SETI Finds Funds For the Allen Telescope Array (For Now)

Ransak writes "It looks as if SETI has met its short term funding goal to restart the Allen Telescope Array. Is crowdsourcing the long term future of pure research projects?"

Comments

Good to hear

[Lanteran]

At least there's still a significant number of people interested in space.

Re:Good to hear

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought that was the POINT of privatizing it.

Re:Good to hear

[BJ_Covert_Action]

And yet, somehow, none of our political leaders are. Aren't out Congressional representatives supposed to, you know, represent us in some form or another?

Re:Good to hear

[Arlet]

Are none of them interested in space, or just a minority ? In the latter case, it may be a correct reflection of the general population.

Re:Good to hear

[hairyfeet]

Uhhh...we're broke, it case you haven't heard. We have THREE wars going on now, an infrastructure falling apart, and at every turn you got the teabaggers, many of whom signed a "Never raise taxes, I don't give a fuck WHAT happens" pledge cockblocking at every turn.

I mean sure it'd be nice if we could afford science, hell I'd like to cut the military budget a good 40%, bring our boys home, kill the F35, and use that money to fund R&D to bring us back on top INCLUDING space tech, but that ain't gonna happen as long as we got teabaggers flinging shit everywhere like rabid monkeys and going "Give teh rich more MONIES LOL!"

ya know, never has a name been more apropos than that.......teabaggers. Because they sure as hell remind me of those little 14 year old Halo shitheads. But to fund space (and bridges, and SS/Medicare/Medicaid) you actually need this thing called ...oh what is it? Oh yeah money which the teabaggers would happily see the country go third world before ever making a rich man pay a dime. Remember the one who is bringing them the pledges to sign is none other than Grover Norquist, Mr "I want to drown government in the bathtub" himself. you think we can afford anything but bombs as long as THESE bozos are around? As if!

Re:Good to hear

[bejiitas_wrath]

I doubt that they will stop the wars whilst people like Obama and others are in the White House and in charge of the nation with their own agendas that do not benefit the majority. Most people care more about Lady Gaga than space exploration.

Re:Good to hear

[Anonymous Coward]

"Aren't out Congressional representatives supposed to, you know, represent us in some form or another?"

Almost. They represent the lobbyists who then give them the money to buy our votes.

Re:Good to hear

[Elbereth]

Interested in space? This is communicating with space aliens, which is science fiction. It's slightly better than the army spending billions of dollars on remote viewing and other psychic nonsense, but it's still so far removed from science that I shudder to think of all the people wasting their talent on this. It's harmless, it's keeps idealistic dreamers busy, and there's the ever so slight chance that something interesting will turn up, so I'd say that it's probably not worth raising a stink over it. On the other hand, I'm glad that Obama is more concerned with practicality than idealism, because I find the idealism necessary to support SETI naive.

Maybe it's true what they say about how you become more conservative with age, because it becomes harder and harder for me to retain the idealistic beliefs that I had 20 years ago, when I was an ardent socialist. These days, I usually just hope for gridlock, so that nothing gets done and nobody fucks up the system any worse than it already is. I'm still probably more of a social democrat than anything else, these days, but it's difficult to even work up the enthusiasm and idealism for that watered-down philosophy. Oh well. Such is life for that most melodramatic of people, the disillusioned existentialist.

Re:Good to hear

[IrquiM]

That is not how the democracy in US works. There, you vote for the rich guy with the most agreeable politics.

Re:Good to hear

[IrquiM]

Interested in space? This is communicating with space aliens, which is science fiction. It's slightly better than the army spending billions of dollars on remote viewing and other psychic nonsense, but it's still so far removed from science that I shudder to think of all the people wasting their talent on this.

It is still science though - however useless it is, not science fiction.

Re:Good to hear

[Rockoon]

It is still science though - however useless it is, not science fiction.

I wonder.. has SETI found anything at all that is the least bit scientifically interesting?

You would think that it would be the Search for Extra Terrestrial Unexpecteds, instead of Intelligence.

This:
Noise, Noise, Quasar, Noise, M-Class Star, Noise, Unknown, Noise, ...

Instead of:
Not Intelligent, Not Intelligent, Not Intelligent, Not Intelligent, Not Intelligent, Not Intelligent, ...

If you are going to analyze the data, then why on earth would you not try to classify and database as much as possible? Seems like a big waste of resources.

Re:Good to hear

[taxman_10m]

I think seti@home does do that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astropulse

Re:Good to hear

[WrongSizeGlass]

It is still science though - however useless it is, not science fiction.

I wonder.. has SETI found anything at all that is the least bit scientifically interesting?

You would think that it would be the Search for Extra Terrestrial Unexpecteds, instead of Intelligence.

They haven't found anything yet, and may never find anything at all. That certainly doesn't stop government agencies from spending millions and millions listening in on an undisclosed (yet presumably large) number of phone calls hoping to hear something besides Not Intelligent noise.

Sometimes the possibility of finding something is the only motivation (or justification) for searching for something. Hoping to stumble across it is not good research.

Re:Good to hear

[Anonymous Coward]

"That is not how the democracy in US works. There, you vote for the rich guy that tells you what you want to hear."

FTFY Sorry, but the politics, as in the actual maneuvering, portion is largely ignored. The facade, the illusion of benevolent leadership is what is most people vote on.

Re:Good to hear

[grumling]

Name recognition and seniority are why most (over 90%) are elected in Congress.

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

Re:Good to hear

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

I think the SETI people are more interested in spacing-out.

Re:Good to hear

[Anonymous Coward]

Or maybe space is dead because fundamentally, it IS dead? What's so appealing about an immense, deadly radiation-blasted vacuum? We can't even get our shit together on a planet that has EVERYTHING!

Re:Good to hear

[Dachannien]

Let's see... Whose opinion should I trust about the scientific validity and importance of SETI: some random guy on the internet, or Carl Sagan?

Re:Good to hear

[Lord Kano]

On the other hand, I'm glad that Obama is more concerned with practicality than idealism, because I find the idealism necessary to support SETI naive.

WHAT???? Idealism was the center of his campaign and he hasn't come up with one practical solution since he got into office. And no, blaming Bush doesn't count as a solution.

