Beyond Contact: a Guide to SETI 176
| Beyond Contact: A Guide to SETI and Communicating with Alien Civilizations | |
| author | Brian McConnell |
| pages | 417 |
| publisher | O'Reilly |
| rating | 9/10 |
| reviewer | michael |
| ISBN | 0-596-00037-5 |
| summary | the definitive guide to SETI |
Some readers may recall what Stephen Hawking said about his book, A Brief History of Time:
"Someone told me that each equation I included in the book would halve the sales. I therefore resolved not to have any equations at all. In the end, however, I did put in one famous equation, E=mc2. I hope that this will not scare off half my potential readers."
Hawking was facing the same challenge as Brian McConnell faces in this book. Both are trying to turn advanced knowledge of their field of endeavour (which requires heavy math, heavy astronomy, heavy physics, heavy programming, and so forth) into a work which can be comprehended by lesser beings. McConnell has taken a different path than Hawking - his book has plenty of advanced equations, diagrams, and concepts. McConnell does a reasonable (and often very good) job at trying to bring readers up to speed when he thinks he's going to go over their heads, but it is still not a book for the faint of heart or mathematically-challenged. There are enough equations in the book to bring its readership down to (.5)n -- oh, roughly zero, give or take.
In any case, it's a good book, but technical. You were warned.
The first couple of chapters cover the history of searching for extraterrestrial life, "are we alone?", the nature of intelligence, and similar areas. Drake's Equation is the famous set of fudge-factors that would tell us whether we were likely to find other life forms, if only we knew what the values of the variables were:
N = R * fs * fp * ne * fl * fi * fc * L
Fill in values for all of those and you'll be famous forever. But what it means, as our knowledge stands now, is that we have no clue at all whether there is likely to be life out there or not. Comforting, isn't it?
The next several chapters cover the technical aspects of communicating over interstellar distances. The electrical engineers in the audience will have a leg up here; everyone else has the opportunity to learn the basics of signal processing and the peculiarities specific to communication across galaxies. Pretty thorough and informative, without being overwhelming.
Finally, the latter half of the book covers the 64,000 lightyear question: what to say? How to communicate with an intelligence where you can't assume even the most basic things in common? Yes, yes, you've probably heard of the idea of starting with the periodic table or basic mathematics and working up. But that's sort of like a dot-com business plan:
- Establish Contact
- Send Periodic Chart
- ....
- Communicate!
McConnell fills in the "...." part, and it's obvious that a great amount of thought has been put into it. Pretty quickly McConnell is describing how to send entire self-executing programs (see Vernor Vinge's A Fire Upon the Deep).
This book is a bit of an oddity. If we're just talking about entertainment reading, it falls short - too technical. If I was grading it as a scientific work, again it would fall short - not technical enough. :) But as far as I know, this is the only work which tries to explain what SETI really is in terms that educated, reasonably bright laymen can understand, and as such, it does a fine job.
You can purchase this book at Fatbrain. Want to see your review here? Check out the book review submisison guidelines! :)
Step 3 (Score:5, Funny)
3. Wait 40 more years
SETI@Home (Score:5, Informative)
Here is a link with the stats and stuff:
http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/cgi-bin/cgi?cm
-J
Re:SETI@Home (Score:3, Informative)
Re:SETI@Home (Score:1)
Both have the same founder, tho.
-J
What are they calculating? (Score:4, Insightful)
crunching? Missile ranges? Nuclear calculation?
A few sys admins at The Swedish Radio [www.sr.se]
where fired some time ago because they had seti@home running on some machines.
The management said that didn't know what seti@home acutely did.....and of course that it was a security threat....
Just my 0.02
What the Variables Mean (Score:5, Informative)
R = the rate of formation of stars in the galaxy
fs = the fraction of stars that are suitable suns for planetary systems
fp = the fraction of those stars with planets (thought to be around 1/2)
ne = the number of "earths" per planetary system i.e., planets suitable for liquid water
fl = the fraction of those planets where life develops
fi = the fraction of planets with life where intelligence develops
fc = the fraction of those planets that achieve technology which releases detectable signals into space
L = the lifetime of such communicative civilizations
Drake calculation (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:What the Variables Mean (Score:1)
fl = the fraction of those planets where life develops = 1.0
fi = the fraction of planets with life where intelligence develops = 1.0
fc = the fraction of those planets that achieve technology which releases detectable signals into space = 1.0
L = the lifetime of such communicative civilizations = more or less infinity
This indicates a huge number of civilizations, yet we detect none.
