[ExI] SETI needs new approach (was for the fermi paradox fans)

[Adrian Tymes]

On Sun, Jun 22, 2014 at 7:42 AM, The Avantguardian <
avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> True. But how much *time* do we have compared to our potential
> competitors/collaborators in other star systems?
>

There is slightly more evidence for "billions of years" than for "until
tomorrow" - to wit: no obvious immediate threats in our lightcone.
Anything beyond that is unjustifiable speculation.


> >But there are at least two variants of #2 that seem more likely.  Either
> some signal was accidentally transmitted on that frequency (and whoever did
> it isn't stepping forward because illegal or illegal) and bounced off, or
> one was transmitted on a nearby frequency and got frequency shifted in the
> process of bouncing off.
>
> So choose. Which is more unbelievable? Extraterrestrials or a conspiracy
> theory?


I have no reason to choose.  Both of them are less believable than mundane
explanations, such as the one I just gave.


> The laws of physics gave rise to life here. What is so special about
> *here*?
>

Coincidence and chance is one possibility.  As unlikely as it sounds, it
does completely explain what we observe, without any even-less-likely
additions.


>   >When we (presumably an intelligent species) sent out the Arecibo
> message, we only did it *once*. Why would they do any differently?
> >>
> >
> >Because they wanted there to be no mistake on the receiving end?  Or they
> wanted to avoid the chance that the listener happened not to be listening
> at that moment?
>
> You are assuming that *we* are supposed to be the recieving end. That
> seems an unlikely assumption. The majority of tweets do not go to Lone
> Signal.
>

You asked about an extraterrestrial equivalent to the Arecibo message.  By
definition in that case, we would be supposed to be on the receiving end.


> Repeated signals are hard to reliably incorporate when everything in the
> universe from electrons up to galaxies spin.


That a thing is hard to acquire does not change whether it would be the
necessary proof.

Thought experiment: how often is Greenwich, England at its closest possible
> distance from Olympus Mons on Mars? Now imagine that instead of Mars its
> some exoplanet in a star system many light years away.


The daily, or even yearly, variance in the distance from Greenwich to Mars,
as a fraction of the total distance, is far smaller than the daily and
yearly variances from Greenwich to any exoplanet, as a fraction of that
total distance.


> those damnable queen ants with their aristrocratic airs.


Ant "queens" are more like "breeding slaves": kept alive and nurtured so
they can produce more ants, but only so long as they keep popping out
larvae, and forbidden from leaving.  While I grant that there are humans
who enjoy aspects of that as a fetish, the package as a whole for the
slave's entire life from first pregnancy to death is far from mainstream
practice.

Why go through all the work of mining and refining gold when you can just
> take the finished product from the Incas?


If you can travel the stars, you can get gold - or just about any other raw
resource - in great quantities from places without life that will sabotage
your efforts to take it.  Unless they're within several light years of us,
these rocks would be much closer to them, too.


> I am willing concede that that the fraction of the signals SETI has
> recieved is from intelligent ETs *could* be zero if you are willing to
> concede it *could* be grester than zero. I just don't appreciate that a
> lack of evidence is being paraded as a logical paradox. If you are
> unwilling to to fund the experiment, then you deserve to be ignorant.
>

I don't have to claim that the odds are literally zero.  I just have to
note that the probability of there being one, in the fraction of signal
space they have yet to explore using the limited methods they propose,
times the potential benefit if they find something, is estimated at less
than the amount they are requesting.

Yes, the potential benefit is quite, quite large.  The odds are quite,
quite small - again, *using the methods they currently propose*.  My
"contribution", by spending the money instead on my rocket launch startup
CubeCab, is focusing on making LEO and beyond more practical for humanity
to access, so that among many other things, SETI can easily access and
propose to use substantially less limited methods, drastically increasing
their odds of finding something if it is out there...and resulting in all
kinds of other benefits even if SETI still finds nothing.

It is akin to the problem of hunger in Africa.  You can feed 1,000 people
for a year - or with that same money, you can fund changing their
conditions so that they can keep what crops they grow, allowing them to
keep themselves out of hunger for much longer.  You don't have enough money
to do both at once.
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