all worlds, all times"'' hand-etched on its surface. The inscription was located in the "takeout grooves", an area of the record between the label and playable surface. Since this was not in the original specifications, the record was initially rejected, to be replaced with a blank disc. Sagan later convinced the administrator to include the record as is.


Journey

''
Voyager 1 ''Voyager 1'' is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. Launched 16 days after its twin '' Voyager 2'', ''V ...
'' was launched in 1977, passed the orbit of
Pluto Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of trans-Neptunian object, bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the S ...
in 1990, and left the
Solar System The Solar System Capitalization 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 ...
(in the sense of passing the
termination shock The heliosphere is the magnetosphere, astrosphere and outermost atmospheric layer of the Sun. It takes the shape of a vast, bubble-like region of space. In plasma physics terms, it is the cavity formed by the Sun in the surrounding interstell ...
) in November 2004. It is now in the Kuiper belt. In about 40,000 years, it and ''
Voyager 2 ''Voyager 2'' is a space probe launched by NASA on August 20, 1977, to study the outer planets and interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. As a part of the Voyager program, it was launched 16 days before its twin, '' Voyager 1'', ...
'' will each come to within about 1.8
light-year A light-year, alternatively spelled light year, is a large unit of length used to express astronomical distance, astronomical distances and is equivalent to about 9.46 Orders of magnitude (numbers)#1012, trillion kilometers (), or 5.88  ...
s of two separate stars: ''Voyager 1'' will have approached star
Gliese 445 Gliese 445 (Gl 445 or AC +79 3888) is an M-type main sequence star in the northern part of the constellation Camelopardalis. Location It is currently 17.1 light-years from Earth and has an apparent magnitude of 10.8. It is visible f ...
, located in the constellation
Camelopardalis Camelopardalis is a large but faint constellation of the northern sky representing a giraffe. The constellation was introduced in 1612 or 1613 by Petrus Plancius. Some older astronomy books give Camelopardalus or Camelopardus as alternative fo ...
, and ''Voyager 2'' will have approached star
Ross 248 Ross 248, also called HH Andromedae or Gliese 905, is a small star approximately from Earth in the northern constellation of Andromeda. Despite its proximity it is too dim to be seen with the naked eye. It was first catalogued by Fra ...
, located in the constellation of Andromeda. In March 2012, ''Voyager 1'' was over 17.9 billion km from the Sun and traveling at a speed of 3.6 AU per year (approximately ), while ''Voyager 2'' was over 14.7 billion km away and moving at about 3.3 AU per year (approximately ). In May 2005, it was reported that ''Voyager 1'' had entered the heliosheath, the region beyond the termination shock. The termination shock is where the solar wind, a thin stream of electrically charged gas blowing continuously outward from the Sun, is slowed by pressure from gas between the stars. At the termination shock, the solar wind slows abruptly from its average speed of and becomes denser and hotter. Of the eleven instruments carried on ''Voyager 1'', four are still operational and continue to send back data. It is expected that there will be insufficient energy to power any of the instruments beyond 2025. On September 12, 2013, NASA announced that ''Voyager 1'' had left the heliosheath and entered interstellar space, although it still remains within the Sun's gravitational sphere of influence.


