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SETI Gains Respect, NASA Funding
securitas writes "After having its funding cut off by Congress a decade ago, the SETI program has just received a NASA five-year grant (Google link) to participate as a lead team in the NASA Astrobiology Institute, which investigates the origin and future of life in the universe. For more information, see the Astrobiology Institute's announcement and the NASA press release."
As much as i would love to support the search for life in the galaxy sometimes its not a good idea. Although i do think that as humans we should try to search any money we put into a project like this is as good as gone and in finacial hard times like this we cant afford to throw around much.
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
The search for intelligent life on Earth continues.
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God, is that you?
Speaking at Defcon 12 - Credit Card Networks Revisted: Pen
I didn't know NASA had enough money to donate, with all the cutbacks and whatnot.
Its about time that SETI got some serious funding, its mainly been kept going by enthusiastic amateurs over the last few years and at one point in the early 80s it actually looked like it was going to close.
One thing they should be able to do with is money is investigate the interesting readings they've been getting from proxima centuri, where several M class planets have been discovered. The chances of it being life are small but the fact is that the 55Gev readings they've been getting are a complete mystery so even if the're just coming from a tachyon field it should produce some interesting new data
All that glitters has a high refractive index.
Sure you say that now, but you'll be crying when china has all of the lucrative exclusive extra terrestrial trade deals worked out and we're still trying to sell cars to canada.
It is important to note here that the U.S. government through its agency NASA has officially thrown support to the adherents of evolution.
If there is no evolution, then there is no chance that life would exist anywhere else in the universe because it would have had to have been Created only here. The New Testament of the Bible (in which most Creationists readily and eagerly believe) repeatedly claims that there is only one Son of God and that only through Him is salvation possible. This would mean that if by some chance that there were lifeforms elsewhere in the galaxy that they would have to be perfect beings or destined for Hell. Since a loving God wouldn't create beings guaranteed to spend eternity in the flames of Hades, it stands to reason that God would have only created Life here on Earth (where, again, He sent His Son).
But with NASA supporting the search for ET life, the government has implicitly thumbed its nose at the Creationists.
It's about time, if you ask me.
I have been pwned because my
Sometime back, we read NASA withdrew funding for DARPA, IIRC. What's so compelling for NASA to pump more funds into SETI? Some kind of social engineering at work here, methinks.
It's ironic, but NASA seems to be getting more attention after a spectacular failure (Colombia disaster)
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
I never understood why it was so hard to give funding to a program that could make the most important discovery yet.... (except for oil on mars... that'd be the only thing that'd get us off this rock faster...)
At least they got the 24 hours of time to point Arecibo where they wanted before... now maybe they'll get more time, more radio telescope data to send out as workunits.
The whole program seemed to be a great use of national money to me when I first learned about SETI, and its still a good place to invest money I think.
Of course, I could be wrong....
That putting that trojan in the screensaver that lobbies congressmen was a good idea.....
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
It's now nice to know all those 60-Some data sets I've gone through at about 30 hours each weren't in vain.
SETI Institute Selected as Astrobiology Lead Team
The SETI Institute is proud to announce that it has been chosen as a lead team for NASA's Astrobiology Institute (NAI), the international research consortium coordinated through NAI's offices at NASA's Ames Research Center. NASA Ames is a long-standing partner of the SETI Institute in the search for life on other worlds, and we welcome this opportunity to deepen our scientific relationship.
Well im fine taking that chance. In fact i take a chance to die that is much more likely to happen almost every day i get in a car. I think i will just count on the fact that i wont need to rely on trade with aliens while im still alive.
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
Preemptive War on Terrorism. Almost taken care of.
Preemptive War on Little Green Men. That's our next Goal.
I mean, with all the infrastructure and the servers running smoothly I personally believe this to be a very promising effort. So are they in or are they out of the funding?
cu,
Lispy
why don't we just stop putting money into the arts too? according to you, we can't afford such frivolous things such as curiosity and expression and searching for meaning.
As much as i would love to support the search for life in the galaxy sometimes its not a good idea. Although i do think that as humans we should try to search any money we put into a project like this is as good as gone and in finacial hard times like this we cant afford to throw around much.
:P) attitudes like this piss me off enormously. All this stupid "we shouldn't put money into this, that and the other because of hard times/the poor/the children" is spurious.
At the risk of starting a flamewar (I'm in an asbestos suit
Fact: Agencies like NASA can stimulate the economy, by virtue of their sheer size. The same, but more so goes for the defense establishment
Fact: many items which we take for granted today would not be a reality if it wasn't for the research money the governments provided
I believe the single greatest hope for the eventual equality of all (which is somewhere in the american constitution, right?) is technology. You may or may not agree with this, you might say education, for instance, but more effiecient and cost effective ways of teaching and learning will come out of research.
The "I don't want to pay so my descendants will benefit" attitude is an attitude that would have wiped out the human race, or any species, for that matter, if it was rife. If you are bemoaning your contribution, there is nothing stopping you disappearing into the hills and living as a hermit (except that wouldn't fit in your comfort zone, would it), while the rest of us go and make progress for the benefit of the species as a whole.
