[With Less Fi] Telepathic Communication via Radio Transmission

[impyre]

mW is indeed milliwatts. Megawatt is MW (big m). And no, it doesn't take much power to simply radiate a signal. A lot of people think of radios as having some invisible line drawn where they can't reach any further than that (the range)... but in reality RF signals work in exactly the same fashion as regular old light. (they can even be reflected) Even tiny amounts of power can generate light, and how far away you can see it depends on color, power, whether it's focused (directional) or not, how the light is generated, etc. There are LED's, why not RFED's? Also, making the signals directional instead of omnidirectional makes a ton of sense (from a biological perspective), this way you can control who "hears" your signal. This also gives you the ability to focus on a distant point for extended range. More than likely there would be some type of organ that could change shape in real-time (like the muscles around a dog's ears) to allow you to change the shape/angle of the cone.

[Starwhip]

mW is indeed milliwatts. Megawatt is MW (big m). And no, it doesn't take much power to simply radiate a signal. A lot of people think of radios as having some invisible line drawn where they can't reach any further than that (the range)... but in reality RF signals work in exactly the same fashion as regular old light. (they can even be reflected) Even tiny amounts of power can generate light, and how far away you can see it depends on color, power, whether it's focused (directional) or not, how the light is generated, etc. There are LED's, why not RFED's? Also, making the signals directional instead of omnidirectional makes a ton of sense (from a biological perspective), this way you can control who "hears" your signal. This also gives you the ability to focus on a distant point for extended range. More than likely there would be some type of organ that could change shape in real-time (like the muscles around a dog's ears) to allow you to change the shape/angle of the cone.

Oooh, now we're getting somewhere!

(I was going to rep you but apparently I repped you recently and I can't... )

What reflects radio signals? Material-wise, I mean.

And no, I don't want these creatures to have giant radio dishes on their heads... or anywhere else, for that matter.

EDIT:

OK, reflection is probably going to have to come from electrically charged areas of the organ. A "mirror" to reflect radio waves would have to be very, very thick. Think "space-telescope" thick. (Maybe not that thick, but you get the point. Not easily containable)

Edited April 12, 2015 by Starwhip

[Tarrow]

My view is that the AM receiver is not that complicated and could be replicated in nature. The transmitter with extra power and more complicated circuits, however, would have to be a specialized subset of the species much like Ant Queen.

The wikipedia article on electrocommunication gives a couple of really good examples of species already functionally capable of communicating at range via am / fm / waveform shape modulation of electrical signals. Of all things electric eels seem to have it pretty well organised

The world is an infinitely stranger place than we give it credit for.

edit: and even weirder, some use it in an active transmit / recieve mode in much the same way that radar would work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrocommunication

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroreception

Edited April 12, 2015 by Tarrow