So...Fermii Paradox, not only why haven't we detected any, but why aren't they omnipresend and we were born into a universe-wide civilzation?
Catastrophic events (nuclear war, or physics problems that would lead to destruction of the planet, runaway nanotech, too-easy-to-craft viruses, etc.) may destroy some, maybe even the vast majority. However, some must have made it through, if in no other instance, then there must be some planets with one smallish continent that had dictatorship on it that made it to the stars (depressing, but true.)
So that's out, so what's left? I've rejected it being "rare", i.e. we are the first.
The only solution is a variation of "dying out". That is to say, the "radio band use" window of a civilization is rather small, and then they move on to something better (which is to say, much faster than light.)
So, given that, an entrepeneurial physicist should look beyond radio waves for something else in physics. There may very well be vast galactic, if not universal, "cable channels" we can tap into. We only need figure it out.
The other possibility -- this is a bizarre virtual reality of some sort, nature unknown, purpose unknown, surrounding metareality unknown.
Re:What the Variables Mean (Score:1)
Or, none of you exist and I'm God on some kind of bizarre, memory-wiped (to prevent boredom) existance, although if that were the case, I think I'd be some kind of billionaire lesbian supermodel.
Re:What are they calculating? (Score:1)
1. Since the data can be reverse engineered, it is probably SETI data.
2. It would be STUPID to entrust some critical national security calculations to something that can be hacked or spoofed so easily (even if they didn't know what they were hacking on)
Re:What are they calculating? (Score:2)
Re:What are they calculating? (Score:1)
Self-Executing Programs? (Score:2, Interesting)
Say I was only interested in this aspect of the book, is it worth getting? The idea sounds facinating, but there's no details in this review! Can anyone tell me more?
Re:Self-Executing Programs? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Self-Executing Programs? (Score:1)
I've always found it pointless. . . (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:I've always found it pointless. . . (Score:1)
Re:I've always found it pointless. . . (Score:3, Informative)
If there are other lifeforms out there, what are the chances that they would be on the same technological level as us?
Even if they had something more advanced than radio waves (whatever that might be), certainly they would realize that RF is a cheap, simple, robust solution to certain problems -- such as, say, navigational beacons. Even on Earth, with GPS and other hi-tech navigational aids governing the waterways, we still use lighthouses to say "stay away" in the clearest possible language.
Earless aliens (Score:2)
Would not have radio technology. Perhaps their eyes however are so much more deveolved than ours that they communicate very well with holographic technology.
Perhaps they beam light from a laser with information on it into their eyes which gives them all the information of radio and then some.
You have no clue about aliens so why assume they are anything like us.
Even if they were exactly like us 100 percent, they still may have skipped radio, or simply thought radio was silly kinda like how we think some of the eastern sciences are silly.
Aliens also may have known how dangerous radio was and purposely kept it form transmitting into space, perhaps because unlike us they knew there was life out there and didnt want to be found.
Lastly, what if these aliens are so much more advanced than us that they mastered every technology we have and then some to such a point that they'd be a god to us. considering we are about 100 years or so from being at god level technology wise. Aliens that are 1 million years older than us most likely have the ability to travel dimensions, can prolly phase right into our planet at any moment and phase out without us being able to notice, lastly they could be monitoring us right now, and could have been trying to communicate with us for thousands of years already but because we were too dumb to understand it, we wrote bibles saying god spoke to us, made people kings and worshipped them, when these people may have just been the contactees.
Theres too many possiblities that people dont even investigate because they somehow believe that its unlikely, yet finding aliens via seti is far more unlikely than any of the stuff i've mentioned.
Smarter aliens you wont find, they find you and could easily shield their radio waves from reaching.
Dumb aliens are prolly like animals on earth.
So we must be looking for aliens exactly like us, kinda like screaming words in english in the jungle or listening for words in english in a forest.
