Search For Alien Life On 86 Planets Begins

liqs8143 writes "Astronomers from the United States have begun searching for alien life on 86 possible earth-like planets. A massive radio telescope that listens for signs of alien life is being used for this project. These 86 planets are short-listed from 1235 possible planets detected by NASA's Kepler telescope. The mission is part of the Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) project, launched in the mid 1980s. A giant dish pointing towards each of the 86 planets will gather 24 hours of data, starting from this week."

Comments

crop circles

[Beliskner]

I would first search the exoplanets pointed to by the most interesting crop circles from the global crop circles database why do the hard work when the aliens have done it for us, just draw a line from the centre of the Earth, through the crop circle to the appropriate starsystem

Re:crop circles

[AlienIntelligence]

Is that how it works? I was always assuming a LOS across the diagram,
like the ones in the Atacama highlands.

-AI

Re:crop circles

[supertrinko]

Have you factored the rotation of the earth into this plan of yours?

Re:crop circles

[JoshuaZ]

I would first search the exoplanets pointed to by the most interesting crop circles from the global crop circles database [cropcircleresearch.com] why do the hard work when the aliens have done it for us, just draw a line from the centre of the Earth, through the crop circle to the appropriate starsystem

So the aliens are coming down to Earth from hundreds of light years away, and leaving hints in crop circles about what planets they are coming from instead of just saying hi? And they happen to use a calling card that is easily duplicated by low level technology? And the aliens happened to start in a handful of Western countries and then spread their message around the globe?

I was talking to my barber a few days ago. Nice chap by the name of Occam. He had some interesting things to say about this sort of claim.

Re:crop circles

[Nidi62]

why do the hard work when the people with rope and wooden boards have done it for us,

Fixed that for you

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

The earth moves though, so you'd need to know when the crop circle appeared, to within a tiny fraction of a second. Unless you're joking, and just wanted to see who didn't realise they're fake.

Re:crop circles

[Black Parrot]

So the aliens are coming down to Earth from hundreds of light years away, and leaving hints in crop circles about what planets they are coming from instead of just saying hi?

They wanted to make sure they only had to deal with the smart people.

Re:crop circles

[Time_Ngler]

It's obviously a project being run by an alien bureaucratic agency of some kind. Probably has been running for centuries to keep the "wooden board and rope" skilled aliens employed.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

whoosh

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[maxwell demon]

The crop cycles started long before the Iraq war.

Re:crop circles

[Beliskner]

Have you factored the rotation of the earth into this plan of yours?

The aliens would probably expect us to be able to solved all trivial problems like that.

Re:crop circles

[Black Parrot]

It's obviously a project being run by an alien bureaucratic agency of some kind. Probably has been running for centuries to keep the "wooden board and rope" skilled aliens employed.

LoL. I get an image of a flying saucer hovering over a farm and beaming down a team of Greys with ropes and boards, who quickly press out the design they've been given. Then it's beam-them-up, and a smoke break while on the way to the next farm.

Re:crop circles

[Opportunist]

Hmm... odd, most reports about contacts have been from some hillbillies high on moonshine.

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[Opportunist]

Well, but he could probable be the one to answer that one question that would puzzle me to no end if I was an alien: Why is your species so hellbent on killing each other over nothing?

Re:crop circles

[neo8750]

Well, but he could probable be the one to answer that one question that would puzzle me to no end if I was an alien: Why is your species so hellbent on killing each other over nothing?

Well sometimes we just get bored...

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a big assumption about aliens. Whether we like it or not the killing of each other has favored the genes of the killer over those that hold peace above all else. That's been our history, whether it continues to be our future is up to us.

Re:crop circles

[camperdave]

So the aliens are coming down to Earth from hundreds of light years away, and leaving hints in crop circles about what planets they are coming from instead of just saying hi?

What makes you think that the crop circles are location hints and aren't the alien's way of just saying "hi"? I suppose you'd just land somewhere, pop open the hatch and speak. That's the obvious way to your naked ape mind. However, that may not be obvious to an alien species. It might even be considered extremely rude and aggressive. Instead, they leave sophisticated artwork in fields (helped along by a bunch of drunken art majors)

Re:crop circles

[camperdave]

Well, but he could probable be the one to answer that one question that would puzzle me to no end if I was an alien: Why is your species so hellbent on killing each other over nothing?

Because we have a small talent for war.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, and thats great and all, but how about we spend more of our public resources on fixing earth rather than useless trivia like this. Like, I don't know, reversing the government spending trend. If this data (and I call it data, because it isn't useful enough to be called knowledge), were good for anything, then why doesn't the private industry seem interested in it. This type of research is just welfare for otherwise bright individuals who decided to get an ivory tower education so they could spend their lives on meaningless pursuits.

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[Anonymous Coward]

It's because we say the guy in the story is the son of god, and they say he is only a prophet. Duh. And they are hiding our oil under their sand.

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[Anonymous Coward]

In order to make the trip they would clearly be of a higher intelligence and technological sophistication. They would have dispensed with socialism and embraced the free market - and accepted God into their lives.

Obviously they are waiting for the stain of librulism to wash off the human race before making themselves truly known.

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[belthize]

We don't kill them over nothing, we kill them because they're wrong, usually about incredibly important things like which side to butter your bread on.

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[formfeed]

Hmm... odd, most reports about contacts have been from some hillbillies high on moonshine.

That's because the aliens are visitors from an advanced libertarian society of tea-partiers.

Re:crop circles

[Wolfling1]

Its a nice theory. Superluminal corkscrew gravity waves have been considered as a communication tool for some time now.

Problem is that they are also generated by black holes as their axis sweeps across us. They are not an indication of intelligent life.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

today's meaningless research is tomorrow's must-have knowledge for modern technology.

Here's just one example:
Einstein came up with general relativity almost 100 years ago. Fairly useless in his day. It was fascinating, albeit only on a theoretical level. Todays modern society runs on general relativity (along with, to a lesser extent, quantum physics). Without knowledge of general relativity, your GPS device would be off by a minimum of 4 miles, with inaccuracy increasing from there. Without GPS, our army is lost in the middle of the desert. etc. etc.

yeah, let's just throw all our money at "fixing earth" (a "problem" with no definition is one that can never be finished because you will continually be revising the criteria to solve it).

Re:crop circles

[RobertLTux]

"I was talking to my barber a few days ago. Nice chap by the name of Occam. He had some interesting things to say about this sort of claim."

My barber came from england hes a bit odd, last name Todd used to live on fleet street very particular about his tools but does give a nice shave.

anyway i think he and Occam should talk tools sometime.

Re:crop circles

[donaldm]

Have you factored the rotation of the earth into this plan of yours?

Not only the is Earth is revolving on its axis but it is also revolving around our sun in an elliptical orbit and our sun is actually revolving around our galactic hub. I think it would be allot more accurate to use a blindfold and pins on a galactic map rather then rely on crop circles of which many have been proved to be hoaxes :)

Re:crop circles

[dreamchaser]

That whoosing sound you heard was the GP's joke flying over your head. It's amazing how so many otherwise intelligent geeks have no sense of humor, or a broken humor detector at the very least.

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[donaldm]

We don't kill them over nothing, we kill them because they're wrong, usually about incredibly important things like which side to butter your bread on.

Don't forget "My invisible friend is better than your invisible friend", that just slightly more important than which side of bread you put butter on :)

Re:crop circles

[TapeCutter]

If this data (and I call it data, because it isn't useful enough to be called knowledge), were good for anything, then why doesn't the private industry seem interested in it[?] This type of research is just welfare for otherwise bright individuals who decided to get an ivory tower education so they could spend their lives on meaningless pursuits.

Because private industry isn't interested in "meaning", they're interested in profit. Oh, and "fixing the earth" is a political problem, not a resource problem.

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[rhook]

Without knowledge of general relativity, your GPS device would be off by a minimum of 4 miles, with inaccuracy increasing from there. Without GPS, our army is lost in the middle of the desert. etc. etc.

Right, because people couldn't navigate before there was GPS. And lets not forget that all soldiers learn how to navigate with a map and a compass in basic, and other school during their career give them refreshers. Even in the Navy they still navigate the old fashioned way, using GPS to verify their chart plotting. Same with the Air Force.

Re:crop circles

[rhook]

There are hundreds of reports of UFOs from pilots who flew during WWI and WWII (the so called 'Foo Fighters'). Not to mention all the reports from Naval officers of USOs, UFO reports from astronauts, pilots, and mass sightings of UFOs over major cities. Lets also not forget about the UFOs that were seen over the US Capitol in 1952. President Truman even issued a shoot down order. I guess they were all drunken hillbillies too? Any logical person has to admit that there is something out there.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Foo_fighter

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/1952_Washington_D.C._UFO_incident

Re:crop circles

[dilvish_the_damned]

I would first search the exoplanets pointed to by the most interesting crop circles from the global crop circles database why do the hard work when the aliens have done it for us, just draw a line from the centre of the Earth, through the crop circle to the appropriate starsystem

I forget, is that done using Eastern Standard Time?

Re:crop circles

[MJMullinII]

Yes because I'm sure they managed to reach the point of developing a civilization that was capable of traveling the stars by only holding hands and never, ever doing anything "bad".

Que the limousine liberals and pickup truck right-wingers.

Re:crop circles

[MJMullinII]

Yeah, and thats great and all, but how about we spend more of our public resources on fixing earth rather than useless trivia like this. Like, I don't know, reversing the government spending trend. If this data (and I call it data, because it isn't useful enough to be called knowledge), were good for anything, then why doesn't the private industry seem interested in it. This type of research is just welfare for otherwise bright individuals who decided to get an ivory tower education so they could spend their lives on meaningless pursuits.

Everyone is a Socialist when the government is helping/paying them and a Libertarian when it is helping/paying anyone but them.

Re:crop circles

[SomePgmr]

Local # 299,792,458 - Intergalactic Crop Stompers Union?

