you're out of shape, valerian. what's the matter, eat too many tacos down there in puerto rico?
you two coming along or you just gonna do it right here in the sand?
i'm sorry, miss arroway, not only is it too speculative a subject for a doctoral dissertation, at this point in your career it'd be tantamount to suicide.
i'm not. you're far too promising a scientist to waste your considerable gifts on this nonsense --
and only two probabilities: one: there is intelligent life in the universe but they're so far away you'll never contact it in your lifetime --
two: there's nothing out there but noble gasses and carbon compounds and you'd be wasting your time.
i disagree.
what is it that makes you so lonely, miss arroway? what is it that compels you to search the heavens for life when there's so much of it being neglected right here at home?
i will approve a general thesis on the detection of radio signals from space but that's all. no e.t.i.s. enough?
now i remember why i went into theoretical work. kent.
still settling in, really. where's dr. arroway?
what's that?
tell me.
so?
no, thanks.
peter sends his regards.
very well; since my appointment he's been made interim director.
i'm surprised you even knew it was an election year.
now exactly. it's.  complicated.
ellie.
you know why i'm here.
ellie, i should have done this a long time ago, certainly before i left the n.s.f., but i wanted to give you every benefit of the doubt --
it's not like you've given me much choice.
meaning i have to go defend a budget to the president and to congress and you're out here listening to washing machines.
the point is, this isn't just scientific inquiry anymore -- it's turned into some kind of personal obsession.
no.  you're not. but the price has just gotten too high.
then why haven't you detected any signals? if, as you claim, there have been thousands, millions of advanced civilizations out there for millions of years then why hasn't one signal gotten through? it'll take a month or two for the paperwork to go through; you're welcome to stay until then.
it was a worthy experiment -- worthy of you; i was wrong about that part. but it's over now.
what's the latest?
let's get some decryption people here, now. dr. lunacharsky's visiting at the university of new mexico --
if it's attention you want i'd say you've got it. just one thing: why vega? everyone's looked at vega for years with no results, and now, yesterday, they start broadcasting primes. why?
michael kitz, national security advisor.
mike, because of the earth's rotation we're only in line with vega so many hours a day; the only way to get the whole message is to cooperate with other stations. if dr. arroway hadn't moved quickly we could have lost key elements.
you must have checked the signal for polarization modulation already.
hope there's a cartoon.
throw a gray scale on it; standard interpolation.
it's a hoax. i knew it!
with all due respect, the hitler broadcast from the '36 olympics was the first television transmission of any power that went into space. that they recorded it and sent it back is simply a way of saying 'hello, we heard you --'
-- it's extremely unlikely that they had any idea what they were looking at.
good morning. in 1936 a very faint television signal transmitted the opening ceremonies of the olympic games as a show of german superior technology. that signal left earth at the speed of light and twenty-six years later arrived on vega, which they then sent back to us hugely amplified. as evidence of intelligence this is indisputable --
whoever or whatever they are, they're clearly move advanced than we.
 maybe only decades or centuries, maybe much further along than that.
the only way would be if we had a radio telescope in orbit.
 arrangements also have to be made for the v.i.p.s coming in, mostly religious leaders.
the theological ramifications of all this are obvious; the president feels we need to include religious interests rather than alienate them. she's also named palmer joss as their liaison; he's requested a meeting with you.
apparently he's genuinely interested in science. this could be a chance to win him over.
ellie --
i want you to listen to me, carefully. the minute the implications of this message became clear, this stopped being simply a scientific matter and became a political one -- an extremely complex, extremely volatile one. there are forces at work here you don't understand; i can help you up to a point, but only up to a point.
it's not a threat, ellie, it's a fact -- if you're not careful, you may find yourself out in the cold very quickly. play ball. really. it's good advice.
interesting analogy. and how guilty would we feel if we happened to destroy some microbes on a beach in africa?
we're continuing around the clock, but the amount of data is enormous. it's difficult to tell when we'll find the key that will tell us the machine's purpose -- maybe tomorrow, maybe next year, maybe never.
of course, ms. president. we'll keep you fully informed.
the president wants to discuss a few matters in private.
we've cracked it. lunacharsky found it.
you were right, ellie. you were right all along.
ellie.
actually i'm running late --
i don't understand.
ellie.  you should know that i'm no longer the president's science advisor.
as of three o'clock this afternoon. i submitted my resignation.
excuse me, i'm late for a meeting.
 two years is still a hell of a long time -- and as far as we can tell there aren't any provisions in the machine design for storing food, water, even air.
they knew our level of development. if, as you say, they've done this many times they'd be well aware of the implications.
now i know why the japanese gave up having a candidate in exchange for licensing rights.
what happened?
15,000 degrees.  isn't that a little excessive?
ladies and gentlemen, i come to you today not only as a scientist, but as a politician -- an occupation for which i make no apologies. with all due respect to doctor arroway's talk of naked honesty and integrity -- high ideals, to be sure -- i believe it would be foolish and, in fact, dangerous to ignore the fact that what we are dealing with here is a political situation -- the most political of situations -- and one that must be examined in that context.
the image we put forth, the impressions we give may determine precedent for decades if not millennia to come.
we must be optimistic enough to hope for the best -- and wise and experienced enough to prepare for the worst.
ladies and gentlemen. i'm proud of what we've achieved as a species and a civilization. i would hate to see all that we stand for, all that we've fought for for a thousand generations, slighted, taken advantage of, or god forbid, done in by the fact that at the final hour we chose to send a representative who didn't put our best interests first.
you aren't staying?
right. well.
ellie.  we both know that if i was any kind of a man, i never would've entered this race. that i would have told the president straight out: helen, eleanor arroway is naive and strident and an enormous pain in the ass.  but she's got more courage and intelligence than the rest of us put together. that more then anyone else on the planet, she's earned this. and that she should be the one to go because she's the best we have. but that's not who i am. i like to think it's who i might've been if things had gone a different way; that i might have been worthy, really worthy of what i've been given.  you do what you have to do. and in the end, as with everything, it comes down to power. and it isn't fair.
nothing. i guess i just wanted to thank you.
for giving me a chance, just for a moment, to feel what it must be like to be you.
what is it that makes you so lonely, miss arroway?