This is also the reason that 20 new types of disposable wipe a year piss me off so badly.
Rational thought is the only true freedom
...is point their telescopes at Alabama. Tons of other-worldly creatures live there.
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
NASA have run out of stuff to exploit from the crashed flying saucers at Area 51 and now they're looking for which star system to send their 'honeypot' radio signals to :-D.
just think without goverment money art would not exisit
"seeks to answer an important question: are we alone? Statistically, probably not. But finding that 'first contact' will have a world-altering impact upon technology and religion etc "
We are not alone. It's obvious. Arrogant to believe otherwise. Who cares about religion? How would discovering another race help our technology?
"gets punters involved in science"
How? Using their screensavers gets them involved? You could say the same about protein folding or whatever.
"utilises information already gathered and processed for other astronomical research. It really is about making maximum use of the data gathered by the radio telescopes of the world "
No, that would be true if they were doing just about anything but looking for aliens.
"PLZ resend disk 2 of TWO TOWERS"
I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No man comes unto the Father but by me.
That's a pretty clear statement of divinity on the part of Jesus.
Well, unless you are about to say that those words were put there by zealous scribes, in which case which parts of the Gospels should be believable? Only the parts you like and that fit in your worldview?
Isn't it time for Slashdot to partner with NYT just like Google did (link-wise)? After all, Slashdot is a rather large referrer to NYT articles.
More like "We have over 80 YodaBytes of porn. Will trade our collection of 5 breasted sexy hairy slugs for your stuff"
Life is not for the lazy.
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are watching the stars."
I think he was referring to sentiments such as this.
Yes, a lot of government money is misallocated while basic needs are not met.
But any civilization can't claim to really advance when it's "stuck in the gutter" worrying only about the basics when it lets the arts and sciences lie fallow.
We are fundinng a fictitious president 400k a year.
We are funding a fictitious war over 100 million.
We are paying congress people to tell us fictitiously that they are working for us.
So I don't see why its news that we are paying to find ET on the fictitious idea that we ever will.
why don't we just stop putting money into the arts too?
Yeah, why don't we? If Art is about expression, you shouldn't care about the money. Go express yourselves. Just stop using my taxes to do it.
"seeks to answer an important question: are we alone? Statistically, probably not."
Statistically, almost certainly. Barring accidents or idiotic governments that totally devastate the human species, we will have colonised the entire galaxy in a million years or so, and be conducting engineering projects on a massive scale that would be visible from many light years away: the odds of the only two intelligent species in the galaxy evolving within a million years of each other are probably pretty slim, so if they existed they'd be here by now.
I run seti@home just on the offchance that we're lucky and there is someone else around, but statistically, if there really are aliens out there, they should be as difficult to find as a million-strong herd of penguins running around Manhattan shouting 'Phear The Penguin Horde!'.
CS Lewis wrote his Space Trilogy, and so far I believe his claim that it was the first that suggested that other worlds might be more advanced than earth. And he was Christian and HE noted that nothing in scripture or tradition would prevent or require life on other worlds. If there were, they might be unfallen (and would probably avoid us), fallen but redeemable (and either BC or AD regardless of their technology), or fallen and unredeemable.
The latter category is where the demons go (having been angles). Note that Christians do believe that there are other beings in the universe - the angels and demons.
My problem with SETI is how do we know when it has failed? If there are millions of indistinguishable stones to overturn looking for treasure, and you can only overturn a thousand, is it really science?
Assuming we find an unfallen world (which we thankfully can't access) and find that they are far advanced in every science and art, but politically incorrect. I.e. they respect life, don't give into their lusts, have no swear words in their vocabulary... Or maybe we found one and it was classified.
Why not also study parapsychology - maybe we can cross over with John Edwards and Ramtha and other channelers could prove that there are other beings in the universe, or in local parallel universes to earth. Isn't this what SETI is supposed to be looking for?
We can study parapsychology "scientifically", but until something blatant happens we will never end. SETI is the same way. Funding based on mere beliefs in ETs or God(s) should either both or neither be funded.
Of course if your point is that SETI is being funded because of political validity instead of scientific validity, your point destroys your position. The same way that although breast cancer kills far more than AIDS and isn't easily preventable, even the Feminists support the far greater funding on AIDS research.
And while you bring up evolution, you shouldn't forget its twin brother - eugenics. For some reason research along the lines of Nazi scientists makes people squeamish - but if we are merely evolved animals, we can be bred like dogs or pigeons in order to make a better person. Realize that this was all very scientific at the time (and many of the writings of Charles Darwin you don't see reproduced today were quite racist). And the Christian opposition pointed out that we had souls.
Finally, the reason I consider it that evolution is still pseudo-science is that there is nothing known within scientific law which can produce complex mechanisms (the original cell, the cambrian explosion, structures like a feather or the eye). Merely adding time doesn't help. And I don't believe that it is honest to just call each link a miracle - though research might end up if it eliminates everything else.
Instead of looking for ETs, I think it would be far more profitable to look for this law, force, or whatever. Something like an eye should take billions of years, not millions. So what and where is this "engineering" force?
Neither side admits it might exist and no one is looking for it.
