SETI is "Hunting with new tools"

SETI is boosting their efforts in the search for intellegent life by introducing their latest telescope which they say will be able to search more star systems in the next 1-2 years than any that have been used in the past 45 years.

HAT CREEK, Calif. - Astronomer Michael M. Davis checked his computer. One of the antennas on the state-of-the-art radio telescope being built in the valley outside his office was picking up an unusual pulse from beyond the earth. A signal from another intelligent civilization? Not today. It was the Rosetta Satellite, en route to study a comet.

Hopeful moments followed by disappointments like this are par for the course for researchers at the SETI Institute, the privately funded successor to the now defunct government project dedicated to searching for alien life. They have been searching the heavens for decades, but they have not been able to gather enough data to conclude, or even guess, whether we are alone in the universe.

This time, however, the scientists hope things might be different. This month, the first telescope designed specifically for such a search began scanning the skies. It is still in its early stage of development, but when it is completed the telescope will be so powerful that it will be able to look at more stars in a year or two than we have in the past 45 years.

"The absence of a signal so far is not particularly compelling," said Davis, an adjunct professor emeritus at Cornell University who recently joined SETI to oversee the telescope project. "We could have a billion intelligent cultures with radio waves buzzing around them . . ., but we haven't had the capability to detect them."

www.msnbc.msn.com...

Personally, I have mixed feelings about SETI. I think that it's great that they are focusing sooo much time and energy into the search for radio signals in distant solar systems. But, I sometimes think that their efforts could also be spent more productively investigating occurence closer to home. But, it seems that each group has their niche, and SETI is just covering the radio waves niche. On the other hand, the dog and pony show they did during the "Peter Jennings UFO Special" was completely ridiculous and to me showed me how one sided and closed minded they can be.

SETI sounds like a group that had "good intentions" at first but then turned into a hoax aimed at fooling ignorant 'ufologists'. Space travel is more important than searching the infinity of space of radio waves that can come from multiple sources.

I agree. I think that SETI had good intentions, and could still pull thru. But they have tarnished their image with their need to bash anything that isn't soley focused on searching for radio signals in the cosmos. The idea that anything could be going on near our own planet is laughable to them. Not very open minded of them, IMO.

SETI is all smoke and mirriors...

I am not sure, however, to what extent they know they are being used.

The fact that they are not really a civilian organization accountable to a purely civilian authority means they are inherrently compromised anyways.

You think they'd tell us if they found something?

Not bloody likely...

Well I for one love SETI. I think it's great, and this is an a fantastic development. I look forward to it.

This would be a great post for the SETI forum... *wink wink*

I have never read about any progress made by SETI. They gave us no clues or leads to anything. They should change the direction of their efforts to something else more productive like supporting space exploration or the Hubble Telescope.

Originally posted by Amorymeltzer
This would be a great post for the SETI forum... *wink wink*

Ya, ya I knew that was coming

[edit on 31-5-2005 by mpeake]

Originally posted by IncubusMorningView2001
I have never read about any progress made by SETI. They gave us no clues or leads to anything. They should change the direction of their efforts to something else more productive like supporting space exploration or the Hubble Telescope.

To paraphrase most every genius, but specifically Edison, SETI hasn't made not progress, SETI has just found lots of places without aliens.

I have always liked SETI, at least it gets a little respect which for the subject of UFOs is pretty rare.

On the other hand, their narrow focus seems to me to be only looking for a very narrow sample of possible alien beings. Those that happen to use a particular band of energy. So I have no trouble with the notion that they may have started as, or even continue to be, agents of disinformation.

But...

To those that believe that SETI is controled to some unknown degree by those who wish to keep secrets: Ok, perhaps, but still, people have to look to be able to see. And control over humans is never perfect so SETI is one more place where someone with honor might discover something interesting.


A.T
(-)