Posted on 09/06/2005 6:31:20 PM PDT by KevinDavis
SETI, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, has a fundamentally fascinating hypothesis. Not only do SETI researchers assume extraterrestrial life exists, which most mainstream scientists now take as a given, but they further theorize extraterrestrial civilizations exist that can be detected from Earth. Since about 1960, a handful of SETI researchers have tested that hypothesis by scanning the heavens using radio telescopes and increasingly powerful, sophisticated search programs. Optical SETI, looking for ET laser pulses, is now beginning. The political situation of the times, however, has pushed those interested in SETI into a narrow philosophical position.
Most humans want their life’s work to be something respectable, especially to friends and close associates, and SETI researchers are no different. Unfortunately for them, SETI has not always been respected by the scientific community at large, and certainly not by Congress. NASA started a modest SETI program in 1992, but Congress quickly shut it down. Since then, American SETI programs have been university-funded, or funded through private donations. The SETI community has been trying to establish the credibility of its chosen field ever since.
(Excerpt) Read more at thespacereview.com ...
I thought you were posting about the Egyptian pharaoh. Just kidding...SETI has been around for quite a while as I recall. Fascinating stuff.
It is quite fasciniting... I think we will have contact within a hundred years...
I hear the Allen Array has its first few dishes all set up now.
SETI should check Washington first.
Even if there are other intelligent beings and societies in the universe, it's quite likely that there will not be any 'contact' for another few million years or more.....(not that humans are likely to be around so long)..... in the context of the billions of years of the existence of the universe, it seems extremely anthropocentric to imagine that there will be 'contact' just in the very brief time period in which we have started to seek it. Even our centuries are very miniscule time periods in relation to the universe. Also, if there were any intelligent beings out there, chances are they would be so far away that there never will be any 'contact'....
I hope you're right. I believe that will be a real eye-opener for mankind. I'm convinced there are lots of civilizations out there. I hope they're smarter than we are. I expect they are.
If they aren't, they probably wouldn't survive to make contact.
Good point. But I still recall the Titanic sending out an SOS before it sank. {;o)
It is indeed fascinating and I hope we'll have contact sooner than a hundred years.
Little green men ping.
Can you spell double standards?
There are no ETs....shut the program down.
Sounds like religion to me--not science.
THANKS.
LUB
AHHHHH . . . and your omnicience told you this?
I have been crunching work units for years!
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