I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not, since this is a good idea. I, for one, and sick of my tax dollars to fund no-talent-hacks who throw elephant crap at canvas and call it art.
Their hypothesis is also a good test of the theory that IL abounds in the universe. But so far, in the narrow range (+-10deg) that the Arecibo telescope scans, no synthetic transmissions have yet been received. Considering that during the last 5 years signals from anywhere as close as this solar system to as far away as the edge of our galaxy could have been recieved, but have not, leads to a few hypotheses.
One, all existing IL have evolved past the use of ER as a means to communicate. Even here on Earth communications are rapidly moving to cable and the Internet, neither of which have any significant radiation leaking into space. Two, our civiliation is the only one to have reached the stage of using ER for communications. Three, there are no other civilization 'out there', ours is the only one.
Running with Linux for over 20 years!
Bummer. I will no longer be able to righteously correct slashdotters who ignorantly complain that SETI is "wasting" their tax dollars. :)
I was always kind of proud of SETI for making it on private donations alone; it seemed like losing federal funds was the best thing that ever happened to them. Anyway, this grant is just for the Astrobiology Institute partnership; they still have their own funds for their normal operations.
Liberal (adj.): Free from bigotry; open to progress; tolerant of others.
"it on lake Travis and we go to hippy hollow with it."
What does it mean if I actually KNOW these places . . .
Sdelat' Ameriku velikoy Snova!
There's a hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in outer space. - Arthur C. Clarke
Revolutions are never about freedom or justice. They're about who's going to be top dog. -- Kilgore Trout
Watch the Farscape episode "I, E.T." for a stimulating glimpse of what it might be like for us to discover alien-life. This script was well-written and well-acted. Note: it's a human making contact with an alien Jodie Foster-like astronomer.
This argument, posted above, is bunk:
Fact: Agencies like NASA can stimulate the economy, by virtue of their sheer size. The same, but more so goes for the defense establishment
So, couldn't we just take all of NASA's funding, and create, I don't know, the National Hungry People Eat Association (NHPEA) and just have this giant beaurocracy that exists to feed hungry people -- perhaps not terribly efficiently or fairly -- merely because by virtue of its sheer size, it could be stimulating the economy? I mean, it'd "stimulate the economy" and occasionally nurish people too!
Personally, I'd like to see NASA get more money and the Pentagon less... and I work for a military laboratory. I think you'll find the slashdot is all in favor of military research (if it will eventually be shared). After all, the Internet and GPS are pretty cool technologies. I don't know how many slashdoters, however, are in favor of spending so much money building and maintaining weapons. Do we really need as many AK47s/landmines/missiles as we keep building?
Either way, it doesn't make sense to fund an organization "for the economy" -- you could just create a second organization in leu of the first, which could accomplish some positive things for the country/world, and also "stimulate the economy, by virtue of its sheer size."
Support a few technologists in Washington.
With all due respect, the question of origins is a philosophical one rather than a scientific one. It is not possible to use the scientific method to determine origins.
The creationist and the evolutionist are in the same boat. Neither can observe, record, repeat the process.
Both are constrained to collect extant data and propose theories about what caused the universe. In that respect, they are limited to speculation.
Speculation is unlikely to provide an answer. On this idea, CS Lewis said: "It's like expecting that the accidental shape taken by a splash when you upset a milk jug should give you a correct account of how the jug was made and why it was upset."
Studying the shape of the splash is science, and that I do not oppose. Having scientists comment of meaning (the why question) as a result of their "splash" studies is laughable.
For that matter, it is not possible for scientists to say with certainty how the universe was prior to its existence. This is not science, but speculation and should be named as such.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
There might not be other intelligent life out there, but there's certainly some sort of life out there somewhere.
My Journal - 1,337 fans and countin
...AND a smokescreen. There are literally hundreds of witnesses that held military, intelligence, and private postitions with proof to show that "they" have been visiting us for some time now, and that our gov knows quite a bit about "them". Yes, I know this sounds "crazy" but the proof simply shows otherwise.
Read "Disclosure" by Dr. Greer and "UFO's and the National Security State" by Richard M. Dolan. Two extremeley well documented and referenced books among thousands. Many state that they have proof that we "see" these things on radar constantly, and that they are commonplace at NORAD, so why are we spending money on trying to find radio transmissions from accross the galaxy? I say open a book, do the research, and then ask these people to simply disclose the truth.
Done and done. No more of this crap, deception, and wasted expenditure.
Unlike missile defense, SETI has at least succeeded in their original goal of mapping out 1000 stars. Their next goal is a million stars. Alternatively, SETI has succeeded in a another field. Because of their lack of funding, SETI's need for computing power helped to pioneer the use of grid computing. Although, this is a side benefit, SETI first showed how massive grid computing is possible at a minimal of expense.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
There was a headlining story on the NYT yesterday:
Gen. Tommy R. Franks said today that violence and uncertainty in Iraq made it unlikely that troop levels would be reduced "for the foreseeable future," and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld nearly doubled the estimated military costs there to $3.9 billion a month.
My math might be worse than Dubya's, but I figure it at about $130 million A DAY.