Wonder how long you have to be on the job before you get to be the one holding the clipboard.

Re:crop circles

[tnk1]

Actually, GPS *did* make it possible for an offensive like the run through Southern Iraq to flank the Iraqi forces in Kuwait during the First Gulf War. In an otherwise featureless desert, they would have had to rely on things like roads to orient them, which would have constrained their axis of attack to one more easily covered and more expected by a lower tech military.

Speaking from experience, relying on the orienteering ability of your troops can have uneven results, especially without landmarks.

While military forces still will use older style methods of navigation, and should since GPS could be vulnerable, one should not underestimate how much of a force multiplier GPS is. There have been major battles in history that would have gone the other way entirely if all of the components of each force knew where they were exactly.

Re:crop circles

[theNAM666]

Your objection is neatly address in the works of Douglas Adams, I believe. However Adam's theory suggests the the circles are oriented in a manner most likely to fuck with human beings.

Re:crop circles

[tnk1]

That's the silliest thing I have ever heard. Even if the aliens have found a way to generate universal peace amongst their own kind right now, they are the results of evolution just like we are, and they had to adapt to their own biospheres much like we did. That means a capacity for conflict. It is unlikely that an alien species who has any idea about evolution and natural selection, which is to say any alien civilization who could detect us or vice-versa, would stare at us in some sort of uncomprehending disbelief.

The only real possibility of that happening is that they are so old a civilization that they have actually forgotten where they themselves came from and even then, they can't be ignorant of the basic conditions that life has to deal with. More likely, they know exactly why we kill one another, they probably have just as much history of it as we do.

In other words, I find the whole E.T. concept of advanced alien civilizations made up of beings who can travel through space in starships, but somehow be unable to comprehend the basic facts of life to be ridiculous.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Those people saw man-made craft, natural phenomenon or were hallucinating. "UFO" just means unidentified flying object, not extraterrestrial. Most people have probably seen things in the sky that they couldn't explain, such as meteorites, but the rednecks are the ones who make absurd reports about being taken and raped by little grey creatures that just miraculously happen to be humanoid in shape and have an unending fascination with anuses. Yeah, uh-huh.

Certainly extraterrestrial life does exist somewhere in the universe, but just as certainly none of it has ever visited our planet. If an extraterrestrial civilisation is roughly the same technological level as us or less, then they won't be able to travel the vast distances in space. If an extraterrestrial civilisation is so far advanced to be able to travel the vast distances, then the chances are very probable that they could learn absolutely nothing by studying us and wouldn't waste their time to even visit. In all cases, the chances of an alien looking pretty much like us (bipedal, two arms, two eyes and all features in approximately the same places) a la Star Trek or Star Wars is laughably remote.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

The aliens already did that work for us. They knew when we would start using the crop circles to locate the planets, and placed them accordingly.

However, it is also possible that they noticed that the time when we ought to use them is coming near, and they infiltrated /. with one of their operatives to begin convincing the smart masses to use the crop circles like that. Beliskner, feel free to come clean at any time...

On a more serious note, don't forget that you need to factor in the rotation of not only our planet and star (as another poster noted), but also the planet and star of the aliens.

Re:crop circles

[Spy Handler]

Those people saw man-made craft, natural phenomenon or were hallucinating.

And you know this for a fact... how?

Most people have probably seen things in the sky that they couldn't explain, such as meteorites, but the rednecks are the ones who make absurd reports

Pretty much 100% of military pilots and airliner pilots are college educated. I would also say they are THE most reliable and authoritative people, as a profession, to judge what is a man-made flying object, what is a natural aerial phenomena, and what qualifies as neither -- certainly more than any internet geek posting on Slashdot --- because 1) they have the most experience with man-made flying objects than any other profession and know what they are and aren't capable of, 2) they spend more time in the sky and looking at it than anyone else, and 3) they have nothing to gain by reporting UFO's... i mean absolutely nothing... and everything to lose; ranging from ridicule by their peers to outright termination of their flying careers. And yet there are plenty of credible reports by them if you'd care to look it up. Some of them are even backed up by ground radar.

I would just say, don't be so quick to dismiss something as redneck hallucination just because it doesn't fit into your Carl Sagan-inspired worldview.

Re:crop circles

[dotancohen]

And the aliens happened to start in a handful of Western countries and then spread their message around the globe?

Do you really think that when crop circles were an unknown phenomenon and one would appear in Elbonia someone would rush to report that all over Europe? Only when the phenomenon was recognized did reports of the occurrences spread outside of the third world.

I'm not actually suggesting that crop circles are an extraterrestrial phenomenon. I am simple stating that just because you don't hear about something doesn't mean that it doesn't happen.

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[Surt]

That is how they say hi. Just because your primitive mind is having a hard time grasping it doesn't make it any less obvious as a universal form of greeting.

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[Beliskner]

The plot would generate an arc through the sky

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[mdm42]

They wanted to make sure they only had to deal with the smart people.

Not much chance of that on this planet.

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[ozmanjusri]

Without GPS, our army is lost in the middle of the desert. etc. etc.

Desert. Quagmire. What's the difference?

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[mug funky]

i know several college educated people with mental illnesses, the symptoms of which include auditory and visual hallucinations.

mental illness wasn't particularly well understood back in the day.

Re:crop circles

[Spy Handler]

well I only brought up the college education business because the guy I was replying to insinuated that UFO sightings == rednecks. Of course having gone to college does not preclude anyone from hallucinations (and if you went to a west coast one you are probably more likely to hallucinate on LSD)

However I think in the case of Japan Airlines flight 1628 sighting, in which the entire flight crew including the pilot, copilot and the navigator saw the same thing, and is backed up by ground radar (FAA air traffic controller in Anchorage), you can safely rule out visual hallucination.

Re:crop circles

[terjeber]

Irony - definition, something that you can stick a fridge magnet to.

Re:crop circles

[terjeber]

Here's the problem. Every time a highly advanced species or group of individuals has met a less advanced group, eventually the lesser developed group perishes more or less with perhaps a few lucky individuals integrating into the more advanced group. Happy (for the less advanced) integration normally happens only within the same species. In cross-species situations if the lesser developed group is lucky they become servants for the more advanced group. Perhaps well treated servants (like horses and pets are to us), but servants all the same.

A civilization capable of traveling across interstellar space is significantly more advanced than ours. There is no reason to think we'll be anything but fun little pets to them. If we are lucky. If we are less lucky we will temporarily become an exploitable resource populated by mindless ants-like creatures.

Re:crop circles

[ToronadoCheese]

I would first search the exoplanets pointed to by the most interesting crop circles from the global crop circles database [cropcircleresearch.com] why do the hard work when the aliens have done it for us, just draw a line from the centre of the Earth, through the crop circle to the appropriate starsystem

So the aliens are coming down to Earth from hundreds of light years away, and leaving hints in crop circles about what planets they are coming from instead of just saying hi? And they happen to use a calling card that is easily duplicated by low level technology? And the aliens happened to start in a handful of Western countries and then spread their message around the globe?

I was talking to my barber a few days ago. Nice chap by the name of Occam. He had some interesting things to say about this sort of claim.

Dont underestimate the power of a committee to produce the illogical. Dont assume that committees dont exist on other worlds.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

But surely we can just fire the 1000-gigawatt beam weapons in any direction until we hit something, whereupon it will instantly vaporize.

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[Pikkebaas]

Have you factored the meaning of the word "humour" into your interpretation of GP's post?

Re:crop circles

[supertrinko]

Don't worry, I had enough faith in their intelligence to assume that they already knew what I asked. I meant for my reply to be seen as sarcastic humour. Apparently I'm not very good at that.

Re:crop circles

[pinkushun]

Because crop circles are made by cows rolling in the fields.

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[GameboyRMH]

You can have a quagmire without a desert. For example, Vietnam.

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[smitty97]

Another example, "Family Guy"

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[elrous0]

Duh, you just use the time of day and year when the last local redneck was anally-probed. Do they have to spell it out for you?

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

That thing that just whizzed by over your head was the joke.

Re:crop circles

[elrous0]

No, those were Soviet spycraft and secret U.S. spycraft. Do you think it's a coincidence that the vast majority of these "sightings" happened at the height of the Cold War near U.S. military bases? The military wasn't covering up little green men, they were covering up their spy gear.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, because being a pilot and/or college educated makes one invulnerable to mental or physical disabilities, drugs or just being drunk.

Anyhow, being a pilot absolutely does not mean that one is able to determine what all airborne craft and natural phenomena are. How many drivers can tell the make and model of an automobile that is several miles away? Also, how many of those pilots actually said that they believed that the UFOs that they saw were definitely extraterrestrials? Are there ANY clear photos or videos of an extraterrestrial craft? In our digital age where so many people carry high resolution imaging devices in their pockets and all of the cameras installed by businesses and governments along with satellites, you'd think there would be at least a single clear image out of all of those claims, yet there isn't.

Sorry, I'm not buying it. As nice of a fantasy as it might be, we're flying solo on our little piece of cosmic dust for now. Oh and I've never read anything by Carl Sagan. My worldview is inspired by logic and thought, not childish fantasy and daydreaming.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

the guy I was replying to insinuated that UFO sightings == rednecks

Nope, you're the one who insinuated that. I actually said that a lot of people have probably seen UFOs ("unidentified" being the key part) and that rednecks are the ones who claim to have actually made contact with aliens, ie. abduction. In fact, that distinction was the main point I was making. You even quoted (out of context, I might add) the exact part where I made the distinction.

Most people have probably seen things in the sky that they couldn't explain, such as meteorites, but the rednecks are the ones who make absurd reports about being taken and raped by little grey creatures that just miraculously happen to be humanoid in shape and have an unending fascination with anuses

So yeah, you might want to work on your reading comprehension.

However I think in the case of Japan Airlines flight 1628 sighting, in which the entire flight crew including the pilot, copilot and the navigator saw the same thing, and is backed up by ground radar (FAA air traffic controller in Anchorage), you can safely rule out visual hallucination.

