Physics?

Oh you mean who is to say it doesn't take their civilization 1000 years to properly develop modern radio techniques? Or a million? Nobody said that it couldn't happen but its highly implausible... unless its a species with far less intelligence and ingenuity then humanity.

And whats with the "biased" claim... what did I say that was biased? I didn't show unfair prejudice against something in that statement, I merely stated the facts at that point (what you quoted was the facts, not my logical conclusions from said facts)

Because of limited resources. Some things DON'T have to be either/or... those require that those things do not compete for resources. (in this case, funding).

I've been wanting to develop a real starfighter, and according to Stephen Hawking, I guess I better get on that.

Damn!  I forgot how hot Leonard Nimoy was in his prime.  Thanks Fuzzy Logic.

taltamir... a different civilization would be different. It might get to different discoveries at different times in its development than ours. There wouldn't be a Protestant Reformation and all the other factors creating the Industrial Revolution... they might happen at differential rates... different lifespans, different cultural values...

The Laws of Physics are not variable. They are not the only variables however, and the mode of their discovery might vary widely from how we discovered them. They might not advance beyond them for a long time... or not at all. Who knows?

To assume they would develop at the same rate is a bias. Not an evil one, but still a bias since it assumes things which are not necessarily true, and blinds one to other possibilities. Sitting here with our eyes and ears (and minds) open, not assuming anything and just trying to interpret findings as objectively as we can with our knowledge expanding all the time (and thus requiring revisions in prior thinking and interpretation) is all we can do.

To reject it all out of hand is blinding ones self unnecessarily. 

1. They are not going to have radio communication powerful enough to be seen from space without having gone through industrialization. (it requires mass produced over the air mass media)

2. If for some reason their period of radio powerful enough to be detected from another planet but primitive enough to be detectable via techniques seti utilizes lasts much longer its still a tiny insignificant amount of time in evolutionary scale.

3. Stop using the strawman that I am assuming identical rates of development, I never did. I presented the facts (the rate of development of humanity) and left it for others to draw conclusions.

Despite the possibility that radio is easy for any extraterrestrial beings to pick up, it suffers from a few glaring problems.

First of all there's attenuation.  Over many light years, radio signals become less powerful, unless of course someone gets the clever idea of launching a bunch of radio relays into the galaxy to amplify the signal and pass it along to the destination.

Then there's the effects of interstellar matter on radio waves and the natural background radio noise.  Basically it's like trying to yell across a crowded nightclub to your friends.

Also, there's no guarantee that the signal will actually be received at the other end, even if the equipment is available, because you can't predict that aliens will do the same thing we're trying to do - make contact.

I was actually just thinking that we should be looking for directed neutrino sources as well.  This explains better than I could.

It's not looking for BBC World news..... it's looking for non-background energy transmissions generally within the 'radio' frequencies [since they're called RADIO Telescopes - NOT 'radio antennas' [like your Tranny has]].

Eg...your car's ignition system emits radio frequencies.

Actually they ARE looking for BBC. Analog TV transmission is about the easiest thing to detect.

SETI can only detect lightly compressed data and carrier waves. Modern data compression with high compression rates (such as what humans use today) and removal of wasteful carrier waves is no longer distinguishable from white noise.

Furthermore, advances in transmission led to ever more efficient directional antenna that are releasing less and less excess radio waves into deep space. The strength of transmissions going to outer space from earth has already peaked years ago and has actually declined.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox#Communication_is_impossible_for_technical_reasons

Please note that wikipedia is NOT my source on this one. I have read studies by actual scientists on the subject. Wikipedia just provides a decent summary of the issues.

I don't understand why you think that radio communication will suddenly go away.  If we assume that our current understanding of physics is correct, radio is always going to be around because:

1) Being light, it travels as fast as anything in the universe

2) It isn't easily absorbed by stuff that gets in its way (the interstellar medium, the atmosphere of a planet)

3) It's the lowest energy form of light, so it's relatively easy to produce

Therefore, it's somewhat likely that we will be able to detect radio from a technologically advanced civilization.  That does assume that there isn't some sort of magic (ie sufficiently advanced technology) based on physics that we don't currently know, but I think  that any reasonable discussion has to assume that our understanding of physics is at least somewhat correct.