While it's great that we're "funding" SETI, perhaps some of the money we're pouring into Iraq would be better spent on science. Mars, anyone? Zubrin's plan calls for $30 billion for a long term program, just over 7 months worth of war. Which would you prefer, nonexistant WMDs or a manned landing on the Red Planet?
while (!sleep){
sheep++;
}
My problem with SETI is how do we know when it has failed? If there are millions of indistinguishable stones to overturn looking for treasure, and you can only overturn a thousand, is it really science?
It's impossible to see every single square mile of the Earth, but that doesn't make travelling less worthwile.
Funding based on mere beliefs in ETs or God(s) should either both or neither be funded.
We know that intelligent life can exist - we're the proof of that. We don't have any hard scientific evidence that God exists. That's a fairly major difference.
Something like an eye should take billions of years, not millions.
Source, please?
Even given that this is true (it's not true at all), why does this make evolutionary biology pseudoscience? What is your definition of pseudoscience?
Helium balloons want to be free.
If there were oil on Mars it would only prove there was life, a while ago. But echonomically, it would be completely useless because you need oxygen to burn it.
Actually, stranger beings reside in California.
I had but a simple dream, to destroy all humans.
Not sure why someone would write an article about SETI with that many links without puting a link the the actual SETI@Home web site.
SETI@Home
It was me, I did it, I moved your cheese
During the Q and A session, someone asked him about UFO's. He really flew off he handle, said they did not exist and did not want his research dollars to be confused with UFO research.
He essentially said: "Aliens: Don't call us. We'll call you".
Its hard to believe that someone who is looking for alien life in distant gallaxies cannot believe that they are already here.
I would argue that sending the money to social programs make it 'as good as gone' just as fast. With our current set up we are building a society of couch potatos who can make more money of unemployment than they can working.
I would rather see the money spend on people striving to answer a very difficult question. And in the process forced to develop technology that has very general applications. The money is not wasted... after all, all that money 'wasted' on the early space exploration only generated:
computers (no economic return there...)
Plastics (nope that stuff sure dosen't get used)
Fuel Cell advancement (Never see a market for those trikets)
Satillites (what economic benifit could possibly come from that)
And that is the short list. People at the time groaned about the wast of money on such a useless task as 'getting to the moon' what people never understand is that it is not just the goal that is important, but everything that has to be designed or invented to reach the goal, that is where the payoff is found.
We also know that Jesus pledged to return one day. So far, He hasn't. This means that he is most likely purging other civilizations of sin. Christ died 1,970 years ago; assuming that He is not bound by the speed of light, that gives Him enough time to purge 59 planets of sin. (If he is limited by lightspeed, things get complicated, but there is no reason to assume that such an arbitrary natural law applies to God.)
The point is that with each passing year that Jesus does not return, the odds for extraterrestrial life go up. This is a good thing. I for one am excited about the prospect of life among the stars, and I am convinced that it exists. Don't let an overly-narrow interpretation of Scripture dictate a purely ethnocentric worldview to you; it will only hold you back.
Certainly "it is not possible for scientists to say with certainty how the universe was prior to its existence". I've never heard one claim otherwise, though I have read theories that state it is categorically impossible to know what was before.)
However the "origins of life" are not necessarily a one off historical event the sort of which we are forever prevented from revisiting. Indeed, one of the questions is whether life has originated independantly in different places. We do not know whether we can "observe, record, repeat the process". SETI is looking for evidence that it is a process that may have occurred independantly a number of times.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
SETI@Home attracts... football players?
- Evolution
- Genetics
- Biology
- Geology
- Astronomy
- Physics
As you move down in the list, it is more likely that the creationist will object to a smaller portion of the scientific field. To think like the creationist, it is sufficient to merely apply the following litmus test to science:The otherwise clause in this simpleton logic is especially telling: for the creationists, even those purporting to be creation scientists, create no science, do no experiments, and make no judgements in the scientific field except when required to attempt to discredit those portions that undermine their religious doctrine.
Really, it's as simple as that. Any other answer you get will be self-deception on the part of the creationist.
XML causes global warming.
To all the morons complaining about NASA funding SETI...please get a clue. I mean you wanna help poor people right and this SETI funding could go to feed so many right? WRONG! The amount of funding SETI is getting is less than 10% of what we spend in ONE DAY on foriegn military actions. This is also about the same amount of money GWB raises at one of his campaign dinners. So get a clue about shit before you break out the bleeding heart feed the poor bullshit. I am all for helping people but I cant even possibly imagine how NOT funding SETI is gonna make any difference at all. It is such a tiny drop in the bucket its sad almost. I am so sure the people complaining about this are donating their time to soup kitchens and such too, not. Hipocrits...
"At first, we thought it was just another snake cult."
I think the SETI project has the SETI@Home Screensaver to thank, a project that provides both useful computational power and an indication of the public support that the program has. Although people might really just want a nice screensaver and don't expect to find little green men.
Yeah, I'm sure people thought the automobile was a worthless idea. I'm sure people thought space travel was a worthless idea. I'm sure people though that a microwave was a worthless idea.
Right...