All of those people and not a single camera. How convenient. I'm sure they all immediately ruled out every possible explanation besides aliens too.

Re:crop circles

[ginbot462]

>> and a smoke break
Aliens are unionized? Huh, who knew. Explains why we always get differing report on ships/looks. The work gets farmed out to Chianzotal 17 after the union labor charges too much.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Because NASA AND THE GOVERNMENT like to spend money that we can use in Health Care,Schools,Housing,and RETIREMENT in stupid things like that!!!

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[StikyPad]

There are hundreds of reports of UFOs from pilots who flew during WWI and WWII.

Not coincidentally at a point when both aviation and radar were in their infancy. In other words, people weren't used to seeing *anything* in the sky, especially from the sky, let alone resolving and identifying it accurately. And radar, introduced only in the latter half of the second world war, was prone to both false positives and false negatives.

Extra-terrestrial theories about UFOs are the modern-day equivalent of sea monsters -- people see something they can't explain and so they invent an explanation. Naturally these explanations are never mundane, because extra-ordinary events like eclipses can never have mundane causes, like planetary bodies naturally aligning. No, sir, these events are evidence of an angry god. And likewise, UFOs = aliens.

Re:crop circles

[StikyPad]

HA!! Gust gos 2 show dem aliens no whats what. And u thaut kolledge foke wer thu smart wuns!

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[Opportunist]

I find the combination of "advanced" and "tea-partier" somehow ... scary. It's like building the better idiot.

Re:crop circles

[Opportunist]

I'm talking about people who had a meet&greet with the li'l greys. Not people seeing something in the sky.

Show me one, just one, sane person with an IQ above room temperature who claims to have met and talked to an alien (one from outer space, I'm not talking about Mexicans, ok? No lame jokes) and we're talking.

Re:crop circles

[Opportunist]

So that's what all those abductions are about. They need soldiers.

I mean, be serious, think back 2-3 millennia and consider how much the average Spartan or even Roman Legionaire could dish out and take before he went down, and how well they managed to recover. Think the average American today could come close to that? Now imagine you're a species with a few centuries of space travel under your belt, high tech at your disposal that we could only dream of, I'd guess it makes you weaker from a physical point of view. Plus, waging war has the nasty side effect of being potentially lethal for the guys doing the fighting.

Face it, we're just prime soldier material for a more advanced species. Think about it: Harder, maybe easier to patch up, expendable and no political problems if you waste a few thousand of them since they got no family that could vote you out of office.

Re:crop circles

[Opportunist]

Wonder what God's plan was when he buried all of our precious oil with those towelheads. Either he's an asshole or he has a really weird sense of humor.

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[Opportunist]

Less so. Unlike your invisible friend, that bread could at least feed a person for a few hours.

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[Opportunist]

Not entirely silly when you think about it. A lot of species created a highly ritualized, non-lethal (or even non-violent) way of competition to determine the right to breed, from colorful feathers to blunt horns to butt heads against each other with. Highly social predators often even avoid killing each other in a ranking fight. There are plenty of examples in the animal kingdom, where fighting for the right to propagate is most likely more violent and less "refined" than in humans who usually do it by buying expensive cars and other junk to impress the other sex.

Of course any evolved species will have some way of competition, if they are carnivorous or at least omnivorous they will probably also know how to hunt and kill, maybe derive pleasure from that act. I do not know a single other species, though, that hunts and kills its own kind for the sake of pure lust of killing, with no other intention but just that.

Re:crop circles

[Opportunist]

Or, just maybe, they are interested in their own development, just like we would maybe be if we found a civilization of prehistoric sapients. Think of the answers we could get that way. There is probably little our planet (and we) could offer to a species that somehow managed to invent FTL travel. Fuel? Unlikely, there's plenty of hydrogen to go around. Any mineral? Again, there's a solar system where you can get anything you might want with probably far less resistance. What would you want from this planet? Slaves? In that case, we'd have witnessed an invasion by now. Why bother with spotty abductions if you can just scoop up what you need, anyone here thinking we could possibly resist something like that for a minute? No, Independence Day does NOT count as a possible scenario.

I'd want to believe that with advancement in civilization comes the ability to accept the existence of others without the need to destroy their existence. Once you solved pretty much every problem these "savages" could solve, namely power, workforce or resources, the only thing left is to study them.

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[Anonymous Coward]

It depends on the reasons we fight one another. Often, it is over idiotic things such as religion. I wonder if they have religion? I wonder if they would be willing to kill one another based on unprovable claims? An advanced species probably wouldn't think too highly of another species (a supposedly intelligent one) that kills members of its own species for such trivial and unprovable things. Killing to survive is an entirely different matter.

Re:crop circles

[RockDoctor]

So, that would be about five minutes ago?

Oh, you were meaning "anally probed by someone other than a sibling, child or parent of the redneck".

Ten minutes ago.

Re:crop circles

[rhook]

i know several college educated people with mental illnesses, the symptoms of which include auditory and visual hallucinations.

mental illness wasn't particularly well understood back in the day.

Can you explain, if you will, how their hallucinations have shown up on radar?

Re:crop circles

[rhook]

All of those people and not a single camera. How convenient. I'm sure they all immediately ruled out every possible explanation besides aliens too.

Yes, because everyone had a camera phone back in 1986. The fact is that not many people had access to a camera all the time back then.

Re:crop circles

[RockDoctor]

Room temperature here is about 295K. The number of people on the planet with an IQ of 295 is on the order of (calculates ...) considerably less than zero.

Re:crop circles

[RockDoctor]

In cross-species situations if the lesser developed group is lucky they become servants for the more advanced group. Perhaps well treated servants (like horses and pets are to us), but servants all the same.

Ah, you;ve been reading your Gulliver's Travels recently, haven't you?

Re:crop circles

[rhook]

Then explain why we never were able to shoot a single one down. The Soviets managed to shoot down our spy planes during the cold war, and those were more advanced than any the Soviets had. In fact the Soviets focused on spy satellites instead of building spy planes.

Re:crop circles

[camperdave]

Don't watch much Twilight zone, do you?

In the words of the Alien Ambassador:

I think you have misunderstood me. Your savagery is an issue. That's true. But, you see, on the thousands of planets under our control, we breed warriors, gentleman. Warriors to fight for us across the galaxy! In your case, your savagery has not bred true. You are woefully backwards in the act of war. you fight erratically and clumsily. Your weapons are shockingly crude. And worst of all, in your hearts you long for peace. A small talent for war. Too small. Too small to be of any use to us.

We're not soldier material at all. That's the problem.

Re:crop circles

[rhook]

Except these were also visually identified. So that throws your "primitive radar" theory out with the bath water.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Who said anything about a phone camera? 35mm cameras were very ubiquitous in 1986, especially on an international flight and especially with the Japanese.

Re:crop circles

[rhook]

And usually left in their luggage. It is also something that one would not normally find in the cockpit.

Re:crop circles

[Maritz]

You need to have a quick read up on what a false dichotomy is. You picturing some kind of meeting, maybe all the big shots on the planet, taking a quick show of hands to decide whether to 'fix earth' or 'run a space mission called Kepler'?

Re:crop circles

[Maritz]

I don't think he was being serious.

Re:crop circles

[Maritz]

UFOs definitely exist, but the hypothesis that they are alien spacecraft is currently so lacking in evidence that it is ridiculed, and rightly so to be honest. Anecdotes are not compelling evidence no matter whose anecdotes they are. Extraordinary claims etc.

Re:crop circles

[Maritz]

A radar signature is not the same thing as an alien spacecraft. A nice story without solid documentary evidence is not compelling. I literally don't care what it was, because it cannot be demonstrated. I'd love to find out there were aliens whizzing about here, but it'll take more than a weird story and a radar signature to convince me. If there are aliens around, it probably ought to be really bloody obvious.

Re:crop circles

[Maritz]

You see, what you're doing here, is ridiculing the mundane explanation. Maybe they're alien spacecraft, maybe they're not. The point is, you don't have adequate evidence for your assertion. Your explanation for these phenomena is that they're something incredibly exotic. You have to understand that the bar becomes very high for a claim like that.

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait a minute. You are able to rationalize a UFO as being a spacecraft belonging to a super advanced race of extraterrestrials who traveled thousands of light years because they were fascinated by a turboprop airplane based purely off of hearsay, but you just can't believe that someone on an airplane could have a camera handy? Seriously?

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you saying that every single report of a UFO sighting has shown up on radar? Or just a small handful? Additionally, you do know that it's possible for human made aircraft and other natural phenomena like meteorites to show on radar too, right?

Re:crop circles

[Opportunist]

That joke's only funny 'til the first geek comes up with a temperature scale other than Fahrenheit, I know...

C'mon, don't say you didn't get the idea of the question, why're you tackling semantics?

Re:crop circles

[Opportunist]

Honestly, I don't. It's an interesting idea, but frankly, I don't think we're "bred". Too little guidance, too many ways for us to simply and plainly fuck up the whole planet and too much chaff amongst the ones fit for service, especially since we now, too, become complacent and flabby. If we were bred, I am pretty sure that we would be handed weapons instead of having to invent them ourselves so we can better serve without being retrained when it comes to harvesting time. I mean, let's be honest here, our evolution, even that of our weapons, simply takes way too long, who can wait a few millenia just to get a bunch of a few million soldiers?

Re:crop circles

[StikyPad]

You're not citing any specific incidents, and neither was I, so nothing is disproved by your claim of visual targeting even if it that claim were bulletproof, which is being generous.

Aside from that, I addressed both radar and visual UFOs.

Visual: "people weren't used to seeing *anything* in the sky, especially from the sky"
Radar: "And radar, introduced only in the latter half of the second world war, was prone to both false positives and false negatives."

So that throws your not-so-witty riposte out with the bath water. Whatever that's supposed to mean.