Challenges facing SETI (Score:5, Insightful)
To date, most books on bioastronomy in general and seti in particular have been rather daunting and require a good grasp of not just physics and biology, but even philosophical issues such as anthropomorphsim and technical matters such as DSP; a popular book on the subject, such as this one, could go a long way to raising public knowledge of the subject past the "looking through telescopes for aliens" level.
Re:Challenges facing SETI (Score:1)
talking with spacemen (Score:2)
Suggestions were based on the idea that you would knot know each others languages, and so had to somehow use models for communication. typical type things would be coins for modelling the solar system, etc.
of course, if you could actually talk, proof would be in the form of an actual scientific facts for which there is no correct evidence for on earth. doesn't even have to be that technical.
Re:talking with spacemen (Score:2)
Re:talking with spacemen (Score:3, Funny)
Alien: beep. beep.
Human: Want...some.....gum?
Coins for planets! (Score:1)
It should have been titled (Score:5, Funny)
Re:It should have been titled (Score:2)
GTRacer
- O'Reilly: Promoting zoological awareness one book at a time!
Re:It should have been titled (Score:4, Funny)
A Yeti [phobe.com], of course.
Perhaps a single celled organism? (Score:2)
Solution to the Drake equation (Score:3, Interesting)
fc is the fraction of intelligent species that develop the ability and desire to communicate with other civilizations : after the aliens realize the voice of the UN secretary general of the time on the Voyager probe recording was a fucking Nazi [olinfrederick.com], probably 0.
Therefore, N=0.
OT: Using your Video Card for Number Crunching (Score:1, Interesting)
Not right now (Score:5, Informative)
And although this may be unpopular on
Ugh (Score:2, Interesting)
I have the same problem with this author that I have with Gene Roddenberry: why must intelligent species on other planets be anthropomorphic?
The author's assumption is that the intelligent and man-like beings are sending coded messages via radio waves in hopes of finding other intelligent beings. This is fine, but consider that the author is framing his arguments in Mathematics, and more importantly, base-10 numbers. Look at your hands: there should be ten fingers. That is the origin of our numbering system. Our system of mathematics and our discipline of deductive logic is a product of the organization of the human nervous system. Simply put, the author and his compatriots have painted themselves into a corner and assumed away most of the problem.
I propose that intelligent beings in other solar systems are not anthropomorphic, do not have ten fingers, do not count in base ten, and probably do not even share this concept of "numbers" anyway. Keep crunching transforms for SETI, but don't assume you are speaking the same language as THEM.
Re:Ugh (Score:1)
Let's say there are some intelligent super vegetables on Venus having an enourmous lifetime (let's say 10000 years), but their information processing is extremely slow.
We would never have any chance to commute with them, so trying it is useless.
So I think's it's ok to concentrate on anthromorphic lifeforms. There might none of them, but there might be no aliens at all.
And anyway: have we got anything better than radio communications (I mean a form of communication with electromagnetic waves, which includes light or X-rays) ?
Re:Ugh (Score:2)
If it takes you a year to form an action, the circumstances which cause the action arent likely to still be around.
On the other hand, the life could very well be intelligent, and even migratory (spores or seeds or something)
But we wouldn't notice it as intelligent, and likely the reverse would be true as well..
However since the theorem involved specifies "technologically advanced" races as one of the variables, encountering species such as this one has already been taken into account.
Re:Ugh (Score:1)
If there is extraterrestrial life, I'd rather it play Solitaire than Quake. Bring on the superintelligent vegetables! (Maybe they have graphics boards dedicated to card shuffling algorithms.)
Re:Ugh (Score:2)
Re:Ugh (Score:1)
Re:Ugh (Score:2)
This would seem like a pretty collossal blunder for someone who's supposedly so smart. Perhaps you've underestimated him or misunderstood something. This seems more likely to me than this author "framing his arguments base-10 numbers".
Re:Ugh (Score:1)
If he's saying, well, this variable is 1/10 and that one is 1/100 and that other one is 1/20, then big deal, they're all guesses anyway.
anthropomorphic (Score:2)
Re:anthropomorphic (Score:2)
Re:Ugh (Score:3, Insightful)
Most "number" transmissions I have seen have been unary (in other words, three pulses equals three). I know binary was used on the plaque in (ummm) Voyager, was it? but that wasn't a serious attempt to communicate with other species.
Mathematicians aren't stupid, and I promise you that they know perfectly well that aliens aren't likely to use base 10.