You should be modded as a troll. It's people like you who stifle innovation and discovery.
I don't see how it's unscientific to try and figure out how something originated. Sure, it'll be hard, but I wouldn't say impossible. Right now, sure, maybe it is impossible, but maybe not in the future. Furthermore, don't put creationists in the same boat as a scientist. They are completely different things. A creationists "theories" are not based on fact, but rather on half truths and word of mouth. I have yet to see creationists use real data. Your whole "splash" analogy was stupid. A person can study the shape of the splash, and other factors involved to get why the splash was created like it was. If you want to talk about something philosophical, talk about the meaning of life, not the origin of life. Perhaps this is what you meant.
Now that's funny, it totally posted this under the wrong topic.
Don't blame me, I voted for Durga.
I made a short documentary film about SETI last year covering the origins of the SETI search, Drake's equation, the various groups involved, and people's opinions about SETI. Maybe some of you might find it interesting. Its a 25 MB download in Quicktime format and you can find it here: http://homepage.mac.com/mcgeary/seti/ Enjoy!
With all due respect, the question of origins is a philosophical one rather than a scientific one. It is not possible to use the scientific method to determine origins.
The creationist and the evolutionist are in the same boat. Neither can observe, record, repeat the process
This is pure, unadulterated bullshit. While it's true that we can't replicate the origin of the Universe, or life itself, the scientific method is perfectly applicable to these questions. You formulate an hypothesis, then observe the evidence to disprove or confirm said hypothesis. The repetition comes in finding different kinds of evidence in different places. You can predict something would be found based on an hypothesis, then look at the evidence and see if it doesn't fit. If what you were saying is true, the entire science of astronomy is pure guesswork without the slightest rational basis. Please.
Both are constrained to collect extant data and propose theories about what caused the universe. In that respect, they are limited to speculation.
You sound like an ID proponent. This conclusion is absurd, and results from intellectual laziness. If you think creationism has anything to do with evidence, you're either ignorant or a liar. Creationist "institutes" openly declare that they *already know the answer*, and that the only acceptable "evidence" is that which supports their predetermined answer, ignoring or distorting all else. It is *not* science.
What you refer to as "evolutionists" really means "everyone except the creationists." To say their goals or methods are more than superficially similar is ridiculous.
Speculation is unlikely to provide an answer. On this idea, CS Lewis said: "It's like expecting that the accidental shape taken by a splash when you upset a milk jug should give you a correct account of how the jug was made and why it was upset."
I remember when I though CS Lewis was deep. Actually, he is to philosophy what Chutes and Ladders is to games of skill. His works are a study in poorly constructed arguments, guided by the desire to shore up a preconceived idea rather than seek truth.
For that matter, it is not possible for scientists to say with certainty how the universe was prior to its existence. This is not science, but speculation and should be named as such.
Asking how something was before it existed is gibberish. But, assuming for the sake of argument, that your statement makes sense, science doesn't say *anything* with absolute certainty. It narrows down the possibilities, and can give us knowledge to a very high degree of confidence (as one famous scientist put it, some things are not known absolutely, but are known with sufficient basis that it would be perverse to withold provisional assent - Like "the Earth is roughly spherical."), but all scientific knowledge is potentially subject to revision. Some things are very hard to overturn because they've been demonstrated from so many directions one would need to dismantle just about everything we know to do so. Gravity is one of these things, and so is evolution.
I have a strong suspicion you're a creationism proponent, since this has become a standard creationist tactic: It's all the same, creationism and evolution are equally valid because it's all just guesswork, yadda yadda. Feigning neutrality is pretty standard.
Then again, you might just not know what you're talking about, in which case I apologize for calling you a creationist, but suggest you need to put your ideas back in the oven and let them bake a little longer.
I disagree that interest levels should be a determinant of funding levels. One of the things that, IMO, the goverment must do is fund activities that are worthy endeavors regardless of the public interest in them or their potential profitability. If it were profitable to search for intelligent life, there would be an entire sector of our economy making (and spending) money to perform the search, and SETI would long ago have had all the money it needed to perform that search, and several other organizations would have cropped up to compete with them. This argument also applies to, say, prescription drugs for the elderly, indigent, and unemployed: it seems to me to be pretty clear that just because a pharmecutical company can't make a billion extra dollars a year in profit that they should be able to deny prescription drugs to people who must have them to survive (or, live a reasonably comfortable life). Since a profit-making organization is unwilling to perform that action, then either a not-for-profit, or the government, must step in and perform it. I am not seeing much in the way of the not-for-profit help, which leaves only the government.
I am not convinced that the bureaucracy that we have in America is the best tool for that job, but it sure seems like it is, presently, the only tool.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. (Einstein)
why are we allowing congress to cut funding then making up that funding on our OWN ? Screw them, SETI should bill congress back for each unit.
What makes you think anyone would care about oil on Mars...and more than they care about the coal, frozen chunks of natural gas, iron (not iron ore, but actual iron), gold, titanium, etc. that are floating around where they'd be even easier to get at than oil on Mars?