Re:crop circles

[RockDoctor]

That joke's only funny 'til the first geek comes up with a temperature scale other than Fahrenheit, I know...

Ah, that's the scale you're using. I re-considered the question in case you were talking in Centigrade, and you'd only exclude a couple of hundred people for a "room temperature + IQ". Varies of course with what you consider room temperature.

C'mon, don't say you didn't get the idea of the question, why're you tackling semantics?

Err, the site's motto is "news for nerds" ; you get held to higher standards than the average person in your country. (If you're using Fahrenheit, that makes you an average American, doesn't it?)

BTW your signature has still got commerce and government inverted.

Oh, bollocks - this client enforces use of IE. Which means I have to spell check for myself ...

Re:crop circles

[Beliskner]

Right, because people couldn't navigate before there was GPS. And lets not forget that all soldiers learn how to navigate with a map and a compass in basic, and other school during their career give them refreshers. Even in the Navy they still navigate the old fashioned way, using GPS to verify their chart plotting. Same with the Air Force.

Yup a good EMP blast would knock out any GPS so map/compass is necessary

Re:crop circles

[Beliskner]

more accurate to use a blindfold and pins on a galactic map rather then rely on crop circles of which many have been proved to be hoaxes [cropcirclesecrets.org] :)

The article states 10,000 crop circle cases, even the entire US army working continuously couldn't create that many crop circles - not at least whilst keeping it secret, Area 51 has people on TV saying they did this and that despite the fact it's such a small facility, so crop circles should have at least 100 people on tape with blacked out faces and disguised voices to protect their identity confessing to everything, where are they?

Re:crop circles

[Beliskner]

Those people saw man-made craft, natural phenomenon or were hallucinating. "UFO" just means unidentified flying object, not extraterrestrial.

Dude, read the GP's article, President Harry Truman was called up and told something like "Look we got tonnes of UFOs out here what do you want us to do Mr President?"

Re:crop circles

[Beliskner]

Errr guys I wasn't joking

Re:crop circles

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you factored the rotation of the earth into this plan of yours?

The aliens would probably expect us to be able to solved all trivial problems like that.

if we haven't it's gonna be embarrassing

Re:crop circles

[Beliskner]

If an extraterrestrial civilisation is so far advanced to be able to travel the vast distances, then the chances are very probable that they could learn absolutely nothing by studying us and wouldn't waste their time to even visit

In the same way that we sit and listen to old sixties music and take our children to zoos where uneducated animals just play around, perhaps the aliens bring their children into Earth orbit to show them us?

I found some

[Anonymous Coward]

It has come to my attention that the entire Linux community is a hotbed of so called 'alternative sexuality', which includes anything from hedonistic orgies to homosexuality to paedophilia.

What better way of demonstrating this than by looking at the hidden messages contained within the names of some of Linux's most outspoken advocates:

• Linus Torvalds is an anagram of slit anus or VD 'L,' clearly referring to himself by the first initial.
• Richard M. Stallman, spokespervert for the Gaysex's Not Unusual 'movement' is an anagram of mans cram thrill ad.
• Alan Cox is barely an anagram of anal cox which is just so filthy and unchristian it unnerves me.

I'm sure that Eric S. Raymond, composer of the satanic homosexual propaganda diatribe The Cathedral and the Bizarre, is probably an anagram of something queer, but we don't need to look that far as we know he's always shoving a gun up some poor little boy's rectum. Update: Eric S. Raymond is actually an anagram for secondary rim and cord in my arse. It just goes to show you that he is indeed queer.

Update the Second: It is also documented that Evil Sicko Gaymond is responsible for a nauseating piece of code called Fetchmail, which is obviously sinister sodomite slang for 'Felch Male' -- a disgusting practise. For those not in the know, 'felching' is the act performed by two perverts wherein one sucks their own post-coital ejaculate out of the other's rectum. In fact, it appears that the dirty Linux faggots set out to undermine the good Republican institution of e-mail, turning it into 'e-male.'

As far as Richard 'Master' Stallman goes, that filthy fudge-packer was actually quoted on leftist commie propaganda site Salon.com as saying the following: 'I've been resistant to the pressure to conform in any circumstance,' he says. 'It's about being able to question conventional wisdom,' he asserts. 'I believe in love, but not monogamy,' he says plainly.

And this isn't a made up troll bullshit either! He actually stated this tripe, which makes it obvious that he is trying to politely say that he's a flaming homo slut!

Speaking about 'flaming,' who better to point out as a filthy chutney ferret than Slashdot's very own self-confessed pederast Jon Katz. Although an obvious deviant anagram cannot be found from his name, he has already confessed, nay boasted of the homosexual perversion of corrupting the innocence of young children. To quote from the article linked:

'I've got a rare kidney disease,' I told her. 'I have to go to the bathroom a lot. You can come with me if you want, but it takes a while. Is that okay with you? Do you want a note from my doctor?'

Is this why you were touching your penis in the cinema, Jon? And letting the other boys touch it too?

We should also point out that Jon Katz refers to himself as 'Slashdot's resident Gasbag.' Is there any more doubt? For those fortunate few who aren't aware of the list of homosexual terminology found inside the Linux 'Sauce Code,' a 'Gasbag' is a pervert who gains sexual gratification from having a thin straw inserted into his urethra (or to use the common parlance, 'piss-pipe'), then his homosexual lover blows firmly down the straw to inflate his scrotum. This is, of course, when he's not busy violating the dignity and co

Re:I found some

[milkmage]

and rubber gloves.. who's got the gloves?

Re:I found some

[Anonymous Coward]

Not rubber gloves, velcro gloves. Now who brought the sheep?

Re:I found some

[said213]

This is the single greatest post I've ever seen on /.

Accessible data?

[Palmsie]

Open to the world? So all us nerds can search and sift through it with you using, for once, not only our bandwidth to help you Mr. Seti, but also our minds.

Re:Accessible data?

[belthize]

Data from all NSF funded instruments are in the public domain after a 'suitable' period for the primary investigator who proposed the actual science with the instrument has had crack at it.

For the telescopes this tends to be 1 year from observing, after that the data is available to all. It sounds like the data from this project will wave that 1 year period and be available for SETI@home as soon as it's done.

Re:Accessible data?

[belthize]

Bah

Here's a comma or two, ',,,' to insert as you see fit, s/has had/to have a.

Re:Accessible data?

[newcastlejon]

Apart from using wave instead of waive your post was fine; don't worry about commas. You might want to rephrase that first sentence though.

Re:Accessible data?

[maxwell demon]

Bah

Here's a comma or two, ',,,' to insert as you see fit, s/has had/to have a.

Here's a slash to finish your replacement command: /

Re:Accessible data?

[ASiemion]

Yes, these data will be publicly available soon. However, providing full random access to ~50TB is challenging for an academic project. If you have s3 or equiv to donate, or HDs you would like to fedex, please contact SETI@home. :)

Re:Accessible data?

[maxwell demon]

About your sig:

Carl Sagan quotes get you an automatic +5 on all posts.

Well, let's try:
"and" -- Carl Sagan, in about any of his works. :-)

Alien sitcoms!

[Dutchmaan]

Just be sure we're up on the latest copyright laws from alien worlds. We wouldn't want to get some giant metallic radiation sphere orbiting our planet as a cease and desist order!

Ohhh, their planet rotates once every 24 hrs too?

[AlienIntelligence]

I guess they are using a 24hr "block" of radio telescope time...
but it was just funny reading it. Like they are going to study
them for 24hrs for signs of intelligent life. As if it was their
"day length period". lol

Wow, I hope no one ever scans our planet "in the morning"
radio talk shows. Not good for first contact, haha.

-AI

Oooh, my nick is relevant again...

too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[rubycodez]

we need to take spectroscopic measurements of earth-sized and super-earth-sized planets to detect evidence of life's biochemistry. But our short-sited congress cancelled the Terrestrial Planet Finder. The most monumental scientific discovery of mankind would be life elsewhere, it will need a little investment which is so very minuscule compared to the money we waste on enriching mega-corporations, imperialism and warmongering.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Insanity Defense]

Short sighted? Or did they think ahead and realize that finding life bearing worlds hurts their religious voters?

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

No, perhaps they just thought it is better to sort out poverty and a broken health system before blowing cash on really completely useless projects.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

Where do people get the idea that finding life bearing worlds would somehow be against Christian doctrine? I've been to a number of pretty conservative churches and never once heard this view, C.S. Lewis was writing novels about aliens 50 years ago, and I know the Catholics have specifically stated it's not a problem for them. So why do people always assume it's an issue?

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

The real reason they canceled the program: they spotted life approaching our solar system, and they don't want the public to panic.

Apparently there's fairly conclusive evidence that we'll make first contact with the ship on Dec 21, 2012. My theory: it's the Mayans returning to reclaim the planet.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yeah, because THAT'S where the money is going, not in to the pockets of the people who voted the project down and those who bribe--er, LOBBY (sorry, I get the two mixed up sometimes) them.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

But our short-sited congress cancelled the Terrestrial Planet Finder.

I don't see where the project was cancelled. It has not been funded and was deferred. It looks to me like they are putting their money to use in similar areas of research anyway: http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110427/full/472402a.html

...which is so very minuscule compared to the money we waste on enriching mega-corporations, imperialism and warmongering.

Or was this just a chance to rant about some other bullshit that has nothing to do with the topic at hand?

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yeah, because THAT'S where the money is going, not in to the pockets of the people who voted the project down and those who bribe--er, LOBBY (sorry, I get the two mixed up sometimes) them.

Understandable. I often get six and half-dozen mixed up, too.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[domatic]

Because many of these people basically believe that Man is God's Special Project. Religion of that stripe has always disliked any aspect of science that suggests the Universe doesn't revolve around Man...often literally.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

The real reason they canceled the program: they spotted life approaching our solar system, and they don't want the public to panic.

Apparently there's fairly conclusive evidence that we'll make first contact with the ship on Dec 21, 2012. My theory: it's the Mayans returning to reclaim the planet.