Re:Ugh (Score:1)
Re:Ugh (Score:1)
Why would the author assume anything else about alien life forms, when we would most likely not be able to communicate with, or recognize that we were communicating at all, if they were any other kind?
You are making the exact same assumption, and have just as little support, as the author. We have no evidence one way or another, so we must look for only those civilizations that we are capable of communicating with.
Now some speculation: As of now, we know of exactly one "intelligent" species, and they have exactly 10 fingers, use numbers in base ten, and are rather anthropomorphic. That's a 100% success rate so far. Why not use that as a precedent?
Re:Ugh (Score:2)
For instance, on a distant planet with a thin atmosphere and dim light, communication may primarily be through touch. Various sensations to different parts of the body would convey meaning. This species may very well design its radios to carry signals to these tactile communications gadgets. Without those same body parts, how are we supposed to decode any message sent to us? On the flip side, how do we know that our signals, carrying visual and auditory information will be comprehended by a blind, deaf species?
Re:Ugh (Score:1)
Unless he's basing his communication on how many digits are being sent out for some reason, the author's methods shouldn't break down if the Aliens have 17 fingers/tenticles/legs/eyes/etc. Math works in any base exactly the same and only the output is different. Actually, even the output is the same, but it just may look different.
Besides, if an Alien can determine that a signal is being sent to them, I think they might be smart enough to put it into whatever base is convienient for them.
Re:Ugh (Score:2, Insightful)
This is true, but that doesn't make our logic arbitrary. In fact our logic is based on a type of "natural logic", according to which the whole universe is organised. That the why our mathematics (which is derived from "our" logic) is so damn good at describing the universe. The reason our logic coincides (or at least closely approximates) this universal logic is just evolution: those of our potential ancestors who had a better grasp of logic had a survival advantage. So there was (still is, see the Darwin awards [darwinawards.com]) a selection pressure in favour of those who understood this natural logic.
Re:Ugh (Score:2)
SETI@HOME is looking for strong, yet non-natural signals, and not trying to decode them - that comes later.
Me Human, You Alien (Score:3, Interesting)
The truth is right here, and out there! (Score:2, Interesting)
something, but lack of proof doesn't make it not exist or not
have happened. Buy applying a form of deception called neo-
cheating, you can easily deceive without threat of getting caught.
We have many examples of this in society today, Microsoft has
done alot of it but so have many others, including individuals.
Now in the probability of there existing higher intelligent life
than ourselves, don't you think they would be better at such
deception on one hand, while on the other having reason to not
want to make contact, a least until we get over trying to blow
ourselves up?
We really don't know enough about physics, gravity, anti-gravity
or all the things that might be derived in technology from such
knowledge, such as what we call faster than light travel.
The point is, communication is a two way street! And unless all
seti is, is an effort to pick up signals sent so long ago that
the sending party is long gone and/or to send such signals that
we well be long gone to ever know if they were received, then
clearly:
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
A little proof of that can be found here [osearth.com] where anyone can
see that a world that spend three times the cost of solving all
the major problems in the world, on military strength for defense
against "threats" instead, certainly is a world bent on destruction.
I mean damn, here we are spending so much resource in a futile
effort rather than spending those resource (seti, military, etc..)
in a way that might show us as being civilized enough for another
intelligent life form to want consider contacting us.
.
NO...NOT PEACE! (Score:1)
I'd love to see that episode again, but I can't even remember what series it was on...Amazing Stories, maybe...or else maybe a renewed Twilight Zone or something else...
-sk
Let's do some math.... (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Let's be generous and say there is a one in a thousand shot of a star having planet capable of supporting life (right distance from the star so that it's between 250-350 K at the surface, enough atmospheric pressuse so that water can exist as a liquid, protected by massive outer planets against constant meteor bombardment, far above-average abundance of Oxygen, Sulphur, Nitrogen, and Phosphorous, etc, etc.) That puts the number of *potential* life supporting planets in the galaxy at 400 million.
3. Let's be very, very generous and estimate that life actually *does* form on one in every thousand potential life-supporting planets. Most molecular biologists will tell you that even the most basic life is so complex that the odds of it forming from inanimate matter are staggeringly small, and we should count ourselves lucky that it managed to happen once in the entire history of the Universe. But we'll be liberal and say one in a thousand. That puts the number of planets in the galaxy with any sort of life at 400 thousand.