The only thing I can figure: most planners / politicians don't really believe in space, any more than they believe in Santa's workshop, history, or the constitution of the country that they "serve". These sorts things are all handy to have in your bag of speach writting tricks but that's about it.
-- MarkusQ
I haven't seen folks point this out, but...
I don't think the aliens would take it kindly if we sent Marklar to try to teach them about Marklar and save their Marklars from Marklar, if we can't even get Marklars here to follow the same Marklar.
They might get offended :)
- NimbleBinary geeks can count to 1,023 on their fingers
I would prefer $3.9 billion a month went to c) the domestic front in healthcare for the poor and elderly, education, and social programs.
LOL well put.
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
This is the kind of thing that pisses me off. Personally I think our Government spend faaaaaar too much money as it is, and then this story comes along. I'm all for SETI and stuff, but I don't think this is a totally worthwhile use of my tax dollars.
Pork spending. I'm sure someone at NASA has a brother in law that works for SETI or something similar and that's how the funding got there. I seriously doubt it was because of evidence or anything solid and concrete.
I mean, we have enough problems that the Federal Government is involved with already...and now they're going to throw more money at a cause best funded by private dollars? Insane. While I think NASA is a worthy objective (atleast partly, it should be privitized)...I don't want Federal Money going to support something like SETI.
The reason they cut the funding off in the first place is that it is frivolous. Like grant money given to artists and crap like that. Let's see Government give another big across the board tax cut..raise revenue back a little and stop funding all these silly programs that are clearly private groups and shouldn't receive Federal Dollars.
Let's secure our boarders and get better education in our schools and fix our roads and things of that nature before we start spending Tax Dollars hailing Alpha Centuari.
Only you can stop the stupid Represenatives and Senators wasting our money. End pork spending.
--Reverend Raven
Desperate days demand dire deeds.
...for aliens to send them a better shuttle design.
Your ignorance is showing, first poster. If you knew anything about Alabama as a state you would instantly know that the Redstone Rocket, the Saturn V, and lots of other space technologies came out of Huntsville, AL. Ever heard of Dr. Werner Von Braun? Lived and worked right here in Alabama. NASA, the Space and Rocket Center, Space Camp...all that crap is here. Yes, in AlaFuckingBama.
I hate Alabama because I've lived here all my life. You people assume that just because we're in the South we're backwards morons. While this is in part true (but no more than any other state)..this kind of blind regionalism is no more right when making fun of a southerner than it is making fun of a New Yorker or a D.C. native, or an Eskimo.
And no I do not have a southern accent. I don't understand it either.
--Reverend Raven
Desperate days demand dire deeds.
You have to fund basic science, otherwise, you would have future scientific discoveries and technologies dry up and your economy and empire would eventually crash faster than it normally would (rise and fall of empires). SETI research is very important, SETI@Home proved that BIG supercomputers could be built from the internet, it has provided driving impetus to develope better low-noise reciever technology, optical SETI research advancments, ie: you train the next generation of researchers who "go on to discover things like "the cure for acancer etc"...the fact that the cancelation of NASA funded SETI 10 years ago was very pollitically motivated (if it had a "easy military component" to it, it would have survived)). War based societies tend to crash faster (I believe that this was a basic tennant of the people who used to critisize the old Soviet Union empire, was that it was entirely militairy based, it basiclly had little or no free thought to explore and do things that were not of immediate militairy advantage due to the fact that all resources are put into war and there is no support for the arts, sciences etc..so no good ideas get developed or discovered,), so basiclly, in these scocieties, if the eviroment changes, your toast. Any way, the discovery of life out there will be the biggest motivation for humans to expand beyond earth, maybe stop fighting each other so much, and develop cheap nanotech to get out there and do things, who knows?
I never understood why it was so hard to give funding to a program that could make the most important discovery yet
Are you smoking crack? It would be entirely useless. Communications would be impossible(remember, the closest object is what, hundreds, if not thousands of light years away?), as would be travelling there(we can barely get people to the moon.)
The SETI people are an embarassment to the scientific community- they're basically religious fanatics, almost cultists- convinced that there MUST be intelligent life out there, and they're arrogant enough to think that they have a snowball's chance in hell of actually discovering life if it does exist. Have you ever stopped to think of the sheer impossibility of almost every aspect of the SETI project?
Please help metamoderate.
Mod this up!
I modded it up earlier but some dickhead changed my mod and the system will not allow me to fix it. Differences of opinion by the moderators should not reflect on the quality of the post and this guy makes a very good point IMHO that most will agree with.
The idea that it is not possible to determine origins is patently absurd and flies in the face of decades of work in Paleontoloy, geology, planetatry geology, atrophysics and so forth.
It is equally patently absurd to label as a "TROLL" someone who takes issue with the closed mind of someone who suggests that:
The creationist and the evolutionist are in the same boat. Neither can observe, record, repeat the process
I can mod the original post as a troll and considered doing so, but the purpose of slashdot is to promote intelligent discussion so I left it as it was and modded up the reply.
All can see the result and form their own personal opinions. I think it is quite clear where my opinions are. The REPLY does not deserve to be labled as a TROLL!
In reply to your post, you do make a point. However I would like to draw attention to a single aspect of the Drake Equation.