Please don't troll like that! I'm a recovering alcoholic!

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[rubycodez]

Funding has been deferred since January 30, 2007. Look at your calendar

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[witherstaff]

The are short sighted, aliens would allow them to dump money into the military like nothing else.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

How? I swear this is some strange dream on the part of Atheists.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[tnk1]

Let's be clear here. You could probably feed and clothe the entire world for less than the U.S. defense budget. Poverty and medical care doesn't need more money thrown at it, the real facts are in the logistics and whether you are allowed to spend your money on those things. Just think about it, what would be the response of a country like North Korea if we just said, "hey, we'll feed your people for you, just let us set up a working infrastructure to distribute food fairly and run it." Good luck with that.

The point is, you can always throw money at problems like hunger and health care. In the end, you can't just subordinate everything to those tasks because the power structures that make it impossible to feed everyone right now will just expand to suck up that money as well, with little to show for the extra money. At some point you have to say: "We are going to spend money on something other than the immediate essentials so we can progress, instead of just spinning the wheels on the stationary bike faster."

There is zero doubt that there are things useful to humanity in space. Huge amounts of resources, more living space, scientific discoveries, and the possibility of meeting other civilizations. Yes, it's hugely expensive right now, since we have almost zero infrastructure, but we have the resources to do it right now. We should be using them while we can.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Bytesahoy]

I don't think that the majority of politicians have the mental capacity for that. Although, it does sound like something they'd do, trying their hardest to stay elected and what.

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, so that would be when the Democrats took control of the House and Senate. I guess we now know who the anti-science politicians are...

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[elrous0]

That's on a Wednesday. I have to work. Could they wait until after 5?

Re:too bad they cancelled TPF-1

[Maritz]

How are they getting on with the whole sorting out poverty thing..? Just wondering. I imagine if you said something to a senator/whatever along those lines off the record they would laugh hysterically at you.

What exactly..

[slackzilly]

..are the signs of alien life they will listen for?

Re:What exactly..

[linuxguru]

sort of like 'I Love Lucy' but in shrieking, alien speak.

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

..are the signs of alien life they will listen for?

A massive radio telescope that listens for signs of alien life is being used for this project.

Re:What exactly..

[jcampbelly]

Over the planet's transit over the face of the star, from our angle, the light interacts with the atmosphere of the planet before passing through to be seen by our telescopes. The light is broken down into component frequencies to determine the chemicals present and their relative concentrations in the atmosphere. Some chemical signatures can be understood as the the result of natural processes, while others do not seem to occur without the influence of biological processes. We are looking for 'unnatural atmospheres' modified by exotic processes that cannot be readily explained under natural conditions.

Re:What exactly..

[vlm]

Over the planet's transit over the face of the star, from our angle, the light interacts with the atmosphere of the planet before passing through to be seen by our telescopes. The light is broken down into component frequencies to determine the chemicals present and their relative concentrations in the atmosphere. Some chemical signatures can be understood as the the result of natural processes, while others do not seem to occur without the influence of biological processes. We are looking for 'unnatural atmospheres' modified by exotic processes that cannot be readily explained under natural conditions.

So the TLDR version is we're watching for a sudden methane (etc) signature for an instant as the planet transits its star? Why watch for 24 hours, then, assuming the orbit has been well characterized?

Re:What exactly..

[slackzilly]

OMG an informative answer on slashdot :-o

Hope this gets +5 informative.

Re:What exactly..

[Americano]

I always imagined it'd be more like the Honeymooners, but with the character of Ralph Kramden shouting "To the Earth, Alice! To the Earth!"

Re:What exactly..

[Black Parrot]

Over the planet's transit over the face of the star, from our angle, the light interacts with the atmosphere of the planet before passing through to be seen by our telescopes. The light is broken down into component frequencies to determine the chemicals present and their relative concentrations in the atmosphere. Some chemical signatures can be understood as the the result of natural processes, while others do not seem to occur without the influence of biological processes. We are looking for 'unnatural atmospheres' modified by exotic processes that cannot be readily explained under natural conditions.

Hope they're looking at some seriously red-shifted planets, if they're trying to look at light with a radio telescope.

Re:What exactly..

[jcampbelly]

They're going to take a while to capture the data on each planet, since they can't watch continuously with an earthbound telescope. They may only have a window of a few days to capture a transit on some target planets, so it will take multiple transits to get that much data for all of them (the project will last a year). I believe they get the most valuable data when the planet first passes into the star's disk and then again as it leaves, as this gives some sense of differentiation between different parts of the atmosphere.

Re:What exactly..

[rrohbeck]

So what they're looking for is "alien life according to our preconceived notions"?

Re:What exactly..

[slackzilly]

They have to. They can't look for signs that they don't know about.

Re:What exactly..

[maxwell demon]

So what they're looking for is "alien life according to our preconceived notions"?

We have no idea how to detect other forms of life, therefore it makes more sense to look for life as we know it than to not look at all. If we find something, we know there's (probably) life up there. If we find nothing, we at least know that if there is life on those planets, it's not the type of life we know about.

Re:What exactly..

[jcampbelly]

I must be sleepy -- you are correct and I have now RTFA.

Re:What exactly..

[JoeRobe]

Do you happen to have a reference for this? I have never heard of radio astronomy being used to detect molecular signatures (frequently microwave and mm-wave, but not radio). The molecular signatures during solar transit to which you are referring have typically been studied using optical and infrared telescopes, since the 200-20000 nm range is the region in which vibrational and electronic transitions occur.

I figured they were looking for classic radio-frequency patterns, much like the ones we're constantly emitting from our broadcast stations.

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

Instructions on how to build a machine.

Re:What exactly..

[ASiemion]

..are the signs of alien life they will listen for?

Astronomical radio signals indicative of an engineered origin.. lots of electromagnetic energy in a narrow frequency range or a very narrow time window. The latter is also produced by pulsars, but there's only one known pulsar in/near the Kepler field and, generally speaking, pulsars to not contribute a significant background for such searches because they are so rare - only ~2000 are known.

Re:What exactly..

[l0ungeb0y]

Farts... that's right, farts. We're too far away to detect methane trace elements, but with current advances in super-flatulentelescopy, we can now detect any gas passing that may be happening across vast distances of space.

Re:What exactly..

[Black Parrot]

But there has been talk of doing what you described. Do you know whether we're "there yet" with the necessary technology?

Re:What exactly..

[chill]

Well, if we just focus on "non-random noise", any patterns we find would be a big hint towards life -- as a form we know or not.

We're just looking for "signal". Wow!

Re:What exactly..

[w0mprat]

Pointless. If our own technological civilisation is anything to go by, any radiowaves broadcast into space is a brief aberation, as more sophisticated communication becomes more efficient, lower power and increasingly inward angled.

Unless they are specifically beaming something very powerful in our direction and have been doing it for million years, we just wont see it.

Has anyone done the math on if it's even possible for typical terrestrial radio transmissions to be detectable above background noise accross interstellar distances?

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

"Do you happen to have a reference for this?"

Google is your friend.

"I figured they were looking for classic radio-frequency patterns, much like the ones we're constantly emitting from our broadcast stations."

While you're at it, Google the "inverse-square law".

Re:What exactly..

[maxwell demon]

Farts... that's right, farts. We're too far away to detect methane trace elements, but with current advances in super-flatulentelescopy, we can now detect any gas passing that may be happening across vast distances of space.

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

Re:What exactly..

[JoeRobe]

Google is your friend.

Wow, what a great idea. In fact I did search for it, and found nothing for it in regards to RF atmospheric absorption during solar transits, hence the query for a reference.

As far as the inverse square law goes, while it is applicable for all forms of emission, the noise base on RF telescopes is incredibly low, meaning that we're really good at detecting it, especially with monster dishes. Hence SETI and the whole SETI@home project. The 1/r^2 law also implies that the radio source is emitting isotropically (i.e. like a blackbody), when RF trasmitters are not isotropic. So one might view the planet a bit like an RF lighthouse that is emitting beams, some of which might be kind enough to be pointed toward us. At which point the 1/r^2 law doesn't apply whatsoever. Thanks for the snarky attempt at being clever.

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

Alien Idol. Here's recent episode.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybXrrTX3LuI

Re:What exactly..

[thegarbz]

That second bit is not quite right, and your analogy actually shows that quite perfectly as light emitted from a lighthouse also obeys the inverse square law. The 1/r^2 law gives you the decay over distance, and this is the same whether you have an omnidirectional antenna, a sun spewing light, or a well focused laser. Try it some time with a flashlight and a lightsensor if you have one (I think many smartphones can give you a lux reading these days)

That said the inverse square law does not mean that you wouldn't be able to pick up radio signals from far away. It is just one part of the massive formula which takes into account the gain of the receiver, transmitter, sensitivity of electronics, mismatches in transmission characteristics etc.

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

That said the inverse square law does not mean that you wouldn't be able to pick up radio signals from far away.

If by far away you mean serious interstellar distances, then yes, it does mean we wouldn't be able to detect a signal, because no matter how much gain the antenna has and no matter how sensitive the receiver, any signal from that kinds of distance would be indistinguishable from background noise.

Re:What exactly..

[SETIGuy]

They will be looking primarily for deliberate transmissions. They look for continuous narrow-band signals, intermediate bandwidth pulses on millisecond timescales, broadband pulses on microsecond timescales, and soon (in beta) intermediate bandwidth signals consisting of a noise like signal followed milliseconds to seconds later by an overlapping identical signal.

Most leakage signals are too weak to be detected by the small telescopes we have like Greenbank and Arecibo, but the Arecibo planetary radar and some missile defense radars could be detected at interstellar distances.

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

So when we detect an "unnatural atmosphere" we'll call it life on another planet? Where it'll really just be something that we don't yet understand? Yeah, because calling it life on another planet will keep your project funded for the rest of your career.

Re:What exactly..