4. There is no reason to assume that just because life exists, it will become intelligent and start using EM communications that we can receive. I don't know how you could put odds on something like that. Let's just go nuts and say that ALL planets with life eventually give rise to intelligent life. So 400 thousand planets out there in our own galaxy will have intelligent life at some point in their history.
5. Now, here's the depressing part. Our planet has been around for 4 billion years. We've been using EM waves to communicate for roughly 100 years. So, in the whole history of our planet, civilization has only been detectable for 0.0000025 *percent* of the time. Let's say your typical advanced civilization (using radio waves) can last 1000 years before nuking itself into oblivion, and your typical planet exists for 5 billion years. That would mean that out of the 400 thousand planets with life, chances are only 0.00002 percent of them, or 0.08 total, are broadcasting at the same time we are receiving.
Thus, even with the most wildly optimistic estimates, there is only an 8% chance that there is even one civilization out there that we can listen to, in the entire galaxy. Forget about there being one within 100, or even 1000 light years.
Of course, you could simply throw those numbers out, and believe in a God who likes to put intelligent life on planets all over the place. But that wouldn't be very scientific.
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Unfortunately, this is the only number in your post that means anything. The rest are pure speculation on your part.
"Most molecular biologists will tell you that even the most basic life is so complex that the odds of it forming from inanimate matter are staggeringly small, and we should count ourselves lucky that it managed to happen once in the entire history of the Universe"
This is simply untrue. In fact, any molecular biologists think it's possible that life may have formed from inanimate matter more than once on the Earth.
"Of course, you could simply throw those numbers out...but that wouldn't be very scientific."
Why would someone else's equally speculative take on the Drake Equation be any less "scientific" than yours?
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:2)
Pure speculation, yes. But absurdly optimistic speculation. My point is, even if we stack the deck well in favor of there being ET intelligence out there, the system itself is still set up in such a way that there's NO chance we'll be able to find it.
"This is simply untrue. In fact, any molecular biologists think it's possible that life may have formed from inanimate matter more than once on the Earth. "
Well, I admit that I am only talking about molecular biologists at the University of Wisconsin. I'm sure there are others with differing opinions. However, if life was easy enough to form that it came about by accident in the wild, it stands to reason that under the most exacting laboratory conditions, we would be able to reproduce life. We haven't even come close. And no, strings of polypeptides are NOT the same thing as living cells.
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:1)
How long have we exactly been performing said search wholeheartedly? What, maybe 2-3 decades? Science is an art of exacting approximation. The reality is that the bio-genesis of life until better formulated will not produce positive results.
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:1)
Or you could just use your bad logic. I can't believe this is +4, informative, should be -1, Troll.
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:3, Interesting)
- planetary distance from star: 0.001
- rate of change of axial tilt: 0.01
- rate of change in planetary rotation period: 0.05
- mass and distance of moon: 0.01
- surface gravity (escape velocity): 0.001
- magnetic field: 0.01
- thickness of crust: 0.01
- mass of body colliding with primordial earth: 0.002
- number & distribution of planets in solar system: 0.01
- atmospheric transparency: 0.01
- atmospheric pressure: 0.01
- carbon dioxide level in atmosphere: 0.01
- oxygen quantity in atmosphere: 0.01
- cobalt quantity in crust 0.1
- arsenic quantity in crust 0.1
- copper quantity in crust 0.1
- boron quantity in crust 0.1
- flourine quantity in crust 0.1
- iodine quantity in crust 0.1
- manganese quantity in crust 0.1
- nickel quantity in crust 0.1
- phosphorus quantity in crust 0.1
- potassium quantity in crust 0.1
- tin quantity in crust 0.1
- zinc quantity in crust 0.1
- molybdenum quantity in crust 0.05
- vanadium quantity in crust 0.1
- chromium quantity in crust 0.1
- selenium quantity in crust 0.1
- iron quantity in oceans 0.1
Multiply all of those probabilities, and you get a number that's *slightly* smaller than
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:2)
Re:but... (Score:1)
Re:but... (Score:1)
flubonium quantity in crust 0.1
mixlplitilik in atmosphere 0.1
continuous cloud cover to seal in heat 0.1
etc.