LK

Re:Good to hear

[jo42]

Lady Gaga

A.K.A. less attractive, less talented, Madonna 2.

Re:Good to hear

[hairyfeet]

Actually she is also a less talented less attractive Bette Midler, as Gaga even went so far as to rip off Midler's old "Mermaid in a wheelchair' bit. Gaga kinda reminds me of old Carlos Menstealia in that all she does is rip off other artists and does their bits for people that haven't heard the original, kinda like how Dennis Leary's first few years were nothing but "Bill Hicks greatest hits" right down to the Jim Fixx joke and of course Menstealia who rips off everybody..

Meh, maybe this is just what we have come to, where you don't even do a parody or homage, you just do references, like how the (insert scary/epic/disaster) movies simply point out something from another movie and that's supposed to be funny, Gaga just does other people's bits and that is supposed to be "talent".

Re:Good to hear

[IrquiM]

Doing science is testing out "ideas" (theories are the wrong word when talking about science) - since they've not yet scanned the entire sky, they're still testing out the idea that there might be intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, producing electromagnetic waves the Allen Telescope Array would be able to pick up.

Money

[identity0]

>Is crowdsourcing the long term future of pure research projects?"

It is in the US if the current budget news is any indication....

Re:Money

[DNS-and-BIND]

Nice shitty little ad hominem attack there. SETI was defunded by the US government a long time ago because they're a bunch of slackjaws who couldn't write a decent grant proposal. Their amateur hour effort got laughed out of Congress.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice shitty little ad hominem attack there. SETI was defunded by the US government a long time ago because they're a bunch of slackjaws who couldn't write a decent grant proposal. Their amateur hour effort got laughed out of Congress.

Protip: if you don't know the meaning of a word, don't use it. You can trick idiots into thinking you're smartar than you really are, but everyone else will know you're a fool.
Ad hominem is when you attack the other person instead of their arguments.

Re:Money

[Elbereth]

Yes, but he has STRONG OPINIONS that NEED TO BE HEARD.

Actually, I've been debating adding him to my ignore list for a good long time, but I think he means well, even if he's a bit of pseudo-intellectual blowhard. Then again, aren't we all? This is Slashdot, after all.

One can either rage at all the trolls, pseudo-intellectuals, and partisans, or one can accept that the internet is actually a very amusing circus, and that each of us play our part to entertain the audience.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, except the quote wasn't referring to SETI at all, but "the future of pure research projects". I work in science (completely different field, though) and from discussions with colleagues I know many are getting nervous about finding funding in the future. This doesn't apply just to the US, and didn't start just now - but obviously it doesn't appear to be getting much better, as GP pointed out.

Re:Money

[colinnwn]

The array construction costs had already been funded, so SETI must not be too bad at grant writing. All they needed was small amounts of operational funding. It was a novel design that allowed easy and cheap upgrades to the array performance, and had the side benefit of allowing concurrent SETI observations to reduce the marginal costs of those observations. It is specifically in their "charter" that hard science projects take observational priority, and SETI observations are secondary. It was retarded and short-sighted that the array was defunded. It demonstrates our society's complete lack of commitment to basic scientific research today; the same kind of research that allowed all the amazing advances of the space age.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmmm... in the last 60 or so years the US has largely lead the way in R&D and pure science research and those that have come close have had their national wealth bolstered by the charities of the US military shouldering some if not most of the load of their national defense. This is to speak nothing of the foreign aid that the US has showered the world with. Maybe having other nations start to put in their fair share isn't too much to ask?
 
The world's population continues to turn to the US in nearly every instance of poverty and disaster but they're also the first to shit on the US when we're up to something they disapprove of. If those of you who don't like US policy and live in foreign lands would be so good as to tell your national leadership that you don't want US monies or defense in your lands please do so as vigorously as you attack the policies of the US. When you can turn the tables and not come to the US for monetary or military aid for 60 or so years then I'd be willing to take such snide remarks with a bit of credence.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, I've been debating adding him to my ignore list for a good long time, but I think he means well, even if he's a bit of pseudo-intellectual blowhard. Then again, aren't we all? This is Slashdot, after all.

No kidding. That should be added to the list of quotes that appear at the bottom.

Re:Money

[Bost]

You call it "Amazing advances of the space age". I call it "Spreading the problems from Earth to the outer space"

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

>Is crowdsourcing the long term future of pure research projects?"

It is in the US if the current budget news is any indication....

Don't worry - its just the only option left for the tin foil hat crowd.

I'm very happy to see this.

[Anonymous Coward]

It certainly indicates that there is a very healthy support on the ground for scientific research endeavours such as this. Could the same thing be said for research projects that are a little dryer? Who can say...

Despite that I am very happy for SETI to have received this funding and I am looking forward to seeing more fresh data coming from this project. Even more so that they did not need to shut down the cryogenic components.

Cue the jokes...

[caspy7]

...about what SETI *hasn't* found

Re:Cue the jokes...

[WrongSizeGlass]

...about what SETI *hasn't* found

Um, ok ... Did you hear the one about SETI finding enough funding to do their research? No, that's OK, no one has. ;-)

obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

...about what SETI *hasn't* found

I for one welcome our new crowd sourced overlords.

Read this as...

[thisisauniqueid]

I read this as "SETI Finds Funds For the Alien Telescope Array"...

Re:Read this as...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah me too, but I'm half asleep and half fucking retarded.

Re:Read this as...

[bluemonq]

That's all right, I read it as that three times, saw your comment, went back to the title, and still couldn't figure what was wrong until right now.

Re:Read this as...

[TheRaven64]

Same here. Little bit of dust was on my screen in just the right place. I was very disappointed when I moved the browser window and it became Allen.

Re:Read this as...

[Anonymous Coward]

I read this as "SETI Finds Funds For the Alien Telescope Array"...

Alien Telescope Army!

Re:Read this as...

[Anonymous Coward]

Still, it is great that the search goes on, even if the space Allens remain elusive.

James Webb

[Anonymous Coward]

SETI is a wast. James Webb is a much better project.
let the fight begin!

