The article delves into the fascinating hive mind in Pluribus, exploring how infected individuals communicate and function as a collective.
A message comes from a planet far away, and it turns out to be the code for an alien virus. This virus infects almost everyone on Earth, making them act as one big group, like a hive mind. The show’s name comes from “E pluribus unum,” which means from many, one.
Only 13 people are immune, including Carol Sturka. She is a strong romance writer who wants to keep being herself. The hive mind wants her to join them. We’re not sure how this hive mind works, but it seems like the infected people can talk to each other without even knowing. If you talk to one, you talk to all.
There are good things about this. For example, you don’t have to remember phone numbers. Anyone can call any number, and the same “person” answers. But the downside is, they aren’t really individuals anymore.
If the theory about radio waves is right, let’s look at how this hive mind could work from a science view.
Do you know what a radio wave is? Long ago, people listened to music on radios. There were two types: AM from 535 to 1,700 kilohertz and FM from 88 to 108 megahertz.
Radio waves are special waves of energy. They are made of electric and magnetic fields. They’re a type of light, just like visible light and microwaves. Radio waves are the longest type and are great for long-distance talking.
To make a radio wave, you need to speed up charged particles, like electrons. Radio stations have big wires called antennas that help create these waves. The waves come from tiny electric currents moving up and down the wire.
But can a human body create these waves? Maybe! Our nerves are like electric circuits. The aliens might have learned how to use this.
How far can these infected people, or plurbs, communicate? If we’re right, every plurb can send and receive signals. One plurb sends a signal, and others catch it like a game of telephone.
To understand how far they can send these signals, we need to know how much energy they use. A human body makes about 80 watts of energy just to keep going. If a plurb uses only a little for sending signals, that gives them about 8 watts for it.
If plurbs send energy evenly in all directions, that energy spreads out. As it travels, the energy will go down the farther it gets. By figuring out how a sphere spreads energy, we can see how strong the signals become over distance.