Depictions in culture

Several works of science fiction, such as the 1979 film '' Star Trek: The Motion Picture'', the 1984 film '' Starman'', the 2000 film '' Battlefield Earth'', and the animated television show ''
Beast Wars Beast most often refers to: * Non-human animal * Monster Beast or Beasts may also refer to: Bible * Beast (Revelation), two beasts described in the Book of Revelation Computing and gaming * Beast (card game), English name of historical Fren ...
'' feature extraterrestrial intelligences discovering the record and turning their attention to Earth as a result. In a ''
Saturday Night Live ''Saturday Night Live'' (often abbreviated to ''SNL'') is an American late-night live television sketch comedy and variety show created by Lorne Michaels and developed by Dick Ebersol that airs on NBC and Peacock. Michaels currently serves ...
'' segment ("Next Week in Review") in episode 64 of the show's third season (originally aired 1978), Steve Martin's character, a psychic named Cocuwa, announced that extraterrestrials had responded to the record with the four words "Send more Chuck Berry". The recording is a major plot piece of " Little Green Men", a season 2 episode of ''
The X-Files ''The X-Files'' is an American science fiction on television, science fiction drama (film and television), drama television series created by Chris Carter (screenwriter), Chris Carter. The series revolves around Federal Bureau of Investigation ...
''. On '' Star Trek: Voyager'', the Greetings from Earth on the golden record are sent to ''
Voyager Voyager may refer to: Computing and communications * LG Voyager, a mobile phone model manufactured by LG Electronics * NCR Voyager, a computer platform produced by NCR Corporation * Voyager (computer worm), a computer worm affecting Oracle ...
'' by Rain Robinson in Season 3, Episode 8 " Future's End". In the 2004 episode of '' The West Wing'', "
The Warfare of Genghis Khan "The Warfare of Genghis Khan" is the 101st episode of ''The West Wing'' and the 13th of the fifth season. It originally aired on NBC on February 11, 2004. Events circle around the detection of a nuclear detonation over the Indian Ocean, a scenario ...
" (season 5 episode 13), the golden record is referenced. In particular,
Josh Lyman Joshua Lyman is a fictional character played by Bradley Whitford on the television drama series ''The West Wing''. The role earned Whitford the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series in 2001. For most of the ser ...
(played by Bradley Whitford), notes the inclusion of
Blind Willie Johnson Blind Willie Johnson (January 25, 1897 – September 18, 1945) was an American gospel blues singer, guitarist and evangelist. His landmark recordings completed between 1927 and 1930—thirty songs in total—display a combination of powerful "c ...
's " Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground" on the record as inspirational. It was also referenced in the 2005 animation known as '' Fafner in the Azure'' as being one of the objects that the aliens discover. In 2014, the
podcast A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosin ...
'' The Truth'' produced an episode titled "Voyager Found", where the ''Voyager'' crash-lands on the property of Dawn and Tad, an alien couple, who decide to play the record. In 2014, composer Dario Marianelli wrote a ''Voyager Concerto'' for Violin and Orchestra, which was premiered in
Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Queensland, and the third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of approximately 2.6 million. Brisbane lies at the centre of the South ...
, Australia in November that year by the Queensland Symphony Orchestra (QSO), and in Stockholm the following April (2015), by the Swedish Radio Orchestra. The QSO, with British violinist Jack Liebeck, performed the piece over several concerts at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre; each performance was preceded by a lecture by physicist professor Brian Cox, who talked at length about NASA's Voyager Mission, and introduced the concerto. The 30-minute piece, in one single movement, depicts the journey of the ''Voyager'' through the Solar System, using as references some of the music that is on board each probe, on the Golden Record. The Voyager probes are a visitable landmark in the 2014 space-trading/simulation game '' Elite: Dangerous''. It is possible to see the golden record on the probe models. The stageplay ''Voyage to Voyager'' depicts the team of scientists, including
Carl Carl may refer to: * Carl, Georgia, city in USA * Carl, West Virginia, an unincorporated community *Carl (name), includes info about the name, variations of the name, and a list of people with the name * Carl², a TV series * "Carl", an episode of ...
and Linda Sagan, Frank Drake, Tim Ferris,
Ann Druyan Ann Druyan ( ; born June 13, 1949) is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning American documentary producer and director specializing in the communication of science. She co-wrote the 1980 PBS documentary series ''Cosmos'', hosted by Carl Sagan, w ...
, and Jon Lomberg, as they work to create the Golden Record. It premiered at the Kansas City Fringe Festival in 2015. English folk artist Jim Moray released the song "Sounds of Earth" on his 2016 album '' Upcetera''. Named after the golden record, it tells the story of the project with a particular focus on the relationship between Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan. Grace Petrie, an English songwriter and folk singer, released a track by the name of "The Golden Record" on her 2017 album ''Heart First Aid Kit,'' which is a love song based upon the story of Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan, referencing the additions made to the record intended to depict the sound of human beings in love. The 2017 documentary ''The Farthest'', directed by Emer Reynolds, features those who worked on the Golden Record and
Voyager Voyager may refer to: Computing and communications * LG Voyager, a mobile phone model manufactured by LG Electronics * NCR Voyager, a computer platform produced by NCR Corporation * Voyager (computer worm), a computer worm affecting Oracle ...
missions including Frank Drake, Timothy Ferris, and Nick Sagan. '' Troop Zero'', a 2019 American comedy-drama film, inspired by Alibar's 2010 play ''Christmas and Jubilee Behold the Meteor Shower'', focuses on the story of a scout group competing to have their voices included on the Golden Record. The 2019 death metal album ''
Death Atlas ''Death Atlas'' is the seventh studio album by American death metal band Cattle Decapitation. It was released on November 29, 2019, via Metal Blade Records. Its release coincided with Black Friday and came more than four years after their previous ...
'' by Cattle Decapitation opens with a track that samples the greetings on the golden record in their entirety. The 2020 indie rock album '' Possession'' by Joywave features sounds from the record.