Re:James Webb

[djl4570]

Not sure it was a waste but I think the assumptions need to be revisited before throwing more money at it. If ET were broadcasting in the EM spectrum SETI should have detected a signal by now. Either we are looking at the wrong frequencies, or the signals are beneath the SN ratio, or ET isn't broadcasting in the EM spectrum.

Re:James Webb

[hairyfeet]

Actually, and I can't remember who said this, maybe some here can, but I remember reading how the odds that SETI would find squat would be so low as to be non-existent simply because there is only a teeny tiny window if you use our world as a model because one progresses from "blasting EM everywhere" to highly localized signals that don't go anywhere so quickly.

Look at how quickly we went from nothing to analog "blast EM everywhere" to tight digital sat signals. What 100 years? In space time that would be less time than a girl's little squeaky fart. So even if there were tens of thousands of races out there, and they all used the same EM bands we did the amount of time their signal was sent out into the cosmos was so damned tiny you would have to watch the entire sky simultaneously to have any hope at all and even then it would be teeny tiny odds. it is like a blind man trying to find a needle in Nebraska and the needle is moved randomly.

So while I thought the golden records were fine, hell it didn't really cost much to throw those on a ship we were launching anyway, I have to wonder if our limited resources wouldn't be better spent in studying our own solar system instead of hunting for ET. Hell even if we found ET it isn't like we could do a damned thing about it, the distances are simply too great. But if folks are willing to put up the cash because they are looking for ET? More power to ya, free country and all that.

Re:James Webb

[TheRaven64]

It's not just a question of blasting EM everywhere, it also has to be the kind of low frequency EM that will be distinguishable from noise at stellar distances. If there were another Earth-like civilisation around Alpha Centauri, at the same level of development, then we probably wouldn't spot them with SETI.

Re:James Webb

[djl4570]

Technological civilizations will only broadcast high power radio signals for a limited period of time, probably less than two centuries. The total number of alien signals that we might detect can be approximated by the following: The number of civilizations predicted by the Drake Equation minus the sum of the following: Fraction extinct or no longer broadcasting due to natural causes (i.e. Extinction level event such as a GRB, supernova, impact etc.), Fraction extinct or no longer broadcasting due to exchange of WMD, and the fraction that ceased high power broadcasts when they migrated to low power digital broadcasting. Given the large numbers predicted by the Drake Equation we should have heard from ET by now. Having not heard from ET we should reevaluate the premise on which SETI is based. Is the Drake Equation overly optimistic? It took two billion years for life on earth to evolve beyond primitive cells into more complex organisms. Life may not be as common as the Drake Equation suggests. Are analogue EM broadcasts detectible at the distances involved? We should have some baseline data on signal strength from the Pioneer and Voyager probes. What happens when we extrapolate that signal strength and SN ratio from a few AU to a few light years?

Re:James Webb

[sophanes]

Read the original SETI report (NASA SP-419) - from its inception, SETI didn't expect to overhear information-bearing signals. Instead, it was looking for deliberately generated 'beacons' - high-powered, spectrally dense transmissions. These should be detectable over distances of the order of several thousand light-years.

Re:James Webb

[toQDuj]

Well, even though the chances might be incredibly slim, I do not see the objection to looking for those signals. It's only futile until you find something.

Besides that, the tech they're using and developing is advancing telescope tech, so something good comes of it regardless of actually finding the ET life signals..

Re:James Webb

[hotdoghead]

It's a good telescope.

"... the efficiency of the ATA will be increased by doing radio astronomy and SETI searches simultaneously."

In fact only one of the science goals listed is actually related to SETI, and the rest are quite interesting even if you think SETI itself is useless.

Re:James Webb

[Richard Kirk]

SETI is unlikely to pick up the waste radio energies beamed out by an alien civilization, any more than an alien civilization is likely to pick up our wasted signals. TV signals may have been traveling from earth for the last 60 years, but they have been spreading out in inverse square fashion, so they will be amazingly weak. Gliese 876 is not going to be sitting down to this weeks 'I Love Lucy'.

SETI might be able to pick up a transmission that is directly beamed at us. We can see planets of Jupiter size orbiting nearby stars. Suppose Gliese 876 is able to see earth-sized planets and smaller from their orbiting 1 Km optical telescopes. They notice that the third rock out has some emission lines in the sodium and mercury lines, and guesses that we have street lighting, and so some level of technology. They have a large transmitter, and they pick a wavelength that we may recognize, and they try sending us a signal. If we look in the right direction, and we have sensitive enough detectors, then we might hear something.

How much looking should we do? We can look at more neighbouring star systems. We can listen at more wavelengths. If we have a much more sensitive telescope, then we can go back and listen again. After a while, we have done all the listening that is sensible with the technology we have. Gliese 876 may be sending us messages coded in organic molecules: these do not spread out like radio waves so they could be a much more efficient way of transmitting data. Perhaps we are listening in completely the wrong way. SETI hopes that another civilization transmits a signal for us to receive. They will probably guess we will not make a superconducting antenna 1000 Km in diameter just to pick up a weak radio signal. If we cannot pick up a signal on a reasonable antenna, then the signal it is probably not there.

Just my 2p's worth, but my vote goes for the James Webb telescope rather than SETI.

Safe Funding Source

[BJ_Covert_Action]

Is crowdsourcing the long term future of pure research projects?"

Why not? God knows funding from the government isn't safe anymore.

Re:Safe Funding Source

[Pieroxy]

Or rather,
Why not? God knows funding from the government isn't anymore.

Well, at least they found something...

[pedantic bore]

Finding the funding for an alien telescope array is the first step in actually finding the alien telescope array itself...

Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[7-Vodka]

Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint. We do away with income tax and you get to spend your money on things you care about. Put it to use where it's most efficient.

Fund a telescope array, feed the needy, keep non-profit hospitals open, invest in the local electric car startups, go part time at work and volunteer at the local EFF. I'm willing to bet you can spend your money better than the government can. Crowdsourcing could be the way of the future of the government would just get off your backs.