If life forms, its ability to thrive and use whatever is there (and not worry about what isn't there) is remarkable.
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:1)
Oh, did I mention that there were 400 Billion haystacks.
Oh yeah...it is not your average needle.....we don't know what it looks like.......actually, we don't know if it IS a needle.
But keep looking...we will know it when you see it.
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:2)
Even if there is intelligent life around one of these 400 Billion stars, how can we know they use EM to communicate, or would look like anything what we would recognize as intelligent life?
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:1)
That's quite an assumption. Why must we conclude a civilisation has to eventually destroy itself? one civilisation or culture could just as easily merge into another, or just fade away. in anycase, 1000 years seems a little pessimistic.
Re:Let's do some math.... (Score:1)
- SETI is assuming that someone is actually sending a signal that we can pick up. have we sent such signals? twice. both very directed and both for a very short time. sending an omni-directional signal is insanely expensive. would the governments of earth ever allow such a waste of resources? than how can we assume that someone else would?
- the more advanced the civilization, the more likely it is to self-destruct. look how many times we've come close. and it'll only get worse. there may be only a 200-300 year window during which a civilization is advanced enough to both send and pick up signals
- we're assuming that an ET would even bother developing radio waves. what if their atmosphere was such that radio communications on their planet wouldn't have worked? what if their mass communication was done using seismic waves and by the time they got off their globe they were using targetted light beams?
i think SETI is bunk. i once wrote a review of the SETI project [epinions.com] around these sorts of arguments.Re:Or.... (Score:1)
Sounds like REAL good odds.
Sure. But the closest galaxy to our own (not counting the Magellenic Clouds) is 3 million light-years away. 3 million. That means that IF we were able to pick up a signal from Andromeda, and IF we were able to distinguish it from all of the background noise between there and here, the folks who sent it are long gone. The message would have originated at the time when the highest lifeform on Earth was the autralopithecus.
That's our closest neighbor. Expand your search radius to the closest 100 galaxies, and you're talking about messages that were sent at the time dinosaurs walked the earth. Of course, it would be monumental to have solid evidence of ET life; we just wouldn't be able to say "Hi" back.
Re:Or.... (Score:1)
I can travel to Vega and back in 10 days. Unfortunately, it will be the year 2042 on earth when I get back.
Fermi's objection (Score:5, Informative)
Fermi's objection to the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations goes something like this: It should take a spacefaring civilization about 1-10 million years to colonize a space the size of the galaxy, even without faster than light travel (the idea is exponential growth -- we send two colonies, then they send two colonies each, and so on). Since 10 million years is short with respect to the amount of time the galaxy has existed (10 billion years) and the amount of time that life has existed on Earth (4 billion years), there should be evidence of colonization everywhere, even if there is as few as one advanced civilization. So, where is everybody?
I'd like to know if the book discusses this. Many SETI researchers are approaching the conclusion that humanity is the most advanced form of life in our own galaxy, at least.
Re:Fermi's objection (Score:4, Insightful)
Other species may have no interest in space travel. They may well be shocked that at this point in our technological development, we *still* haven't developed the Microstatic Dweebelizer, while we would be shocked at how primitive their transportation technology is.
Other species may have no interest in colonization. Wanting to spread your seed among the stars may be a purely human affair.
Other species may not be as suitable for space travel as we are (not that we're particular suitable). If they are less able to survive a wide range of conditions, for instance if slight (to us) temperature variations are fatal to them, space travel might not appeal to them very much. Further, if they could only live within a narrow range of conditions then other planets wouldn't be particularly appealing. Maybe humans are particularly able to adapt to the physical and psychological rigors of space travel.
Again, while I do tend to agree with Fermi and assume that we are the only intelligent life in the galaxy, there are a lot of unknowns about the way an extraterrestrial species would behave. We're *probably* an 'average' species, in the sense of intelligence, capabilities, and so forth, simply because being in the middle is a lot more likely than being one of the extremes, but for all we know we're exceptional in every way (for better or worse). Maybe we're the only species that wants to conquer space, or maybe we're the only species that has gotten this far and not even tried yet.
Re:Fermi's objection (Score:1)
Re:Fermi's objection (Score:1)
You might also add that other species may have decided not to contact or reveal themselves to us.