[JoeRobe]

What was I thinking, you're totally right, my mistake (I should have known this, I work with lasers every day). It's really the fact that the lighthouse beam occupies a smaller solid angle than the possible full 4(pi) steradian.

I think the largest gain would be from the fact that communication radio signals can occupy an absurdly small frequency window, so even though a 100kW emission might fall off to a very small amount, it's all in a spectral range, so spectral power density is large.

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

Ironincally checking the spectra of known planetary systems could be a better way for SETI to search for Intelligence than trying to intercept radio signals. The first thing I would look for is evidence of non-naturally occurring nuclear material , such as Plutonium 239 & 240 and/or the fission byproducts.

Elements with this high an atomic number can be detected in star spectra , Przybylski's Star is an example showing Uranium, Thorium etc... but no Plutonium.

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

5, Informative ?!

RTFA, it's a RADIO TELESCOPE !

Re:What exactly..

[GameboyRMH]

You're setting a very high and unusual standard for intelligent species by searching for nuclear materials, even assuming that it's possible to mine on their planet, and they have the incentive to do so. Would you even pick up those materials in Earth's atmosphere?

Re:What exactly..

[Anonymous Coward]

Others have done the math, you can google it yourself. Overall, consensus seems to be that:

1) There's no way in hell you'd pick up our radio signals from the nearest star, even if you knew we were here.
2) We're not listening for that sort of signal but for deliberate attempts to make contact with aliens (us).

Re:What exactly..

[jcampbelly]

Kepler is the pioneer for the effort, cataloging good candidates for further study. They have something like 2 more years worth of observations to make before it's done with its primary mission. The reason most of the planets we know about right now are super-jupiters close to their stars (and we're just now discovering super-earths) is because we haven't observed enough transits for the longest orbit candidates. Nearer bodies orbit faster, so we have the data for them early on. More exotic planets will come out of Kepler in the following years.

I thought the Kepler mission had the resolution to capture enough of the detail in the "fuzz" at the edge of the transits, but maybe I'm mixing up theory and a handful of other missions. I do know for a fact that this will be one of James Webb Space Telescope's tasks:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DsdXWwAkBs&feature=relmfu&#t=048m27s

Here is a talk about some of Kepler's latest findings (1/10/2011)
"Catching Shadows: Kepler's Search for New Worlds"

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/the-silicon-valley-astronomy/id213308887

Re:What exactly..

[jcampbelly]

I was actually mixing up two techniques in my knee-jerk reaction to comment after skipping the article, heh. However, Kepler and SETI go together like beer and hot dogs and the groups collaborate (that's what the ATA was supposed to be doing). SETI has been surveying stars in the milky way galaxy all along, but they have had to make speculations about habitability, the presence of worlds, etc. But now they have data as a basis. These are presumably not just stars with planets, but ones with planets in the habitable zone, or planets near the mass of Earth. With JWST they can get spectrographic data which will allow them to be able to isolate rocky worlds, or worlds with interesting atmospheres, narrowing the search further.

You are correct, this project is for doing targeted radio measurements (a broader range of searches than their usual algorithms) on stars with known exoplanets that are good candidates for bearing life.

Re:What exactly..

[jcampbelly]

I don't usually feed trolls (or sock puppets), epsecially not this tired old argument, but I'm feeling saucy.

No, the researchers will declare that they have found an atmosphere on another planet unlike anything we can explain with modern science. They will explain their methods for trying to fit the data to natural conditions and point out where the models don't fit. Then they will posit that life is one possible explanation. Speculations will fly in the scientific community, some credible, some not. The popular science media will decisively pick up on the "we may have found life!" headline, neglect to link to the original paper, and publish the least credible ideas with quotes from dubious scientists not even peripherally involved in the project. Some radio host will learn how federal tax dollars were received by the university funding the research and immediately declare that the government is wasting your money searching for aliens. Then people like you will take your opinion to the internet in legion.

Re:What exactly..

[DarthVain]

So exactly like "King of Queens" then.

Re:What exactly..

[thegarbz]

Such absolutes do not exist. Given sufficient transmitter power, gain and sensitivity, and given sufficient receiver power, gain and sensitivity you can do anything you want. The background noise is simply a noise floor, if you get the signal above the noise you're in business, and gain at both the receiver and the transmitter helps do exactly that. The only question is how much is needed.

Aliens with stealth mode. They already know...

[Anonymous Coward]

If they are intelligent lifeforms then is there any purpose to argue with them of who was first?

Re:Aliens with stealth mode. They already know...

[maxwell demon]

If they are intelligent lifeforms then is there any purpose to argue with them of who was first?

No. The one who has interstellar travel first will win. Any further arguments are unnecessary.

Kinda Odd

[dammy]

I wonder how Green Bank measures up to ATA's technical capabilities. Interesting that one gets switched off just a few months before the other goes live. Kinda have a feeling the US tax payer got short changed yet again.

The Aliens are here

[Anonymous Coward]

I do not know why NASA is searching for Aliens when the Aliens were here in the 80's. Massive sightings appeared in CT, NYS and I for one have seen two different crafts. One was so large people pulled over to the side of the road. It was the size of a football field. And, no intervention by earthlings in the air which puzzles me. Another was a smaller disc craft that hoovered above a lake. I believe it was the baby ship. Television even did a documentary on the appearance of these ships. Where was our airforce? Where was NASA?

Re:The Aliens are here

[rubycodez]

sorry to disappoint you, but sightings of man's air and space craft, radio controlled aircraft, deliberate hoaxes, blimps, weather balloons, etc., and absurd declarations by a couple now senile military men seeking fame (which scores of others at the same place and time have denounced as fantasy) do not constitute proof of alien visitation of earth. I know this will be devastating to the whacked weird view you hold between your ears, and your tinfoil hat wearing cyberspace "friends", but the truth is there has never been any credible evidence whatsoever of alien space craft visiting this globe.

Re:The Aliens are here

[Anonymous Coward]

you, me, and countless people who are interested in this topic know part of the truth i guess, however we have now reached a time where the whole world population has to be made known with this topic too. this has to be done slowly and has to look like an event, that is completely new to our governments or else earths population could get angry at a level previously unknown to the powers that be, while recognizing that we were lied to for about 50 years. i guess at least one of this planets will suddenly send signals, that would be clearly interpreted as extraterrestrial communication. we might see an official statement afterwards and who knows maybe even an official visitation. of course this whole ufo and et topic could be an intel-operation to hide secret projects done by the so called industrial military complex

Re:The Aliens are here

[Hognoxious]

Another was a smaller disc craft that hoovered above a lake.

Your mothership is so large...

Re:The Aliens are here

[elrous0]

It wasn't the size of a football field. It was the size of a small car. It was just a lot closer than you realized.

We're doomed!!!!

[lennier1]

They'll intercept transmissions of our reality TV shows, decide that something like that can't be allowed to pollute the universe and then proceed to nuke the whole planet from orbit.

Re:We're doomed!!!!

[dkleinsc]

Or even worse, they'll be tuning in and somebody will spill beer on the broadcasting equipment.

Re:We're doomed!!!!

[thegarbz]

Nah they'll get be sued into oblivion by the MPAA for unlicensed distribution.

Re:We're doomed!!!!

[KingBenny]

which might actually be a blessing for universal life in general , i prefer the way where they just exterminate us with a radical virus and leave the blue planet intact

Re:Ohhh, their planet rotates once every 24 hrs to

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed, if they did listen In The Morning I'm sure they'd have little choice but to come down here and hit us in our collective mouth.

Telescope in West Virginia

[belthize]

Not sure why the author felt it was necessary to repeatedly reference 'a radio telescope in rural West Virginia' without giving an
actual link or reference to the GBT instead of yet another self referential physorg link.

The Green Bank Telescope GBT (http://www.gb.nrao.edu/) is a very impressive instrument just from an engineering stand point.
If you're even in the area it's well worth visiting though it is a bit off the beaten path.

With it's spectrometer (http://www.gb.nrao.edu/gbsapp/) it's also a good instrument for interstellar medium (ISM) biochemistry surveys. That may be a more fruitful area of study unless of course somebody does pick up the Ff99x22dddlw race's version of an Olympic broadcast.

Re:Telescope in West Virginia

[Scott Ransom]

Actually, they aren't using the GBT's spectrometer. They are using an instrument that I helped to develop for pulsar research called GUPPI, which uses FPGAs and GPUs to real-time process 800MHz of radio bandwidth.

However, in this case they are using GUPPI's GPU nodes to record 800MHz of Nyquist-sampled band centered at 1.5GHz. Each sample is 2-bits, and with 2 polarizations, that is how they get 800MB/s (or almost a GB/s as it says in the article).

If you want some basic info about GUPPI, you can find it here:

https://safe.nrao.edu/wiki/bin/view/CICADA/NGNPP

Re:Ohhh, their planet rotates once every 24 hrs to

[vlm]

I guess they are using a 24hr "block" of radio telescope time...
but it was just funny reading it. Like they are going to study
them for 24hrs for signs of intelligent life. As if it was their
"day length period".

I thought the negative elevation angle aspect was even funnier, assuming the targets are distributed in the galactic plane. I'm guessing they will take multiple days to gather 24 hours total of data. Or, maybe we've gone thru the journalism filter, and we're gathering "one days observation" and the journalist though 24 hours sounded "more scientific".

I suppose they could be limiting themselves to stars "that never set" in other word declination > (scope latitude + reasonable beamwidth / sidelobes)

Starting this week?

[PPH]

Damn! Alien sweeps week was last week. Nothing on but reruns now.

I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[BlueCoder]

No alien life would intentionally broadcast it's planets location. They and we will send unmanned probes to interesting places for research. And then we would find a way to leverage the nature of the natural phenomenon to embed a signal. It's not inconceivable that someday we might be able to modulate a sun to transmit a signal on it's light. The place to look for signals is where you would be interested in looking anyway.

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[PPH]

No alien life would intentionally broadcast it's planets location.