No more bridges to nowhere and tax refunds for G.E.
No more occupations, murder and wars.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[deadcrow]

A great point. Because taxation is nothing but forced crowdsourcing. And inefficient croudsourcing at that, because the government only ever spends a small percentage of the take on projects.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Arlet]

I'm willing to bet you can spend your money better than the government can

Yes, for some things. The free market is excellent at solving some problems. Government is good at solving other problems, and usually government programs are created after people notice that the free market isn't taking care of it.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[macraig]

Riiiight... and if we took your profound advice, every stretch of road would be owned by some corporation, there would be no "highway neutrality", and we'd wind up paying multiple tolls to drive anywhere... because the government wouldn't be allowed to tax anyone to collectively buy off the builders of the roads for the ownership (and CONTROL) of them. Who do you suppose paid for all the roads you traverse every single day for free? The government... WITH TAXES. Exactly how would you propose crowdsourcing our streets and national highway system?

Why do you think we're having these endless debates about "network neutrality" now? It's precisely because the government - WE - didn't insist on retaining ownership of all the telegraph, telephone, and telecommunications wires that companies like AT&T have been laying for more than a century. It's shared infrastructure, just like highways, and it should have been our government - us - paying to retain ownership (and control) of those wires... with taxes If we had done that, we wouldn't be worrying about network neutrality now because the wires would be TRULY neutral.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

No more bridges to nowhere

No more bridges to anywhere

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Crowdsourcing could be the way of the future of the government would just get off your backs.

Your conclusion does not follow from your premise. Seems to me that the two are only marginally related.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

except for the things that the government doesn't want to pass through it

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[genjix]

And who says we need roads all over the planet? They're truly a scourge on the environment. Maybe we don't need roads to go right up to people's houses- they could drive and park to a spot and then walk 15 mins to their house. Either that or get public transport.

The current mess with cities is due to government over-regulation. Urban planners agree that suburbanism (suburban means less than urban FYI) is ugly. It was Jane Jacobs who asked "Are we building cities for cars of for people?" If the free market doesn't pay for it then maybe you should think that maybe it isn't needed.

Your internet argument is moot given that people can lay their own wires or easily route around using satellite dishes.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[damienl451]

"go part time at work and volunteer at the local EFF"

Fire up the stake! We all know that there is no such thing as an income effect and that lower taxes will mean that you'll work MORE, not less! How dare you challenge libertarian orthodoxy!

Disclaimer: I'm a classical liberal myself. I just couldn't resist pointing this out though ;-)

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[cgomezr]

So instead of everyone having to pay for public services, let only the generous pay, while the egoists also get the benefits but for free (with the added advantage of having more money to spend in themselves, i.e., a better position in the "free" market).

Very efficient, yes. Maybe it's because I'm European, but I honestly can't understand how anyone but the super-rich can defend such an anarcho-capitalism. It's just beyond me.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[maxwell demon]

So instead of everyone having to pay for public services, let only the generous pay, while the egoists also get the benefits but for free (with the added advantage of having more money to spend in themselves, i.e., a better position in the "free" market).

Very efficient, yes. Maybe it's because I'm European, but I honestly can't understand how anyone but the super-rich can defend such an anarcho-capitalism. It's just beyond me.

It's a religion. They believe in the invisible hand doing good, and only good.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to the cheaters paradise. That road outside my door, let someone else pay for it,

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[tgv]

Except no-one would pay for the scientists getting their education in the first place. The world would very, very quickly become a dumb and hard place, run by tribal war lords. What? You think people are good and are interested in what you care about? Forget it. They want to have your car, your house, and your wife. And without police, they'll have it.

Wanna see how absence of government works? Go to Sudan.

Welcome to libertarian heaven, a.k.a. humanitarian hell.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wanna see how absence of government works? Go to Sudan.

Welcome to libertarian heaven, a.k.a. humanitarian hell.

Somalia is nice this time of year too.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

Fund a telescope array, feed the needy, keep non-profit hospitals open, invest in the local electric car startups, go part time at work and volunteer at the local EFF. I'm willing to bet you can spend your money better than the government can. Crowdsourcing could be the way of the future of the government would just get off your backs.

Sorry, this is just idiotic. The rich will not voluntarily share their wealth with the poor out of sheer altruisms. Yes, there are exceptions here and there---particularly in case of people that are so insanely rich that there is no difference in their lifestyle if they spend 90% of their money---but in general wealthy people do not just help the public good, feed the needy, etc. Libertarianism is the same bullshit as communism, except that it replaces "insight" by "free market".

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

>People can lay their own wires
Now you've gone full-retard

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

No more bridges to nowhere

Pfffffffft! Without taxes, thats more like " no more bridges to anywhere".

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah yes.. the "but.. but.. rooooaaaaddsss!!" argument.

Cue the Somalia canard in 3.... 2...

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

Government is good at solving other problems..

[CITATION NEEDED]

/I kid, because I care

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[mojo-raisin]

libertarianism != anarchy

Libertarians believe in the rule of law and justice (police & courts). We just want people to freer in their choices.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well said. I would go farther; Sudan is actually run well in comparison to the real contrast point, which is Somalia.

Most people have parochial points of view until they have a problem. Then they become fervent supporters of "cause X" but only because they experienced the downsides of not previously supporting that cause.

We have governments precisely because libertarian action and private sector support is too random, too thin and too unreliable to work in the areas that governments are good at.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Anonymous Coward]

And when people notice that the government isn't taking care of something we get free market programs? No, we get badly designed patches that usually involve even more expansion and bureaucracy, and the three letter agency in question invariably persists pretty much forever.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[selven]

So instead of everyone having to pay for public services, let only the generous pay, while the egoists also get the benefits but for free (with the added advantage of having more money to spend in themselves, i.e., a better position in the "free" market).

1. Not all of these services are of the type that the benefit is too distributed for it to be worth it for a single solely materially self-interested party to contribute. Roads could be paid for by billboards (tolls for anything but interstate highways are impractical IMO) and on the lower level by individual businesses that want to be accessible by the public and might also want the public to drive by them. Higher education used to be paid for by employers as on-the-job training before the system got turned upside down and we got a corporate welfare system where the government pays for training. Police and fire protection are obviously fairly private goods, etc.

2. Why do people not shoplift? It's obviously fairly easy, in many places you can just grab something on display outside and walk off without being noticed. Even though the act is unilaterally quite profitable, our society has so little theft (discussions regarding Wall Street and the government itself aside) that it's actually worth it for shopowners to leave their wares outside unsupervised! The same reasons why this does not happen could be turned around and used to encourage generosity, and, since with acts of generosity the perpetrator does not have an incentive to hide the act, the incentive of public approval would even be magnified in the other direction!