On Earth in the 50's we built powerful transmitters and the planet for decades glowed in the Radio Spectrum. By the year 2000 it was still glowing, but new communications technologies had formed such as satelight and cellular. I suspect that neither satelight nor cellular "leaks" anything near the level of signal that radio and TV still "leak" so I wonder if the Seti program for instance would be able to detect say cellular usage on a nearby planet.
In my mind it is quite possible that a technologically advanced civilization may develope communications technology that doesn't "leak" the way our communications does now. If so, then your point about say a 300 year window is well taken but the disapearance of signals may not indicate the "death" of the civilization... it may simply coincide with an advance in their technology and a phasing out of obsolete technology.
His works are a study in poorly constructed arguments, guided by the desire to shore up a preconceived idea rather than seek truth.
"I think you are wrong, it's really not an "investment" of money at all, as there is no chance of return on investment."
I think that society could make a return on that investment... because we would again be in a cold war.
But instead of it being "US vs USSR" it'd be "Earth vs Aliens"
Sure, it wouldn't have to come down to war, or invasion or anything.... but you can bet your butt it'd get inventors, scientists, and engineers working overtime coming up with new ideas and new ways of doing things.
So even if we don't get fusion out of it, at least we might get another TANG.....
while the rewards wouldn't be monetary, they would be cultural, and societal rewards.....
Or, again I could be wrong and people would panic, join cults and drink some crazy kool-aid
If I had the power, I'd mod you up to a +6.
If mars had oil...... not only would it pretty much prove the existance of previous life on mars.... but possibly different life.....
Plants on earth take in CO2 and release O2.......
the atmosphere of mars is like 80+% CO2 if I remember right..... I'd think if the atmosphere didn't escape into space.... that it would make mars much easier to teraform....(assuming water, or ability to crack hydrogen from the ground, and combine with C02). use the greenhouse gas to heat up the planet, and turn it into a giant greenhouse of ferns, beans, prairie...... anything to kick up the O2 levels and heat the place up, get some more nutrients available...... even if it took 300 years to get mars to the point where you could farm plants for food outside of domes and such...... it would give us hope.
No, I don't smoke crack.....
Sure, even if communication is impossible.... it could create a scientific drive to invent some method to communicate.
I don't think the SETI people expect to find proof of intelligent life "any day now"
I think that a snowballs chance in hell is good enough.
50 years from now.... the event horison of places that have seen our signals, AND had time to respond, will have increased by 25 light years.
Yes, that doesn't get you a whole lot farther, but at least it opens up more doors.
The problem is... if we don't listen now, listening later might not do us any good......
SETI is the biggest waste of time and money. It is NOT a worthwhile endeavor. It is useless. SETI is just one huge PR firm. Basically the extistance of SETI what they do is supposed to disprove the existance of extra terrestrial life. It's just part of many groups and people who spread misinformation. I assume the governemnt stopped funding a decade ago because they knew they could get private funding. SETI is just like all those government hired pieces of crap who spread lies about how Aliens don't exist and they try to prove it scientifically (like that spec is just space dust or something not a flying ship, etc) but it's all bullcrap. Yes, they would go to these lengths. There are so many things going on that most people aren't aware of. So many things that would blow your mind...
SETI is the biggest waste of time and money. It is NOT a worthwhile endeavor. It is useless. SETI is just one huge PR firm. Basically the extistance of SETI and what they do is supposed to disprove the existance of extra terrestrial life. It's just part of many groups and people who spread misinformation. I assume the governemnt stopped funding a decade ago because they knew they could get private funding. SETI is just like all those government hired pieces of crap who spread lies about how Aliens don't exist and they try to prove it scientifically (like that spec is just space dust or something not a flying ship, etc) but it's all bullcrap. Yes, they would go to these lengths. There are so many things going on that most people aren't aware of. So many things that would blow your mind...
Funding towards the arts fulfills its intentions: a novel, play, sculpture, etc. is produced. The project has often already been approved, so you already know what you're getting. And it will be something that can be enjoyed by a sizeable fraction of the population.
SETI funding is put towards seeking something that, knowing what we know, would be phenomenally unlikely. And if there *was* contact, communication of any sort would be just as difficult.
Funding for the arts will produce something. SETI will produce little. Yes, there is that great seti@home network, but running climatological models could have also revealed similar technology. Instead, consider that mankind still has only the vaguest understand of how the atmospheres and oceans work, or even how fluids and solids behave, how the human body works, how the *mind* works, etc. A better understanding in any of these fields would have positive contributions to our way of life and our economy.
I see many readers here captivated by the notion of aliens or quarks, but I would hope that they would recognize that the excitement of these topics clouds their judgement. Let us hope that those with the wallet feel differently.
Take all the effort in the senseless effort to find extraterrestrial intelligence and apply it to find terrorists on earth! Distribute a free screen-saver program that takes the unused CPU cycles of millions of computers owned by red-blooded Americans, use them to analyze Echelon intercepts, and figure out where the terrorist is hiding!
We recently got a moderate grant from NSF to persue our hydrogen survey and a search for giant pulses from ETs, evaporating black holes and/or pulsars.
