500-fold Increase in Data Flow from SETI Telescope

coondoggie brings us an article from Networkworld about a flood of new data for the SETI@home project. We discussed something similar a few months ago when a new telescope array went live. The vast amount of processing power required to handle the new data is prompting the SETI@home team to make a plea for more volunteers. Quoting the press release: "What triggered the new flow of data was the addition of seven new receivers at Arecibo, which now let the telescope record radio signals from seven regions of the sky simultaneously instead of just one. With greater sensitivity and the ability to detect the polarization of the radio signals, plus 40 times more frequency coverage, Arecibo is set to survey the sky for new radio sources."

YETI@Home

[Charles Dodgeson]

All my spare cycles are working on Yeti@Home [phobe.com]

To sum up what this increase in data will bring:

[Anonymous Coward]

Six hours nineteen minutes right ascension, fourteen degrees twenty-two minutes declination ... no sighting.
Six hours nineteen minutes right ascension, fourteen degrees twenty-three minutes declination ... no sighting.
Six hours nineteen minutes right ascension, fourteen degrees twenty-three minutes declination ... no sighting.

etc. ad infinitum

Re:Parent is right.

[nschubach]

I guess it depends. You could always argue that An alien race was found and they were technologically advance or already found a cure for many of the diseases and were willing to share. Or they were a warlike race bent to destroy Earth cause we spied on them... Either way, you might not have to worry about cancers and disorders anymore.

Re:Hey Nostradamus!

[nilbud]

I am in touch with aliens, they want us to send cash, lots of cash. Oh no wait, that was a US Presidential candidate.

Re:oh I dunno

[tekiegreg]

I'd wholeheartedly agree with you, so then my life's great priority list is as follows

1) Breathe
2) Sleep
3) Procreate
4) Eat
...
1444) Find Cure for cancer
...
2137832) Find extra terrestrial intelligence

Ergo when I have some computing power to spare I'll devote some to the cure for cancer, when I have the United States's entire Internet worth of computing power, I'll spare a little to extra terrestrial intelligence :-)

Re:FoldingAtHome

[penrodyn]

> Protein Folding should take precedence over pointless searches for noise-in-patterns.

Exactly, you're a hypocrite.

700% increase

[flyingfsck]

My first thought was that some aliens discovered spam...

come on, people!

[commodoresloat]

Amen. I stopped using SETI once they moved to BOINC.

With that kind of attitude, how do you expect us to ever find the aliens?!!

Re:FoldingAtHome

[Dirtside]

Yes, I should know, it was my computer that discovered the candidate object for SETI@home back in 2004. Got on TV and weekly reader for that. What have YOU done with your spare CPU cycles?

Congratulations! You accomplished nothing and yet managed to get on TV for it. You're right up there with Paris Hilton.

We're obviously each free to choose whatever project we want to donate our spare CPU cycles to (or none at all, if we so choose). Nonetheless, I would encourage people to support projects like Folding@Home over projects like SETI@home, mostly because even if we do discover the existence of ETI, the consequences are unpredictable; assuming they're not close enough to visit or communicate with in a reasonable timeframe, then the sole effect of the discovery would be to cause chaos amongst humanity (how many religions would go berserk apeshit if they discovered that Earth isn't God's special place after all? -- on the other hand, maybe a lot of religion would go away once people realize that We're Not Special, and that'd be a nice side benefit -- but still, very unpredictable).

It's also exceedingly unlikely that SETI will ever find an ETI, regardless of whether there are any ETIs out there. F@H, on the other hand, has already provided us with a lot of useful information about biology, and is clearly advancing the cause of science toward the specific goal of curing diseases. As a result it seems like a much better investment in MY long-term health for me to be spending my cycles on F@H.

Re:Parent is right.

[__aaqvdr516]

While it is undoubtedly higher in quality, it also comes laden with galactic DRM courtesy of your favorite Motion Picture Association of the Milky Way (MPAMW) and the RIAMW.

Re:FoldingAtHome

[SnowZero]

Too bad we can't natively run BOINC on our amd64 FreeBSD boxes.

FreeBSD is dying, SETI [berkeley.edu] confirms it.

Re:oh I dunno

[Rakshasa Taisab]

How will you ever manage to procreate if you keep falling asleep before you even get started?...

Aliens vs. Foldator

[deft]

I dont know, who wants to bet Seti finds an alien race with obviously advanced technology that will cure cancer faster than we can find the cure?

wow, really seems like 50/50 to me...