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[tgv]

So police is ok, but education and health is not? And libertarians are also know for their dislike of too many laws. Which of the current laws would you abolish?

Anyway, in a normal democracy you are perfectly free to choose whatever you want. You just have to pay a bit of taxes for that service. Is that really so bad? Do you really want to send the poorest back to dying in the slums because you want all your money for yourself?

And, mind you, you probably would be poor yourself. Unless you happen to come from a powerful and wealthy family, you would be relegated to the underclass. You wouldn't have money to worry about, nor any freedom, since the police wouldn't care for it. Go read some Charles Dickens.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[tibman]

umm, i am NOT helping you move if we have to carry every couch, table, chair, and box 15 minutes each way. That parking area would also have to be a post office. How many mail boxes would have to be crammed into that space? Trash pickup? Oh! Cableman/electrician/plumber has to lug all their equipment and tools out to your house and back. ah, i know a better one; You are having a heart attack.. the ambulance is now a 4x4 monster truck with off-road capabilities so it can reach your house. Either that or they will fireman-carry your body to their ambulance 15min away.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[Ol Olsoc]

Of course, the present mood is "I don't want to pay for anything."

That will work well, won't it?

And that is a big problem for the libertarian crowd. It works until we run out of money. Then well financed neighbors come in and take over and impose their form of government on the libertarians.

"Oh, some country is attacking us with modern weapons - we better develop some. - Ooops- too late!"

Even aside from extreme examples like that, a lot of people - most perhaps - are very short sighted. What future? Do we want to pay for road maintenance? "The road in front of my house is okay - forget about it." At what point do we spend money. ? What about an interstate road system, or should paved roads be only in places where the people can pay for them?" Wealthy people in a populated area want to pave a road between their cities? What if the people in that area don't want a road there? Medical research? There are wealthy philanthropists, for sure. Hardly enough though.

We buy civilization with our tax money. Is it always efficient? Not hardly. But the Tea party crowd "I want to reduce government to a size where I can drown it in the bathtub!" and the libertarian's form of government, where we apparently just decide what taxes we want to pay (for most, roughly $0.00) is just not practical or even possible. We would simply spin down.

Fairly quickly, we'd return to a hunter gatherer lifestyle, or a royalty/serf system in either case. You may like that, I surely don't.

Re:Welcome to the libertarian viewpoint.

[hawkfish]

Either that or get public transport.

Are you sure you are a Libertarian?

This is the way it's supposed to be

[mvdwege]

SETI, like all other religious endeavours, should be funded on donations by its adherents alone. The government has no business subsidising it.

And yes, SETI is about as scientific as Intelligent Design. The whole fundament of SETI is a belief that something must be out there, with no better theoretical basis than the Drake Equation.

Mart

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Anonymous Coward]

SETI is perfectly scientific. You have a hypothesis ("There is intelligent life in the universe trying to communicate with us."), and conduct an experiment to test it.

Of course, there are a few cranks who have a religious belief that aliens exist ("They probed me three nights ago!") ... but a group of people capable of engineering a radio telescope must be a bit saner than that.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ragondux]

SETI is about belief that something may be out there. You don't search for something if you don't believe it might exist, what a surprise. What's unscientific is believing, like you seem to do, that we are very special and that there can't be intelligent life on the other billions of planets in the vicinity.

Once upon a time, SETI opponents relied on the fact that we didn't know if there were exoplanets. Now we discovered hundreds of them. What's your theoretical basis for claiming that life can only appear on Earth?

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Nutria]

and conduct an experiment to test it.

Except that the likelihood of (a) some super advanced civilization existing (b) close enough that the EMF radiation didn't dissipate into unreadability and (c) that they'd actually have the foresight to know when and where we are listening is.. Z E R O.

The mere existence of SETI, that "serious" scientists could even think that "someone else" is bathing the universe with encoded signals, and that so many people want to pay money to listen for these non-existent signals is -- IMNSHO -- an even bigger indication of the decline of critical thinking in the US than Real Housewives Of Atlanta.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Anonymous Coward]

SETI is testing the hypothesis that something is out there.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Arlet]

SETI is testing the hypothesis that something is out there.

No, they are testing that something is out there (but not too far), with a powerful transmitter, and using a big dish aimed at us at exactly the same time we are aiming our dish at them.

Everything else is too weak to detect.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Nutria]

What's unscientific is believing, like you seem to do, that we are very special and that there can't be intelligent life on the other billions of planets in the vicinity.

Nothing in OP's message indicates that we are unique in the galaxy. The point is that we don't broadcast all sorts of messy EM, why should anyone else?

What would be a REAL scientific test would be to launch a large-antennae "Can you hear me now?" satellite with an ion engine aimed away from the orbital plane. Aim the antennae towards Earth. If it can't detect Earth signals at one Lunar orbital radius then SETI should close up shop and give the radio telescopes over to some worthwhile purpose. If it's still detecting signals at 120 AU, then the probability of SETI detecting something goes from zero to 10e-30.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ragondux]

The OP's message claims it is unscientific to believe that there is "something out there", it says nothing about broadcasting EM, or likelyhood of detecting things that actually are out there. There are many good criticisms to SETI's approach, calling it religious or unscientific just isn't one of them.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[TheRaven64]

SETI is perfectly scientific. You have a hypothesis ("There is intelligent life in the universe trying to communicate with us."), and conduct an experiment to test it.

So, if SETI is scientific, what outcome of the experiment would falsify their hypothesis? It is equally scientific to hypothesise that God exists and is watching us and test it by the experiment of staring at the sky and trying to spot him.

A real scientific theory makes predictions that can either be supported or contradicted by experiment. SETI makes no falsifiable predictions, and is therefore faith, not science.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ragondux]

I'm wondering how you calculated that probability of [b]ZERO[/b]. I have no idea about the number of advanced civilization out there, but the only one I know of did broadcast messages to potential neighbours. Granted, it did so for a very short time, so that probably wasn't very effective, but it tried, and it might try again.