-- Brian
Re:Fermi's objection (Score:1)
Re:Fermi's objection (Score:1)
> colonization. Wanting to spread your seed among
> the stars may be a purely human affair.
Although as a Scientific American article on this subject a few years ago said, the only intelligent species we have any actual data on, our own, hasn't destroyed itself, yet, and has every indication of being expansionist.
Even a civilization based on the severest combination of Ludditism, communism, and radical environmentalism would eventually spread through space.
Re:Fermi's objection (Score:3, Informative)
I think we also need to keep in mind that the majority of metal-rich star formation was 7 billion years ago, so other life forms only have about a 3 billion year head-start on earth, not a 6 billion year head-start.
Cubic is less than exponential (Score:2)
[...] even without faster than light travel (the idea is exponential growth -- we send two colonies, then they)
Just to be pedantic, let me point out that this is not exponential (2**n) growth, because it is limited by the speed of light. Instead, there would be no more than cubic growth (n*n*n), because the rate of growth would be limited to the size of a sphere expanding at the speed of light from where this intelligent species originated.
The numbers that you mention already accomodate this, but I thought this subtlety might be of interest to slashdot readers anyhow.
Re:Fermi's objection (Score:2)
Every single inhabitable planet we know of has already been inhabited... what more proof do you want?
Also, bringing life to a planet isn't as easy as simply flying a ship over. To make the colonies self-sufficient, you've got to design a diverse ecosystem specifically adapted to the destination planet and allow it to spread.. not an easy feat. If it's not diverse or self-sufficient, the first plague or late supply ship kills it off.
Besides commiting to travelling to another planet, you've got to have a reason. It's taken us over 4 million years [berkeley.edu] to fill this planet up; At this rate per colonization, 1-10 million years is not neary enough time to expect to fill the whole galaxy.
Arms on a clock (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Arms on a clock (Score:3, Interesting)
Binary.
If you can convery on and off somehow, up or down, in or out, there is a basis for communication. Sure it's not easy, but look at your desktop.. it's created with nothing but ons and off. If we can do that, certainly with enough patience two intelligent beings could develop a method of communication.
For a real world example suggesting that two intelligent beings will always find some way to communicate, consider Helen Keller's story.
Re:Arms on a clock (Score:1)
There's a way of communicating "clockwise", but it's pretty hard. It relies on the fact that "weak interactions" aren't left-right symmetrical. Some details are here [stanford.edu]
This is an important thing to communicate to aliens before we meet them in person. If they hold out their left appendages when we go to shake hands, then we'll know that they're made of anti-matter and that we shouldn't touch them.
No ETIs to be found (Score:2, Interesting)
There was a great piece in Scientific American last year [sciam.com] about why there are no ETIs in our galaxy. I found it thoroughly convincing, at least if you think along these lines: If there were an extra-terrestrial intelligence in our galaxy, and they were explorers, like us (and really, that's probably the only kind of race we'll find until we go out, physically, and look for them), then they most likely would have already colonized the entire galaxy by now.
Chances are, we will colonize the entire galaxy before any other species gets a chance.
That doesn't mean there's not life out there. I think that life is probably commonplace in our galaxy, and I'm sure there's intelligent exploring life in others (but most SETI projects aren't looking that far yet). I would imagine most life in our galaxy is single-celled. Of the entire history of life on this planet, 85+% of the time, it was single-celled.
The conditions under which single-celled organisms evolved to multi-celled organisms was a fluke. In fact, many of the important steps that led to our evolution, were a series of flukes. Evolution does not necessarily lead to intelligence. The objective of evolution is to give you the tools necessary to procreate and continue to exist as a species. Once that job is done, evolution is done.
Humans have been around, what 100,000-200,000 years? The dinosaurs were here for 140,000,000 years, or roughly 1000 times as long as we've been here, and they never developed intelligence.
Anyway, until we have the ability to listen to search for ETIs in other galaxies, I don't think we're going to find any.
Maybe radio isn't the way to go... (Score:1)
No, you want faster communication that the speed of light. At this point, the only type of "communication" that can be done like that involves quantum entanglement. Maybe that's the way to go....
B
Re:Maybe radio isn't the way to go... (Score:2)
Re:No ETIs to be found (Score:2)
You could argue for ants, maybe, but ants are brainless robots. Not enough brainmass...