No iPhones there?

Yet.

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[peragrin]

you do realize there is a 30 light year sphere around earth of radio signals which point right back at us.

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[Henriok]

30 years? I do believe that radio communications are older than 30 years. Try about 100 years.

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[peragrin]

It took until the 1930's for radio transmissions of decent power. More modern transmissions are digital and more directed. Our radio shell will be actually getting smaller.

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[PwnzerDragoon]

Yes, I can't imagine any race ever trying to send a message to another solar system.

Oh, wait...

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[rubycodez]

We still have many one to three megawatt HF transmitters which are not going away any time soon

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[rubycodez]

The format and construction Arecibo message were incredibly stupid. All involved should have been smacked in the side of the head. Seriously, many slashdotters could have contructed a better message to properly convey the intended information and with less bits!

1, It was directed at an area of space with stars 25,000 light years away, instead of at closer collection within light-decades
2. There will not even be any stars at M13 when the signal arrives, the stars will have moved away
3. The binary numbers in the message are inconsistent, one representation at the beginning with fifth and higher bits in adjacent column (not used in rest of message!),, and there is a "always-on" extraneous bit added to the initial numbers, waste of bandwidth. (was this message designed by two committees that didn't talk to each other)
4. It gives the wrong number of base pairs in the human genome
5. The orientation of binary numbers for human parameters and radio telescope antenna is orthogonal to the standard set up in prior portions of the message, bit positions horizontal rather than vertical (did a third committee get involved)

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[PwnzerDragoon]

True enough. Those stars aren't even going to be there anymore in 25,000 years. It was more of a hardware test/publicity stunt than any real attempt to send an actual message. But the fact remains we're still broadcasting stuff into space that can be used to locate us, whether by radio leakage, badly conceived directed messages (better hope anyone in that direction is paying attention in the three minutes we spent sending it), or by physical probes with literal maps to our planet bolted onto the side. Unlikely as it is for anyone else to run into this stuff, we're doing it, and there's no reason to believe aliens wouldn't do the same at some point.

Re:I seem to repeat myself on this subject

[Daetrin]

And referenced in a /. story today, i guess this never happened either?

We may not be doing a great job at actually communicating effectively, but we're doing about the exact opposite of trying to obfuscate our location.

Planet Horton

[retroworks]

Hopefully, we hear "We are here, we are here we are HERE."

Not "Boil that dust-speck, boil that dust-speck, BOIL!"

they fund the SGC useing this.

[Joe The Dragon]

they fund the SGC useing this.

News from Seti@Home

[ah42]

From the relevant thread over at Seti@Home:

"Grad student Andrew Siemion reports that new modifications to a data recorder at Green Bank that we need for our Kepler SETI observations are now complete, thanks to a huge amount of help from Paul Demorest, a former grad student and one of initial authors of AstroPulse. Our first hour of test time is scheduled for this Saturday, 17:30 EDT. We'll be observing with 450 seconds per target on 90 Kepler field stars with interesting planet candidates (~habitable zone, ~Earth size, ~Earth period, ~several planets), then do a raster scan of the entire Kepler field. " - Eric Korpela

Re:Ohhh, their planet rotates once every 24 hrs to

[ASiemion]

These data must be collected over multiple observation sessions, the Green Bank Telescope schedule is available at https://dss.gb.nrao.edu/schedule/public. Next observations are in about 15 hours - May 16 05:15 PT

First Alien Sighting Post

[Barbara, not Barbie]

Occam's Razor - it's the simplest explanation that fits the observable facts.

I thought Vlad was the resident Gasbag...

[Anonymous Coward]

"secondary rim" and "cord in my arse" are fucking brilliant.

global crop circles database

[M. Baranczak]

Lame! That site hasn't been updated since 2008. Either that, or that's when the aliens stopped making crop circles.

Re:global crop circles database

[Anonymous Coward]

So what does that mean?

Checkmate.

What do we expect...

[Anonymous Coward]

We listen for a signal we assume they will be sending with no knowledge of how they might actually send signals to us. good plan! there might be tons of messages being sent that we aren't capable of listening to. I guess that means there is nothing out there.

lol

[Charliemopps]

The utter silliness of the idea that "Life" must exist on "earthlike" planets shows the short-sightedness of the SETI project. They continue to look for life that is similar to our own, at approximately the same technology level. How long will it be before we abandon radio transmission as our primary means of communication? 50 years? 100 years? Even if we still are using radio waves for an extremely long time, the power of our transmissions are decreasing over time as our equipment gets more and more sensitive. On top of all that, we're assuming that life needs to be in this habitable zone in which liquid water can exist. Which, on its face, is utterly silly. I'd only be slightly surprised if we found life inside the corona of a star. Everything outside of that is completely believable... even probable. Life on Jupiter? Saturn? Even Pluto? Totally plausible. Interstellar space isn't even that far fetched. It wouldn't look or act anything like us, but that's not really the point is it?

Re:lol

[FailedTheTuringTest]

Neil deGrasse Tyson makes some interesting points in relation to this: (1) The five most common elements in the solar system are hydrogen, helium, oxygen, carbon, and nitrogen. (2) Of all the elements, the one that makes the most compounds is carbon -- there are more compounds containing carbon than all other compounds of all of the other elements combined. (3) Life on Earth is made mostly of H, O, C, N, plus some trace elements, and is based on C. ("Organic chemistry" means the chemistry of carbon compounds.)

In other words, we are made out of the most common available materials (discounting helium which doesn't react with anything so doesn't produce interesting chemistry), including the element that produces the most complex and varied chemistry. So if you are looking for complex chemistry (i.e. life) elsewhere in the galaxy, it actually does seem to be a reasonable starting point to expect that it is fairly likely to also be based on the most common elements available, and on the element that produces the most complex and diverse chemistry.

Re:lol

[aXis100]

OK smartypants, how are you going to detect technology that doesnt exist yet? How will you categorise signiatures from biochemical processes that we have never seen or studied?

We either have to use our own experience as a reference point or not look at all. I vote we look and hope we get lucky.

Re:lol

[jcampbelly]

If you are more than idly interested in learning about SETI, they have a youtube channel here: http://youtube.com/user/setiinstitute/

They aren't looking for wasteful noise from neo-technological civilizations (but we'll take any unnatural signal we can get!). As you've pointed out, that might occur for a very limited period of time before their physicists move on to better communication technologies. But don't make the assumption that these people are "short sighted," (SETI is 50 years old) or aren't criticizing their own techniques, or actively exploring new ideas. They're looking for broadcast devices, robotic beacons, communications nodes, cross-talk between interstellar routers, gigantic mechanical artifacts, etc. The holy grail would be an alien satellite designed specifically to attract the attention of developing civilizations, like the one in Contact.

There are really good reasons to look in the radio spectrum. The radio range has a noted trough of low noise in 1-10GHz, which is an excellent candidate for communications, if not outright shining a beacon out to the farthest distances. It also penetrates mollecular clouds (and our atmosphere, for that matter) easier than optical and higher frequency light, which scatters easily, and doesn't take nearly as much energy to generate as X-ray and Gamma ray radiation. You will need an EE to further explain.

We may not be prepared to guess at alien biology or sociology, but we do get to project what we know about physics. "They" refers to technologically advanced civilizations.

- Some civillizations may be well beyond anything we can fathom (interdimensional beings, control over gravity, faster-than-light communication). But if they do exist (and that's a big leap), there's very little chance that they are the only other civilizations in the universe. If we make the assumption that "life is out there." We can expect there to be a tremendous variety of life forms and civilizations and some may be within our detection capabilities.

- They all most likely use electromagnetic radiation for communication, since it's the de-facto fastest way to move information through space. Cite wormholes or entanglement if you like, I'm not ignoring the possibility. The algorithms SETI uses pick out general anomalies in known radiation patterns. Even technologies we can't possibly understand have a good chance of emitting some kind of interesting radiation as a side effect.

- They will probably choose communications techniques that are easy to detect against most background sources and will certainly need to be very robust to get through the interstellar medium (charged particles) in the case of an interstellar signal. We might even make assumptions about the kinds of engineering practices another advanced civilization would employ: redundancy, longevity, efficiency. These can help constrain the behaviors we look for.

- If they have at least one outpost beyond their homeworld/star (even a satellite in their own solar system), they will be using directed communication. That means their directed beam is slowly sweeping out a wobbling, circular path across their sky. If we're lucky, and that direction is in line with our star, we might pick up a hint of their artificial signals.

- As the poster above mentions, we are made of some very common materials in the universe and in similar proportions (obviously profoundly more dense on average). That leads to a sound assumption about how life might be elsewhere. At the very least, this is our only /example/ and it's a good practice to focus on planets whose properties are not stupendously hostile to our form of biochemistry.

Wrong channel

[Anonymous Coward]

SETA nearly abandoned the search for intelligent life until some one pointed out they had accidentally tuned into Fox News.

Haven't They Heard

[Anonymous Coward]

Bin Laden was found in Pakistan...

they might listen

[kampangptlk]

they might be listening, but they will not respond until we successfully launch our first warp capable spaceship.

IF they looked at us?

[minus273deg]

How far away are these planets I wonder? What would they see (assuming there's life there) if they did a similar experiment and pointed a radio telescope at us - based on previous comments if they are more that 100 light years away (I assume they are) they would get nothing!

Mr. Politically Correct Opineth:

[theNAM666]

Earth-like planets? Carbonists! Discrimination! Unfair!

Way to pick the wrong submission....

[SETIGuy]

I, of course, submitted a direct link to the Berkeley press release but apparently the Slashdot editors decided the one that was most wrong was the one to pick. First, SETI isn't a project, it's a field of study conducted by a lot of institutions. Nobody would talk about "the Physics Project started 2100 years ago by Pythagoras" when describing a particle accelerator.