Right now we only have a small quantity of gift funds to use toward developing SETI@HOME II and SERENDIP V.
Of course there's always the chance that gift funds pot will get larger.
Support SETI@home
"As much as i would love to support the search for life in the galaxy sometimes its not a good idea. Although i do think that as humans we should try to search any money we put into a project like this is as good as gone and in finacial hard times like this we cant afford to throw around much."
Yes, but think about where the money is going. We're not throwing it into the wind or giving it to another country. It's going to our own citizens to work on this project. It's creating jobs for people and reducing the unemployment rate -- it's not "lost".
All can see the result and form their own personal opinions. I think it is quite clear where my opinions are. The REPLY does not deserve to be labled as a TROLL!
Thanks. I've seen a lot of creationist drivel on slashdot, and never modded it down because I disagreed with it - I ignored it or replied. I think it's pretty clear they have nothing to say to refute me so they resort to childish abuse of the moderation system and AC dung-flinging.
BTW, how did your mod get changed? It says the only mod the post got was as a troll. I guess I must hope for justice in metamod.
They'll probably need the extra radio/computing resources to find their Mars rovers.
Yeah, I'm sure people thought the automobile was a worthless idea. I'm sure people thought space travel was a worthless idea. I'm sure people though that a microwave was a worthless idea.
Yeah, you're right. Sifting through junk signals for space life is exactly on the same level of practicality as a machine that can carry you across land at 10 times the speed previously attainable. It's people like you that stifle innovation. Besides, the automobile is a perfect example of my point. If SETI were a private venture, then people like you with faith in things like that would be free to invest their own money in it. Instead of extorting money from the tax paying public. Then, you and your faith could sit on big piles of money someday smoking cigars and wearing monocles when it all just finally "paid off", which of course.. I'm sure it will.
That was a beautiful portrait of the Virgin Mary!
-- JP
The last person to make a mod over-rides the ones that come before. Perhaps there is a "troll cutoff" but I'm not exactly sure how the algorithm works.
:-)
Thus, we can have a post modded up to say +4 interesting and someone takes issue and mods it to say +3 troll and it will stay labeled as troll unless someone else mods it back up.
This is a little inconsistancy in the moderation system that probably should be fixed. I could see going from say +3 interesting to +2 interesting via applying a "overrated" mod but to go from anything modded positive to "troll" without first going through either 0 or 1 seems to be a little inconsistant.
I think "redundant" works this way too. It would be funny to see a post rated as "+4 redundant" of course. I could waste a mod point to test this but I would not want to to reflect on anyone making a post so I won't.
Just the chance to contact intelligent life somewhere in the universe should be a better alternative than not. After all, such contact could be helpful for us. There's a huge oppurtunity cost that shouldn't be passed up. Wouldn't it be nice to know that we're not alone? Wouldn't it be cool if we learned something from them? Besides, it's not like the project is without scientific merit, as you're making it seem. And if you want to bitch about government spending, you might as well start ranting how the government wastes so much more tax money conducting the most stupid of researches. More money is wasted on finding out things like "why people fart", and "Does drinking a lot of beer make you fat", and other stupid things. The government researching things like that is infinitely more stupid than the chance, the mere chance of having some sort of contact with another intelligent life form.
This is fascinating. Usually when NASA pulls the funding from a program, it stays pulled. Now they intend on restoring aid even though NASA may still leave most of the grunt work to private parties.
:-)
This seems to stem from several things... the discovery of life in extreme environments, increased interest of exploring Mars, and the discoveries of planets around other star systems. (Guess that NASA is rethinking that extraterrestrial life is not as farfetched a concept after all.)
This is going to be quite a century.
!@#$% whole-grain cereal. When I want fiber, I eat some wicker furniture. - G. Carlin
Although i do think that as humans we should try to search any money we put into a project like this is as good as gone and in finacial hard times like this we cant afford to throw around much.
'Good as gone'?? The money is going into mainly jobs for people in the US... money that will keep circulating and helping the economy. It's also doing research, which has the potential to materially benefit our society and world as a whole. There is no 'waste' in this scenario.
The only time you can really waste money is by putting it into something that is destroyed. Like say, putting hundreds of Billions of dollars into making bombs... The bombs themselves explode, so you can't salvage anything out of that. And whatever is nearby, is also mostly destroyed, meaning you need to use more money to rebuild it. That's how you throw money away...
EMR is not the only form of radiation. Einstien was wrong. One question, if a signal is travelling faster than C how do you tell? A radio might detect something in an extreemly short burst, but the signal would only be intellegable over extreemly long intercept distances.
Well it is all academic there is no body out there thinking about extra long array detection, with overall antenna length in the order of say from here to Mars. The individual stations would only pick up short static like burst, however if we are to decode faster than light signals we will need to experiment with signal decompression and time expantion of recieved data. Who knows we might even hear that Paul is dead by playing them backwards.
OH THE SHAME I fell off the wagon and use sigs again!
the economy is downhill and we are going to take a 5 year grant and flush it down the toilet, astrobiology is an important field, but listening for extraterrestrial radio signals is ludicrous