I'm not sure I agree with the eleven lineages part. Can you point to something? Because as far as I know, the Eukaryotes were the first multi-celled "animals", and therefore the only lineage.
my review (I wasn't that impressed) (Score:3, Interesting)
Danny.
hahah (Score:4, Funny)
alien: how are you gentlemen! We are aliens!
seti geek: omg! fuck! real aliens!
alien: take us to your leader!
seti geek: do you have alien computers?
alien: indeed
seti geek: are they really advanced compared to ours ?
alien: indeed
seti geek: Do you mind if I run seti@home on them ?
graspee
What's the point (Score:2)
I know you will all like to argue that SETI does have a specific desired outcome, but to me, there's more important things to focus on here at home, like searching for a cure to cancer by crunching proteins, building better radiation containment containers, and other worthy causes that distributed computing can be so good for.
My $.02(US).
Calculate What? (Score:2)
Now what are you trying to say there? Seti@home isn't an attempt to calculate a particular number or solve a particular equation, it is an attempt to detect radio signals that may be indicative of an extraterrestrial civilization. There's no solution, but there is a set of possible outcomes, the same set that is associated with such things as "crunching proteins to cure cancer"
IMHO, RC5-64 is a worthless waste of effort. What are you proving by yet-again finding the key used to encrypt a known message? Nothing. There's not even the potential to do anything new.
Re:Calculate What? (Score:2)
You can find out how long it would take to decrypt something without actually doing a brute force attack. Doing a brute force attack is a waste of time, computing power, and electricity. If you really want to run something from d.net, participate in the OGR project instead of RC5 (I do on one of my computers). At least those numbers will be useful once the project is over.
The obvious answer, given the time from #1 above, is: NO!
This isn't the first time I've seen someone bullshit some numbers to prove that something isn't possible. Thought experiments don't prove anything. You can belive something all you want, but you can't prove it until you go out and find some real proof.
Why do you keep talking about Seti like it's an equation that has to be solved? You don't "solve" a search.
hoax (Score:1)
http://www.chipcenter.com/columns/bmcginty/col002
thanks for donating your time and resources (Score:2, Interesting)
Well, that and the competition aspect of it too...
But anyway, it was probably the best practical idea astronomers have had in a while -- if you can't afford a supercomputer, get everyone else to create your supercomputer for you! As we all know, people hesitate to spend money on hardware -- who among us would have even donated $5 to the SETI project? But when you pass that cost along as the associated cost of running the computer you've already bought, people readily shell out the "bucks" or cpu time. I wonder how much "money" has been "donated" to the SETI project in this way?
Re:thanks for donating your time and resources (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:thanks for donating your time and resources (Score:2, Funny)
> the SETI project in this way?
Don't give the IRS any ideas. They're thuglike enough as it
I mean, they're a bunch of swell guys! Keep up the good work!
Surprised SETI hasn't worked yet... (Score:1)
Hot young naked space-cam girls, FREE!
Seti Message Recieved! (Score:5, Funny)
Simply send 6 x 10^50 atoms of hydrogen to the star system at the top of the list, cross off that star system, then put your star system at the bottom of the list and send it to 100 other star systems. Within one-tenth of a galactic rotation you will receive enough hydrogen to power your civilization until entropy reaches its maximum! IT REALLY WORKS!
M@
PCI data crunching (Score:1)
Seti is a waste of time (Score:2)
Seti is like standing in the jungle sceaming in english "hey animals, here i am"
Or sitting in the jungle listening for words in English from animals.
100 percent of the time you will find NOTHING because animals dont speak english.
If Aliens are more intelligent they dont need radio. Even Aliens which are at the same level may not have figured out radio, you see every technology is diffrent, one gruop of aliens may have mastered genetic technologies and communicates in some weird way, another may have mastered nano technology and communicates via telepathy.
Theres just no way to figure it out, radio is communicating with sound, this is assuming aliens even have ears.
Work Unit Monitor (Score:2, Informative)
Just that simple? (Score:2, Funny)
"Hey! How do we communicate with you?"
"Yack gra'phth: Orv'gth."
Re:Just that simple? (Score:1)
Hello sentient life forms. (Score:1)