l’ve bet a cup of coffee to any and all that by 2035 we’ll have evidence of E.T. To many of my colleagues, that sounds like a losing proposition. For more than a half-century, a small coterie of scientists has been pursuing the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or SETI. And we haven’t found a thing.I’m optimistic by nature—as a scientist, you have to be. But my hopeful feeling is not wishful thinking; it is firmly grounded in the logic of SETI. Half a century sounds like a long time, but the search is truly in its early days. Given the current state of SETI efforts and abilities, I feel that we’re on the cusp of learning something truly revolutionary.Most of our experiments so far have used large radio antennas in an effort to eavesdrop on radio signals transmitted by other societies, an approach that was dramatized by Jodie Foster in the 1997 movie Contact. Unlike other alien potboilers, Contact’s portrayal of how we might search for extraterrestrials was reasonably accurate. Nonetheless, that film reinforced the common belief that SETI practitioners paw through cosmic static looking for unusual patterns, such as a string of prime numbers. The truth is simpler: We have been searching for narrow-band signals. “Narrow-band” means that a large fraction of the transmitter power is squeezed into a tiny part of the radio dial, making the transmission easier to find. This is analogous to the way a laser pointer, despite having only a few milliwatts of power, nonetheless looks bright because the energy is concentrated into a narrow wavelength range.
After so long searching fruitlessly looking for something that's not there it would be hard for anyone to admit they're wrong. So, just dig the heels in...
Perhaps a lot of the money sent to SETI and otherwise similar wasteful enterprises could go towards funding more Discovery/New Horizons missions etc
If there are aliens, they may not be using our type of communication, but some other form that we cannot detect.
I’ve wondered if there is the possibility that all biological life is supplanted by machine life as an inevitability and until a similar thing happens here there will not be a detection of other intelligence.
Quote from: Star One on 10/06/2017 07:40 amI’ve wondered if there is the possibility that all biological life is supplanted by machine life as an inevitability and until a similar thing happens here there will not be a detection of other intelligence.That presupposes that biological life has to be intelligent life that develops artificial machine intelligence.Ironically, we're most likely to find extraterrestrial life if we deploy our own artificial intelligence to keep relentlessly searching for it.
I skimmed it but missed a compelling argument for why he thinks we will find something. Is it because by 2035 we will have thoroughly explored the LaGrange points and the Moon? I'm dubious of that timeline.
<snip>Sci-fi is sci-fi, but one could argue that the long history of life on Earth is evidence against the existence of Berserker planet-killing starships (see Fred Saberhagen's novels), and therefore malevolent AI in the universe. If we ever create strong AI, we'll test the Berserker/Skynet hypothesis soon enough.In the end, the Fermi paradox looms large. IMHO, we're a long way from either getting positive proof, or being able to draw a negative conclusion.
I think that if extraterrestrial intelligence is not discovered by 2035 or so, the interest for looking for it will diminish even more. Seth Shostak is kind of making that worse by making deadlines like that. Bbut of course to improve enthusiasm in the short term, which is a crucial step to the long term. And soon this date will be forgotten anyway. What could he say? It's his job to promote SETI, and I think this crazy guy does a very good job. And it certainly would be a very bad idea to not even try looking.