This project in particular, is conducted by the Berkeley SETI group which is known for their SETI@home project, Astropulse search for radio pulses and their the SERENDIP project The exciting parts are 1) This targets earthlike planets. 2) It uses the Green Bank Telescope, which is the biggest steerable dish around and 3) they are recording time domain data at 3.2 Gbps (because the observations are short duration) rather than the 64 Mbps they get at Arecibo. That allows them to cover 800MHz of instantaneous bandwidth, rather than the 2.5MHz they get at Arecibo (albeit at much higher sensitivity)

I understand the desire to link this to the ATA shutdown, but that give the mistaken impression that this is a project of the SETI Institute. And they didn't even put a link to SETI@home (where the data will be processed) in the story.

Re:Way to pick the wrong submission....

[SETIGuy]

Oops, that should be 6.2Gbps.

x86 is dead

[ericdujardin]

They should have gone ARM, really. Non-counting the legal battle they face with Intel for usage of the "86" trademark.

nice temperature

[Anonymous Coward]

100 degrees Celsius sure is nice and inviting. "We've picked out the planets with nice temperatures -- between zero and 100 degrees Celsius -- because they are a lot more likely to harbor life," said physicist Dan Werthimer.

Just 24 hours?

[gravis777]

Maybe I am not fully understanding how SETI works, even though I use the home client, but this has always really caught me as strange. Lets say an alien world is actually broadcasting. Not only would they have to be broadcasting at the exact time we are looking for them (or rather, how ever many lightyears ago relevant to the star's distance), but the planet would have to be in view of the earth at the time, their transmisions would have to be able to penetrate both their atmosphere and ours, and they would have to be broadcasting in our direction. Seems to me that 24 hour observation of 80 some-odd planets at once is not going to yield enough data for us to make any kind of reasonable observation.

Re:Just 24 hours?

[marcosdumay]

Two less contrainsts for you to care about...

"their transmisions would have to be able to penetrate both their atmosphere and ours"

As radio does, even if their athmosphere is quite thick.

"and they would have to be broadcasting in our direction"

"Broadcasting" means they are sending signals to a quite wide solid angle, probably the entire sphere. If it was any other situation, it wouldn't be called "broadcasting". Of course, they must have a hellish strong signal for we to detect their broadcast, but direction is not the problem, and they may not be broadcasting, but I guess that constrain is already implicit.

Re:Just 24 hours?

[gravis777]

Wouldn't this depend on the frequency? Also, pretty sure microwave is line-of-sight. So this limits us to one type of broadcast in a fairly narrow frequency range, right?

Re:Just 24 hours?

[marcosdumay]

Yes, that is dependent of frequency. Most planets' atmospheres are transparent to radio (that means, microwaves or longer waves), but not to IR. Microwave is line-of-sight, but on those distances you don't really care about refraction, everything is line-of-sight. It is still a broad frequency band, and any kind of broadcast. And all that SETI is looking for is inside that band.

Really?...

[adumonit]

Zoom down to the floor. An ant amongst countless others before, pauses, points its feelers at you, excretes a few bursts of pheromones, trying to make contact... with you...

....you've just committed your code to SVN, get up 4 more coffee. Go back to yr workstation...somewhere under your feet is something that "tried to make contact"

Using the technology you invented, in a small box called science which you came up with to organise your thoughts, logic and interpretations of the world to attempt to search for other beings with their own interpretations and orders and reasoning and perhaps non-carbon based.

Its futile.

Feed the starving millions in the world instead.

Re:Really?...

[turing_m]

Feed the starving millions in the world instead.

Throughout human history there have been hungry and starving people. As long as breeding abundantly in times of feast works out good for some segment of the population, they will continue to do it. I don't see how dumping more sugar in the petri dish is going to solve anything.

OTOH, we probably have the technology to actually make a difference in whether humanity gets wiped out or not either by our own stupidity or some other extinction event. If humanity gets wiped out, the starving millions get wiped out too.

Re:Really?...

[SETIGuy]

Feed the starving millions in the world instead.

Are a gamer? To you go to see movies? Well stop wasting resources entertaining yourself and feed the starving millions instead.

Great

[Anonymous Coward]

So, we point our receivers at these planets, and if they are broadcasting the extraterrestrial equivalent of The Jersey Shore, we conclude that there is no intelligent life there? In a potentially hostile environment, the truly intelligent life forms should have enough sense to STFU.

Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[dsanfte]

Is this telescope even capable of detecting Earth-type leaky RF signals at such a great distance?

And if it's not, isn't this like cupping your ear and hoping to hear conversations in China?

Re:Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[SETIGuy]

No. We're looking for deliberate transmissions, not leakage. Any planet even a couple decades beyond us in technology could know we're here and might be beaming a signal in our direction.

Re:Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[dsanfte]

The likelihood of someone beaming a terawatt transmission purposefully in our direction, for years at a time, is effectively nil. If this is what SETI is hoping for, it's a complete waste of everyone's time.

Re:Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[SETIGuy]

You'll never know if you don't look. And "a waste of everbody's time"? How is this wasting your time? Are you spending time on slashdot that you wouldn't otherwise be spending?

Re:Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[SETIGuy]

Besides, if it's beamed, it wouldn't need to be a terrawatt. If you didn't know that, your opinions on the subject are probably not worth considering.

Re:Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[dsanfte]

The public at large has a goodwill, founded in the hope of the project's success. That goodwill results in donations to the project and passive political support for the SETI goal. This goodwill is being squandered on a project with (pardon the pun) astronomical odds of success, even by astronomical standards.

You are turning the public into cynics by doing 'something' just to say you're doing 'something', even if the both of us know and understand that there is no chance a SETI telescope can receive earth-type signals, and a next-to-zero chance an alien society will be spending time and energy beaming a signal directly at us.

And while my terawatt hyperbole is just that, I'm sure it's not terribly far off.

Re:Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[RockDoctor]

Any planet even a couple decades beyond us in technology

"Any planet" within approximately 80 light years of us ... which is a relatively small number.

Re:Can't find anyone asking the obvious question

[SETIGuy]

there is no chance a SETI telescope can receive earth-type signals

We're not looking for earth-type civilizations.

a next-to-zero chance an alien society will be spending time and energy beaming a signal directly at us.

A civilization in our galaxy a century or two more advanced than our own would know that this star has a planet with an oxygen nitrogen water vapor atmosphere, both oceans and solid surface and complex photosynthetic life. If you're going to be transmitting beacons, we'd be a very good target.

And while my terawatt hyperbole is just that, I'm sure it's not terribly far off.

What's six or seven orders of magnitude between friends. The Arecibo Planetary Radar transmitter (the brightest transmitter on the planet) is 425 kW. Yes, kW, and we could detect that across the galaxy because it has an effective isotropic radiated power (EIRP) of 10 TW. An SKA transmitter could do better on less power.

Whoosh!

[sgtrock]

:-)

These astronomers are bad at math

[Anonymous Coward]

Go figure that, you think they would be decently good at it.

Psssst hey dummies doing this stupid project. Look at the age of the solar system. Then look at how long we've been on this planet.

Compare the two.

Very slim chances

[cavebison]

The thing I never hear spoken about (perhaps because it might be a depressing thought for SETI fans) is that, while it's not beyond imagining that other intelligent species can develop out there, the chances of us detecting them are staggering low, for lots of reasons that easily come to mind.

Taking Earth as an example. 4.5byr old, life only really taking off at the Cambrian, 540myr ago, when Earth is already half way to the grave (Sun will expire in 5byr). So given any "Goldilocks" planet around a sun like ours, only half it's life at most will be spent with any life on it.

Then there's climate events, like ice ages, which could be anything from 20-100kyrs apart but devastating to any established and densely populated technological civilisation.

Any intelligent species which survives its own immaturity would come to the conclusion that long-term survival and growth depends on becoming independent of the natural world, as "unnatural" as that sounds. A population will initially stabilise due to limits on life span and food production (ours will in 2100 at about 10bn people), but as technology develops and those natural limiting factors are "solved", population will inevitably increase again.

A civilisation with abundant food (obviously farming has been replaced by advanced GM or other methods), limitless energy (eg. fusion but probably a mixture of great things) and long life, faces a stark choice: Don't breed much anymore, or find new places to live.

Apart from being rather dismal, the former choice is not viable in the long term. The future on a single planet holds only an inevitable cycle of natural catastrophes, be it a meteor or climate change, undoing what they have achieved. Its own survival, political and social problems solved, the mature and stable civilisation will naturally look upwards, to the planets.

Now a civilisation during this period would be detectable. They'd have been transmitting radio in the past, as we do now. Once embarking on the colonisation of other planets, they'd be even more mindful of the possibility of other successful species like them and continuing to search and transmit.

But this period of time, where they are still "speaking our language" is very limited. A few thousand years at most. Because during that time, a species will change, inside and out. Having solved major problems, socially and technologically, working together and populating planets, they will see themselves no longer as "a species of a planet", bound and subject. They have become "citizens of space", self-determining and outward-looking, no longer identified with arbitrary limitations. I daresay such a civilisation would have different philosophies and priorities to us. Why would such a species want to find others who are, like us, still bound to their world, struggling, infighting, limited and immature?

Of course they want to find other life out there but, having the perspective of a strong, space-faring species, they would obviously prefer to contact others like them, or even more advanced, so they can learn new things. Confident, looking ever forward, their main question would not be a meek yet arrogant, "are we the only ones?" No, it would instead be a challenge to the universe and to themselves: "How do we contact those others who travel the stars? How do we achieve the next step for our species?" Those questions do not involve us.

All their prowess would be focussed on determining what kinds of communications and transport other advanced, multi-planetary species would be using. They would not be thinking "radio" anymore. They would be bent on discovering the deeper secrets of interstellar travel and communication. Indeed it would be an obsession because here they are, playing on the shore of an unlimited ocean. They must find a way to set sail, otherwise for all their great achievements, they

Totally irrelevant rant

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh goody. Maybe we'll make contact just in time to find out the earth is being demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass. Got to build bypasses.