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Mysterious Star Pulses May Be Alien Signals, Study Claims (iop.org)
"Strange pulses of cosmic light might be signals from hundreds of different alien civilizations -- or just the latest false alarm in the tortuous search for E.T.," reports Space.com. Slashdot reader Okian Warrior shares this excerpt from the paper which argues that the signals "cannot be caused by instrumental or data analysis effects."
Finally, we consider the possibility, predicted in a previous published paper, that the signals are caused by light pulses generated by extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) to makes us aware of their existence. We find that the detected signals have exactly the shape of an ETI signal predicted in the previous publication and are therefore in agreement with this hypothesis. The fact that they are only found in a very small fraction of stars within a narrow spectral range centered near the spectral type of the Sun is also in agreement with the ETI hypothesis.
The researchers add that "at this stage, this hypothesis needs to be confirmed with further work," and Seth Shostak, a senior astronomer at SETI, tells Space.com that "If I were a betting guy, I'd bet this is an artifact of the way they processed their data."
The researchers add that "at this stage, this hypothesis needs to be confirmed with further work," and Seth Shostak, a senior astronomer at SETI, tells Space.com that "If I were a betting guy, I'd bet this is an artifact of the way they processed their data."
It's wonderful when science steps out into the fringe. Sometimes they end up being right or discover something useful unrelated to their initial inquiry.
I've no idea whether they are right this time. But this phenomenon will be studied heavily. And we'll learn more. Pure research, even that which seems obtuse, often provides more knowledge when it's conclusions are wrong. Even when Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann failed to produce fusion using a palladium lattice- there was knowledge gained.
Though I hope these researchers are right. The SETI question has large potential for positive change in society in general.
Another consultant who stuck it out.
"We are the Priests, of the Temples of Syrinx..."
Might SETI 'change society'? For thousands of years we believed there was an ideal extraterrestrial community caled 'Heaven' - did that help us stop wars? Do those who still believe abstain from genocide? Would any other cosmic certainty improve things?
The idea of heaven helped and hurt, as it and its associated ideas still do.
Fundamentally it let one group of people control another group of people, and the people in power caused a lot of harm and backwards-thinking. But they also found a way to discourage people from acting cruel to one another and to encourage those people to conform to certain norms and even to be kind, on promise of heaven and threat of hell.
The norms they chose were not all the right ones, and because of the hierarchical structure and the authoritarian grip on power throughout the institution they also prevented a lot of advances that could have been made over the centuries.
But service done today because of modern Christian teachings, and the benefit of helping hundreds of millions of people internalize the idea that they should be generous, makes it a much better world.
It's just that the shame, control, and rigidity of thought that can accompany the dogma and the hierarchy also causes a lot of harm. A school shouldn't have a principal who knows nothing about education just because he is a priest; priests shouldn't make millions of people lie to them in order to fill out a checklist that they fit a set of rules that says they are of enough value to get married in a church; confirmation shouldn't be done when kids are still too young to be making that decision; sexual rules designed to control obligations to children and spouses before birth control existed should be re-examined now that it does. Many of the rules the church makes are about things that are or were wrong for a reason, but the church teaches that they are wrong in themselves (calling them sin), and that makes it so much harder to change rules that become wrong in a new age.
So anyone who says it is all good or all bad is naive or ignorant. Or most probably scarred by a bad experience. I know many millions of kids have terrible experiences in catholic schools every year, so that alone may make it a net negative. But it also does a lot of good.