Now, humans are moving away from easily detectable radio signals, which is somewhat problematic.  But I don't think that its reasonable to assume that all aliens will move in the same direction with their technology.  Some of them might not move toward directional communication for any number of reasons.

So yeah, there are assumptions going on that lesson the chances of detecting aliens, but the price tag on the project is hardly large by any reasonable standard.

The frontiers of research have to do with understanding how the universe works. The MRI that detected your medical problem came from a machine built to tell what atoms are in interstellar space. That is a practical application. Not discovery and exploration.

To maintain that we shouldn't be doing ANYTHING (such as SETI) because in someone's FAR less than humble opinion is not productive... well, it is among the classic examples of sheer intellectual dullness which I can conceive of.

Anything which adds to human knowledge is worthy (and this includes the null experiments) and it is sheer arrogance to presume to judge what is and is not "worthy".

One of the great geniuses humanity has produced said about himself and his discoveries that he was "like a small child playing and discovering a pretty pebble or shell while the vast ocean of undiscovered truth lay in front of him". That was Sir Isaac Newton.

If you can't duplicate or exceed his genius, at least aspire to his humility. Please.

And don't criticize those who at least try. No one has that 'right'.

Very well said, Doc, you hit the nail square on the head, there. Many of the products we use today are a direct result of 'so-called' waste of time and money research/exploration into space.

I just hope that the end of the Shuttle Program doesn't herald the end of space exploration because the benefits are too great to lose.  The same goes for SETI, we need to keep monitoring space for other intelligent life... who knows, it may turn out to be our saviour at the end of the day.

Show me were I said that.

If you read my posts, I didn't say radio will go away. I said detectibility goes away.

I explained a variety of technical reasons why, such as carrier waves, the analog vs digital tv, directional vs omnidirectional transmission, modern compression algorithms, etc.

Humanity's transmissions into deep space has declined and what is going out is far less discernible as being artificial. Use went up, but technology improved.

Being against SETI is not the same as being against galactic exploration. There are projects that try to map the galaxy and beyond... those are admirable.

Which is why you should steal someone elses money and give it to SETI via taxation to not be a blithering dullard... yes?

What did SETI add to human knowledge? All your claims are from space exploration which is admirable... not from scanning the sky for analog TV signals.

Also there is a HUGE fucking difference between "you should not be allowed to do this" and "this should not be funded by taxpayer, and as for donations, I wouldn't donate to it myself when there are better uses for the money"

What a steaming load.

1. He doesn't know as much about genetics as he thinks he does.

2. I would stop and talk to a worm if I observed it behaving like a sentient being.

Humans did not arbitrarily define themselves as smarter then other animals on this planet. We are desperately searching for the tiniest glimmer of intellect, we have tried decoding their "languages" to see if perhaps their minds are merely alien and they communicate with each other, we are looking and so far we are not find any that are quite there. Although some come very close.

PS. Sorry for double post but forum quote function exploded on me again (it's very buggy) and I had to split the post in half to fix it.

Since space is all about the TARDIS ..... declining radio emissions is meaningless as whatever level they WERE at is still dispersing.

...AM Radio stations can be on the decline [here] but radio 'noise' is still emitted [here].

And SETI is NOT about 'here' ....it is about THERE.

Yes, it could be argued it's almost as valid to just stick your nose into the air and 'hope' to SMELL alien life .... but in reality the MOST FAR-REACHING 'sense' we have yet developed is the RADIO 'telescope' ...so it makes more SENSE [no pun] to 'listen'.

Meanwhile, intelligent life HERE is debatable..... as emotions unravel and spelling goes tits-up.....