You probably mean that that probability is not zero, but is too low for us to spend money on it. That would be a bit more reasonable, wouldn't it?

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[mvdwege]

And like all true believers confronted with uncomfortable truths, you just refuse to listen.

I claimed it to be unscientific to believe in something out there with no better basis than the Drake Equation.

Actually reading the argument and addressing it next time, instead of burning down a strawman, would help your case.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[mvdwege]

And when Christians pray to God, and Muslims pray to Allah, they are testing the hypothesis that someone is listening to them.

See? Perfectly analogous.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ragondux]

I'm not part of SETI, never invested money in SETI and never will, because I don't believe they stand a chance of detecting anything. There goes your 'believer' ad hominem.

I assumed you meant that it was unscientific to believe in ETI today, with our current knowledge, because we only had the Drake equation. Did you mean that we have other evidence that could make it scientific, but the SETI guys only rely on Drake, so they're not scientific? If so, I stand corrected. If not, I think I addressed your argument, but feel free to ignore it and continue feeling unjustly attacked.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Arlet]

What's unscientific is believing, like you seem to do, that we are very special and that there can't be intelligent life on the other billions of planets in the vicinity.

There is a serious mismatch between:

1) vicinity
2) billions of planets
3) SETI programs

If ET emits random radio waves, similar like we do on earth, and we wish to detect them with our SETI program, the vicinity does not have billions of planets, but just 7, namely the ones in our solar system.

Also, the Drake equation only estimates how many ETIs there are. It says nothing about our chance to detect each one. If you add those terms as well, the result is pretty much zero.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ragondux]

First of all, the OP seemed to question de belief that "there is something out there", not the belief that SETI can detect anything. Wikipedia says our galaxy is supposed to contain about 50 billion planets, so the belief that more than one might be inhabited doesn't strike me as unscientific or religious (given that we know of one that is inhabited).

I don't have much hope in SETI as it stands today, but I don't think they expect to catch random radio waves, I think they're hoping to catch a powerfully broadcasted "hello world", from much farther than our own solar system.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Anonymous Coward]

A real scientific theory makes predictions that can either be supported or contradicted by experiment. SETI makes no falsifiable predictions, and is therefore faith, not science.

I think you have an overly black and white view of the way science works. It's rarely as simple as "we run experiment X and if we see (do not see) Y then we accept (reject) theory Z.". Often you can only make statements like "given assumptions A, B, C we can excluded this region of parameter space of theory Z at the 95% confidence level." That doesn't mean theory Z is unscientific or that the experiment is worthless.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Arlet]

I'd call it religious if the Drake equation was used as a basis for the SETI experiment.

If you fix the Drake equation, it should be clear that the SETI experiment is pointless.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Anonymous Coward]

Proper science can conclude, very quicky that the chances of finding ET are about sweet three fifths of fuck all. Even if you presume something is out there - and the chances of that are in itself about zero, intelligent life has only been produced once in Lord knows how long - the sheer distances involved mean that the only kind of signal we'll ever get is from a power source that was orginally a sun and even that takes our very best equipment to even sniff out so applying some logic what exactly are the chances SETI could ever sense anything?

SETI is a religion - it doesnt even pass the merest glance of maths, let alone the "Just look up at the massive expanse of space - you aint gonna find shit out there, even a planet is next to impossible to find"

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[maxwell demon]

And when Christians pray to God, and Muslims pray to Allah, they are testing the hypothesis that someone is listening to them.

See? Perfectly analogous.

Not perfectly analogous. Unlike Christians or Muslims, SETI does a scientific analysis of the results, and openly admits that they haven't yet found anything. You'll probably not find many Christians who tell you "yeah, well, I don't know if god hears my prayers, up to now I haven't found a sign that he does, but I keep trying."

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[erroneus]

Indeed. "Winning a football game" serves as evidence that God exists for most religious yokels.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[varargs]

Yep. Hippie pseudo-science. Greenies everywhere should say a prayer to Al Gore for all the CPU cycles wasted on the so-called "Search for SETI." Jesus wept (or wiped).

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[thue]

And the search for the Higgs is also religious, because we have a belief that something is there? Of course not; we search to validate (or repudiate) our hypothesis.

It is a perfectly valid scientific hypothesis that intelligent life exists elsewhere, based on current scientific consensus. We are merely trying to confirm that hypothesis.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[grumbel]

And yes, SETI is about as scientific as Intelligent Design.

That's bullshit. SETI does not proclaim that alien live exist, it doesn't proclaim anything. SETI is simply looking for it and they aren't exactly hiding the fact that they haven't found anything. In so far its not much different from a biologist or archaeologist running through a jungle or desert looking for interesting things, he might find something or not.

Intelligent Design is vastly different, as they proclaim to already have the answer and then try to support it with fraudulent evidence, ignoring a far better theory that already explains everything they try to explain.

The whole fundament of SETI is a belief that something must be out there, with no better theoretical basis than the Drake Equation.

It's not a believe, its an assumption that there might be something out there and you can't know how false or true it is until you start looking. Also the Drake Equation isn't the theoretical basis for SETI, its not even a theory in the first place, its just a fancy why of saying "I wonder how likely intelligent live would be?". It was meant to foster discussion on a conference some decades ago, not hard science.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[grumbel]

The point is that we don't broadcast all sorts of messy EM, why should anyone else?

SETI isn't looking for random EM transmissions (which last I heard would be lost after some 50 lightyears in background radiation anyway), but for directed beacons aimed into our direction and in general simply ways of how interstellar communication might work. Why somebody would transmit them? Well, we don't know, but there isn't all that much reason to think that nobody ever would try it either. Can't know how much or how little is out there until you start looking and searching.

What would be a REAL scientific test would be to launch a large-antennae "Can you hear me now?" satellite with an ion engine aimed away from the orbital plane

That wouldn't be science, that would be a waste of money, since we already know the answer to that reasonably well.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Beelzebud]

GTFO of my Slashdot.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Nutria]

directed beacons aimed into our direction

Why and how "on Earth" would any advanced ET have known hundreds of years ago to aim a directed beacon at not just Earth (if it were aimed at Saturn, we wouldn't detect it), but Earth now when we have the technology?

