Searching for extera tersesial inteligence

[Pazuzu]

Originally Posted by varmint

over interstellar distances, i'd like a means of communication that doesn't take twenty generations of waiting for someone to say hello back when you say hello.

No one is trying to communicate. They are tying to find signs of life outside of our Earth. Nothing more. Sending a signal out is basically free, why not do it? They're also hoping (as humans tend to do) that they might find that sign of life nearby (within 20 or 30 light years). 10 would be even better, you almost could communicate at that distance.

they are searching in a spectrum that any advanced civilization would find useless. might as well be looking for smoke signals from other worlds.

Actually, they're searching in a spectrum that is well established all over the Universe. They're searching in a bandwidth that is (1) easy to make, (2) would be recognized by any civilization in the universe, since it's the frequency of the most common element in the universe, and (3) has shown to be effective in transmitting cleanly through all of the various debris that exists in the universe (other wavelengths get scattered away and are useless).

Finally, the massive parallel computing designs that they've worked on are being used in other fields of science, so even if you dismiss them as "kooks", they're contributing.

[tabs]

Originally Posted by Heel n Toe

No they pretty much go on indefinitely in a vacuum.

Yep that vacume between the ears is infinite for some..

[tabs]

Anybody who intercepts our signals would realize almost instantaneously that there is no cognitive intelligence on this planet..

[tabs]

Originally Posted by dd74

I have a friend who's been out of work for a while.

These days, he's so deeply steeped in extraterrestrial intelligence, the idea of off-world beings landing on Earth, cover ups, conspiracies, Roswell, and the like, I can barely have a conversation with him, as this is all he chooses to ramble about.

He didn't use to be this way when he had a job.

WHEW...Since I never had a job, so DD can't be talking about me....

[Jim Richards]

Originally Posted by tabs

Anybody who intercepts our signals would realize almost instantaneously that there is no cognitive intelligence on this planet..

hence, radiotabs

[tabs]

Originally Posted by Jim Richards

hence, radiotabs

EXACTLY....what I was talking about....

[Jim Richards]

indeed

[Heel n Toe]

Originally Posted by mbrouder

Imagine there is a predator out there that feeds off beer, buffalo wings, and Cheetos, and its main tool of detection is receiving radio waves.

There... fixed it for you.



Saw a comedian talking about this once...

"Okay, so we all love E.T. and those cute little grey aliens in Close Encounters, but hasn't anybody thought about the possibility that there could big, mean, nasty biker aliens out there, too?"

[TerryH]

In the vast emptiness of the universe, the speed of light is way to slow for us to communicate effectively or travel beyond a small part our own little galaxy. The next closest star in our galaxy is Alpha Centauri at about 4 light years.

Ironically, as the universe continues to expand, the spaces between galaxies are only getting larger. Our own Milky Way is about 100,000 light years across. Parallel universes and worm holes are looked at as possible shortcuts in time/space travel. The speed of light seems a snails pace when put into perspective.

[Pazuzu]

Originally Posted by TerryH

In the vast emptiness of the universe, the speed of light is way to slow for us to communicate effectively or travel beyond a small part our own little galaxy. The next closest star in our galaxy is Alpha Centauri at about 4 light years.

Ironically, as the universe continues to expand, the spaces between galaxies are only getting larger.

The speed of light increases as well. The actual fabric of space is expanding, so the yardstick that we use to measure things is expanding with it.

[legion]

Originally Posted by Pazuzu

The speed of light increases as well. The actual fabric of space is expanding, so the yardstick that we use to measure things is expanding with it.

So how do we know that it's expanding if our tools for measuring it are expanding as well?

And what is "tersesial"?

[Heel n Toe]

Originally Posted by legion

And what is "tersesial"?

"extera" and "teresial"...as well as "inteligence" are words that are used to test the efficacy of Spell Chekk.

[Bob Goding]

Yes----but would "extera tersesial inteligence"have spellcheck?

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by Pazuzu

Slow? Um...how fast would you like them to travel?

Much faster than they do. About 1000x faster would be nice.

Originally Posted by dhoward

Apparently, c=too slow...

Yes, C is way too slow.

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by Porsche-O-Phile

I used to run SETI@home as my screensaver (great idea) but Berkley U. has completely screwed it up. Now it's some convoluted gobbleygook "BOINC" interface that nobody short of a CS major can understand. I fought with it for an hour and said "screw it".

Ditto.

[widebody911]

Originally Posted by m21sniper

Much faster than they do. About 1000x faster would be nice.


Yes, C is way too slow.

Not as bad as Java!

[Heel n Toe]

Originally Posted by Bob Goding

Yes----but would "extera tersesial inteligence" have spellcheck?

I doubt they'd need it... from what I've heard and read, they use telepathic communication.

What I wanna know is do they have terlits... and if so, do they dump them every so often out there, or have they figured out a way to dump their dookie into the superfusion hyperdrive and burn it up.

[slakjaw]

LOL when I posted this I had just come off night shift and was on my 4th beer. I cant believe I butchered the title like that but when I wrote it, it looked fine. Hopefully aliens wont see this post and decide to eat us all.

[VaSteve]

Originally Posted by Pazuzu

Actually, they're searching in a spectrum that is well established all over the Universe.

Um, that's sorta like a local restaurant stating that they are "World Famous".

We can't agree on anything on this planet.

[jyl]

I don't remember the physics, but doesn't the strength of a omnidirectional radio signal diminish with the square of the distance from its origin? Has to do with the formula for surface of a sphere? So if a radio signal is "X" strong 1 mile from the transmitter, it will be 6 trillion squared or 4 x 10^25 times weaker when it reaches Alpha Centuari? I don't really see how such a weak signal can be distinguished from background noise, including that produced by Alpha Centuari itself? I can see if the signal is a supernova, but some local FM station broadcasting "Dancing Queen"? Anyone who knows the math, please explain. Thanks.