How do you say 'Hello' to an alien?

Hi,

I have always been interested in astronomy and space. One thing that has
always boggled me is that does life exist in this universe (apart from the
Earth)?

I have read about the various alien-serach programs like SETI. They search
for intelligent beings. One of our spacecrafts is heading out of the solar
system. It carries a plaque card that has images of a man, a woman and the
position of the Earth in relation to certain celestial objects, just in case
an intelligent being sees it.

I have also read that scientists broadcast information into outer space
using radio. The information is coded as 0's and 1's(binary). Even the most
eminent scientists wre not able to decode this information later; let's hope
an alien can do it!

The question I have is how do code information as 0's and 1's. To code
anything, we would need language, won't we? Or is it possible to send
information without using any language?

Nikhil

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