Unless the thinking is that ET decided to continually blast directed EM beacons at every planet circling every star. Which is, of course, absurd.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[grumbel]

Why and how "on Earth" would any advanced ET have known hundreds of years ago to aim a directed beacon at not just Earth (if it were aimed at Saturn, we wouldn't detect it), but Earth now when we have the technology?

For the very same reason why we "know" where to aim our antennas: Looking at the stars and planets around them gives you a very rough estimation for the likely hood of life. The hypothetical alien race likely has much better telescopes then us and thus more information about our planet, its atmosphere and composition (which in theory could let you detect things such as industrialization). Now of course that doesn't preclude all our assumption from being wrong, maybe an advanced alien race will consist of robots that love to fly around Hot Jupiters instead of more Earth like planets. So SETI might be looking at the wrong things, but you can't know that until you start looking and have searched a reasonable number of the things out there.

If anything, SETI is a hell of a lot closer to playing the lottery then it is to religion. The chance of "winning" might be small, but its non-zero and the potential "win" could be gigantic.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Nutria]

If anything, SETI is a hell of a lot closer to playing the lottery then it is to religion.

Playing the lottery is a "tax on the mathematically challenged". Nothing that you or Ragondux wrote have convinced me that SETI is anything but a "tax on the reality challenged". Flat Earthers have a closer grip on reality.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ragondux]

Playing the lottery is being called a tax on the mathematically challenged because we know the expected payoff is negative. We (reasonable people) don't know the expected payoff of SETI, so it's a bet, not a tax or a scam. Most research is a bet.

(Please note I'm not trying to convince you, as you made it clear with your flat-earther comparison that you can't be convinced. I'm just stating my opinion for the sake of other readers: http://xkcd.com/386/)

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Anonymous Coward]

The likelihood of a wave being able to travel without a medium is zero, and the mere existence of scientists thinking light travelling around not via the aether just shows the decline of Western science...

The point isn't that scientist blindly believe something must be out there so we will be able to see it. If that were the case, they wouldn't need to look already knowing the answer. Instead it is someone asking a question and actually looking to find the answer, instead of pulling guesses at probabilities out of their rear. Funny, someone else complains of pro-SETI people justifying themselves by using the Drake equations to end up with a probability that is little more than a random guess.

Additionally, a lot of SETI is based on intentionally transmitted signals, not incidental radio emissions, and this doesn't require detailed knowledge of us being here, as they could be sent out at random to other stars like we've done a few times before with transmissions. All of the detailed discussion of how far incidental transmissions can be heard or will disappear with time, etc., are straw man arguments missing what the project is about, and SETI is the one compared to ID?

Now the question of whether SETI is worth the cost, what its chances of succeeding vs. the value of its results, and otherwise trying to find where its priority fits in with the rest of research is a whole different deal then just comparing them to ID or claiming they are a signal of critical thinking in US. Opinions vary widely on priorities of various science research and distribution of limited funding is always a perpetual source of argument among scientists.

And before someone tries brushing this off as another blind believer, I'm not a supporter of SETI, just I don't think the disagreement in priorities merits some of the BS thrown about here.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Anonymous Coward]

(if it were aimed at Saturn, we wouldn't detect it)

Even if they were confident enough in which planet to target and exactly where it was going to be when the signal arrives, etc., to point exactly at Saturn, the diffraction limit prevent them from hitting just Saturn. An antenna kilometers in size more than a few light years away would easily light up the entire inner solar system whether wanted to or not if targeting the larger planets. And this is assuming they would insist on targeting something of narrow focus as possible, instead of maybe trying to cover a slightly wider area in case they miss and there are unseen receivers in the same solar system.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Your.Master]

They're testing the contrapositive proposition. Just as:

non-human signals that are extremely unlikely to be natural -> extraterrestrial intelligence
no extraterrestrial intelligence -> no non-human signals that are extremely unlikely to be natural

The contrapositive is absolutely falsifiable, therefore the experiment is scientific.

Falsifiable prediction: There is no intelligent life on other planets.

Experiment: Listen for radio signals that are patterned in a way that is implausible to occur from natural phenomena, and that therefore most likely came from intelligent actions. Determine if they might be a false positive (human satellites, etc.).

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Anonymous Coward]

You clearly have no understanding of the scientific process. You're lame argument could be made about any scientific project in existence.

SETI isn't a project that sprung out of the belief that something MUST be out there. It is project searching to see IF something is out there. This is no different than the search for the Higgs Boson or a lost city cited in historical texts. It's either there or it isn't.

If you bothered to read any of the papers, research, and/or work done by SETI researchers you would know that. You would also know that even IF there is an alien civilization out there, the SETI project has only a small chance of detecting it do to a number of factors, which they explain in fine detail. You would also know the research generated by SETI has resulted in several advancements in signal processing and other fields.

What the hell are they teaching people these days? No wonder we're becoming a third world superpower.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ol Olsoc]

Bloody Hell! Is space exploration religious? Is dipping a bucket in a pond or exploring the ocean to see if there are any creatures we don't presently know about religion? They are the same thing as SETI.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Ol Olsoc]

The Premise of SETI is not "There is intelligent life out there". Whoever posted that was incorrect.

The theory is that There *might* be intelligent life out there, and we might be able to determine it's existence by looking for electromagnetic signals that are irrefutably non-natural.

That is very falsifiable. Pulsars were discovered this way, when a short duration regular signal was shown to be a rapidly rotating dead star .Falsified. Other candidates have likewise been falsified. Perhaps there will come a day when we run out of natural explanations for an anomalous signal. Then the theory will be just about proven. Just about, because something accepted as non-natural one day, might be falsified the next.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Maritz]

Who'd have thought there'd be loads of blowhards on Slashdot saying SETI is religion and that the chances of it finding anything are zero. SETI should have just popped on here and these guys could've saved them the trouble. No point in looking, nothing to see.

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[mvdwege]

I count one, maybe two supporters in this thread. And at least twice that of true believers who feel slighted.

So fuck off with your victim complex. Another thing you have in common with the fundamentalist Christians, BTW.

Mart

Re:This is the way it's supposed to be

[Maritz]

Your assertion that SETI is religion is obvious bollocks. You're the one who claims to know what it can or cannot find, without either evidence or a persuasive argument.

