Signature of LINCOS

Abstract

Suppose the international SETI effort yields the discovery of some signal of evidently non-natural origin. Could it contain linguistic information formulated in some kind of Lingua Cosmica? One way to get insight into this matter is to consider whether specific (bio) linguistic signatures are likely to be attached to a cosmic language for interstellar communication—designed by humans or an alien society having reached a level of intelligence (and technology) comparable to or surpassing ours. How are they to be recognized and do they provide clues for the interpretation problem? In order to get some insight into this matter we consider a special characteristic of the logico-linguistic LINCOS system as described in the present book. The concept of lambda abstraction should qualify for that. It turns out that the characteristic can be used as a specific signature.