Publications

Most of the images used on the record (reproduced in black and white), together with information about its compilation, can be found in the 1978 book ''Murmurs of Earth: The Voyager Interstellar Record'' by
Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on ex ...
, F. D. Drake,
Ann Druyan Ann Druyan ( ; born June 13, 1949) is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning American documentary producer and director specializing in the communication of science. She co-wrote the 1980 PBS documentary series ''Cosmos'', hosted by Carl Sagan, w ...
, Timothy Ferris, Jon Lomberg, and
Linda Salzman Linda Salzman is an American artist and writer. Biography Salzman created the artwork for the plaque on the Pioneer spacecraft and coproduced the Voyager Golden Record. She co-authored the book '' Murmurs of Earth'' with her husband, astronome ...
. A
CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains data. Computers can read—but not write or erase—CD-ROMs. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both com ...
version was issued by Warner New Media in 1992. Author Ann Druyan, who later married Carl Sagan, wrote about the Voyager Record in the epilogue of Sagan's final book ''
Billions and Billions ''Billions and Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium'' is a 1997 book by the American astronomer and science popularizer Carl Sagan. The last book written by Sagan before his death in 1996, it was published by Rando ...
'' (1997). To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the record, Ozma Records launched a
Kickstarter Kickstarter is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of July 2021, ...
project to release the record contents in LP format as part of a box set also containing a hardcover book, turntable slipmat, and art print. The Kickstarter was successfully funded with over $1.4 million raised. Ozma Records then produced another edition of the three-disc LP vinyl record box set that also includes the audio content of the Golden Record, softcover book containing the images encoded on the record, images sent back by ''Voyager'', commentary from Ferris, art print, turntable slipmat, and a collector's box. This edition was released in February 2018 along with a 2xCD-Book edition. In January 2018, Ozma Records' "Voyager Golden Record; 40th Anniversary Edition" won a
Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pr ...
for best boxed or limited-edition package.


Track listing

The track listing is as it appears on the 2017 edition released by Ozma Records. ;Disc one ;Disc two


See also

*
Arecibo message The Arecibo message is an interstellar radio message carrying basic information about humanity and Earth that was sent to the globular cluster Messier 13 in 1974. It was meant as a demonstration of human technological achievement, rather than ...
*
Communication with extraterrestrial intelligence The communication with extraterrestrial intelligence (CETI) is a branch of the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) that focuses on composing and deciphering interstellar messages that theoretically could be understood by another tech ...
* Pioneer plaque * Time capsule


References

* Originally based on public domain text from th
NASA website
where selected images and sounds from the record can be found.


External links

* * {{Authority control Golden record Interstellar messages Search for extraterrestrial intelligence Time capsules 1977 albums United States National Recording Registry recordings Technology in society Message artifacts 1977 in spaceflight Music in space