No it is not.

[drolli]

If they reach $200000 for a project which is a prominent as seti, then i can say: no.

Must postings end with a rhetorical question?

[fche]

Is there no end to the gimmick of inviting pop vox with a rhetorical question at the end of every posting?
Could we ever see questions for which our informed readership could have material answers?
Is there any purpose other than habit, or the quest for page views?
Well?

What a huge waste of money

[Anonymous Coward]

Humanity is lost.

SETI Found Something!!!!

[erroneus]

OMG! I saw the words "SETI" and "Finds" and got immediately surprised! Was I the only one?

I just don't expect SETI to find anything... ever...

Re:SETI Found Something!!!!

[Xtense]

Nobody expected to find a new continent by going around the planet to India.

It's not a question of what we're looking for - it's a question of what we might find, and that, IMO, is what makes SETI worth keeping.

Re:SETI Found Something!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody expected to find a new continent by going around the planet to India.

Funny thing is that SETI is looking for intelligent life and they will find intelligent life the same way as columbus found indians.

Why was there a need for this?

[denzacar]

Shouldn't the "invisible hand of the market" have fixed this?

Re:Why was there a need for this?

[rubycodez]

It did.

Re:Why was there a need for this?

[cobraR478]

If this was intended to be a rhetorical question, I'll agree with the insightful moderation. Otherwise, this should be moderated "whoooooosh"

Progress needs 'random goals' even if unachievable

[winterice]

The way I see it is this: One of the way science and engineering advance, is when a difficult arbitrary goal is set with enough conviction. We try to reach to it, putting a lot of resources into it. Along the way, we are forced to solve difficult engineering problems and gain scientific insights. War is one way to achieve this (and certainly gets its share of resources) but trying to find life elsewhere or putting man on Mars, for example, is a much more pleasant way to do it.

NO

[Anonymous Coward]

Society today isn't completely against scientific research, they just need things spelled out for them.

Besides, it's congress you should be angry at. They're the shitheads that keep pumping the defense budget annually.

seti is more like cryptozoology

[voss]

The assumption of only 1 lifebearing planet in the universe of hundreds of billions of stars is pretty damn silly. Whether the drake equation is right or wrong, its pretty safe to say something is out there. cryptozoology seems like flaky science until they find something like the Okapi or the Giant Squid then its no longer cryptozoology its just zoology.

Really?

[denzacar]

All them people donating a small amount of money so that one project (potentially beneficial to the whole humanity) could continue...
Feels a lot like *GASP!* [whisper] communism.[/whisper]

Re:Really?

[rubycodez]

No, in communism as always practiced by any country in this world, the state would come and seize the wealth needed, telling everyone that we're building for the future day when we can have the pure true communism. The seizers would have better life and more wealth than average person. People who had other points of view would be rounded up and imprisoned, tortured or killed (e.g. China, Soviet Union, Viet Nam, North Korea). Or they would be preemptively killed (see Khmer Rouge)

Always a lie, that business of communism. It has caused much grief for various members of my family in several parts of the globe. In practice, just a religion of power and wealth grabbing, same as those who claim to be "capitalists" but instead are enslavers and thieves.

I did years of it 4 "Team Microsoft"

[Anonymous Coward]

Why? Because I always considered SETI to be a form of potential "stellar 'pre-cartography'" actually, for giving us some clues for potential existence of lifeforms out there via detection of "quasar systems" (anything beaming signals that MIGHT show the existence of life other than ourselves).

* Between this, & NASA searching for the existence of water out there? We might have better "guesswork" as to where to go (or even avoid), life like ourselves...

APK

P.S.=> I haven't done SETI in ages, but @ one point, I was up to position #13 on their charts (& was trying to catch a former co-worker of mine, I *think*, named Steve Bryant (worked with a guy named that @ BellSouth is why))...

... apk

Countries were involved in the donating process?

[denzacar]

And here I thought that a community of individuals interested in a particular human endeavor, pooled their resources to keep that endeavor functioning AFTER it lost all support it had from any possible governing party - political, economical, educational etc.

Communism has nothing to do with states - just like capitalism.
It's just that certain states try to use it as a tool - just like capitalism.
Neither is necessarily oppressive, but both can be used by an oppressive government.

Problem is, there never was and there never will be a single tool that will fit (and fix) every problem or task.
Particularly when the so called "free world" chooses allies such as Nazis and dictatorship juntas just so it could sabotage that particular tool at every step.
Mad dictators with no understanding of the tool beyond "Got me out of the gutter and into power" don't help either.

Also, you can't just take uneducated feudal farmers, drill the "community spirit" (or whatever you choose to call the ideology) into them and then try to let them run a country.
Countries are too big and at the same time too small for something like that.

A family, a tribe, a small town can "run on communism" just fine. Or an entire planet.
Anything in between has excellent chances in failing, even without outside help - because greed is a much simpler tool than empathy.
And while seeds of both communism (empathy) and capitalism (greed) are inherent to all humans (perfectly normal human psychological concepts, beneficial in moderation, detrimental in excess), it is much simpler to get people onto capitalism than onto communism.
"Whatever I can grab is mine and you can go fuck yourself" is a very inviting philosophy.
Particularly for those who are already holding something in their hand.
"Needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" on the other hand is much harder to grasp - particularly whenever one is not among the "many".

On the other hand, it would be simply idiotic to use capitalist approach on a human community the size of a family or a tribe.
Town, city, state WILL "run on capitalism" though - until all capital starts to accumulate in the hands of the "few".
Usually, that is about the time when shit starts hitting the fan.
"Many" are then either sent to fight a war somewhere in order to get more capital into the community and possibly create an even lower class who will do all the work for (basically) nothing (thus making "many" economically obsolete), OR "many" decide that it is time for their needs to outweigh the needs of the few - and revolt.

Due to large groups of people running at speeds of the lowest common denominator - that is rarely a good thing.
Although, it would be a really fun thing to observe.
Particularly if it happened in a large capitalist country, where it was programed into generations of people that socialism and communism are synonymous with satanism and cannibalism.
If for no other reason, than just to laugh at the schizophrenic renaming of such ideas.