The things you mention are all interesting relevant information, but are more a status report for contributors (very welcome of course) than something that can be published in a refereed journal. For that we need "the results we have obtained" and not "how hard we have worked without finding anything." In Einstein's case they have published well-defined upper limits, improved with each set of measurements -- results capable of guiding subsequent searches or black hole theory. They are looking for things which are difficult to detect but definitely predicted by theory. We are looking for things which are certainly difficult to detect and for which the theory is still largely guesswork.

If we can generate results that, for example, define a more accurate upper bound to the probability of an advanced civilisation within 100 parsecs, that would be worth publishing.

New algorithms could perhaps be published in computing journals with sufficient simulation or analysis to back them up, even in the absence of hard results, but then we would fall foul of the complaints that we are more interested in the computing than the science.

Again, I challenge you: what in your mind would be "science?"

In the case of SETI@home, papers could be published saying things like;
what frequencies they have searched,
how the searched,
how they stored the data,
how they analysed the data,
What algorithms they used,
What parts of the sky they surveyed,
What candidates they looked for,
what difficulties they came accross,
And how they adapted their search over time to learn from the results they were getting.

John.

Questions like "how they searched" (piggybacked on either SERENDIP or ALFA) are well documented.

The frequency is well documented, and hasn't changed over the past decade (we can argue over the choice of the hydrogen line, but that is the published choice).

"How they stored the data" is engineering, not science. Alot of your other questions are answered in papers like this one: http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/~korpela/papers/CISE.pdf but again, while it's all very interesting, it's as much engineering as anything else.

This one is interesting: http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/~korpela/papers/likelyhood.pdf as does this http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/~korpela/papers/werthimer01.pdf

I didn't search very hard.

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A lot of space-based telescopes and state-of-art earth telescopes looking out to the twinkling black are going to be the ET finders. Without them being official "SETI" lookers, it seems we'll get the best evidence from these devices.

A lot of my low-feelings about the search came from a quick scan of threads, where it seemed my(computer) 24/7/365, 4 year classic crunching was a wash. Most of the WUs my cpu/mem sweated on were rehash units. Sent to my computer to give it something to do, but not really for the purpose of any ET finding. To keep the "moral" of the project going(and donations flowing in?)?.

I don't know. With childhood forebrain damage, maybe I don't think right.
I'm a great chicken stacker however.

As I've repeated many times since hearing it from Jimi: ETs lookin' down on us, they sayin': those people so uptight, they sure do know how to make a mess.

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May we All have a METAMORPHOSIS. REASON. GOoD JUDGEMENT and LOVE and ORDER!!!!!

A lot of my low-feelings about the search came from a quick scan of threads, where it seemed my(computer) 24/7/365, 4 year classic crunching was a wash. Most of the WUs my cpu/mem sweated on were rehash units. Sent to my computer to give it something to do, but not really for the purpose of any ET finding. To keep the "moral" of the project going(and donations flowing in?)?.

SETI Classic sent out whatever was on the servers: work requests were always filled. I've read that some work units were sent out 17 times.

BOINC does not reissue work just to keep the outbound queue full, so unlike classic, we need a steady flow of work that was not previously crunched, or the queue "goes dry" and we wait for the next package from Puerto Rico.

There was some work that had been recorded a while ago and never processed, mainly because it was believed to be noisy, but that wasn't reissued work, it was simply set aside because it was between noisy tapes and therefore, probably noisy.

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Some people believe ET's are already here. Personally, if I were an ET I would come to a place just like this to learn about humans and to keep a track of how close they're getting to discovering us. And with the added benefit of learning about our information technologies as they develop.

If I had to pinpoint an ET:
He would live in California.
He would be very knowledgeable of computers and networking.
He would post primarily in number crunching.
Last but not least, he would obviously be extremely intelligent.

I can think of several good candidates for an ET. :)

Clever aliens would be nervously pacing up and down hoping that the next shuttle home was running on time.

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Clever aliens would be nervously pacing up and down hoping that the next shuttle home was running on time.

Can't say that I would blame them. Humans can be very violent and unpredictable.

ET would also be prone to violence and unpredictabilty.

Since physics/cosmology is same throughout Universe, intelligent life(any life) would follow the same course. Life kills to survive.

Even intelligent sentients living tens/hundreds of million years in generations more than homo sapiens will not have changed their basic eat what you kill, keep what you kill moralities.

ET would be Riddick, Necromongers, name your favorite. The Ethicals in the RiverWorld Series by P.J. Farmer is a good example.

But, what's the diff? The message will always be: Servers may be temporarily down or project has no work.

That's the message ET will have. Same Same.

ET would also be prone to violence and unpredictabilty.

Since physics/cosmology is same throughout Universe, intelligent life(any life) would follow the same course. Life kills to survive.

Even intelligent sentients living tens/hundreds of million years in generations more than homo sapiens will not have changed their basic eat what you kill, keep what you kill moralities.

ET would be Riddick, Necromongers, name your favorite. The Ethicals in the RiverWorld Series by P.J. Farmer is a good example.

But, what's the diff? The message will always be: Servers may be temporarily down or project has no work.

That's the message ET will have. Same Same.

I'd like to think that we (and they) would evolve, even if they started out driven by survival.

But who knows. We're starting with a sample of exactly one, and some would argue, a sample of zero, intelligent life forms.

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GAIA as described by Asimov in his Foundation Series existed on only one planet, out of 25 million inhabited in the Galaxy. And no one outside knew about it.

As the population grows exponentially in the Galaxy, only distance and separation will keep death by killing at an evolutionary stable state.

Going off-Planet to a new uninhabited World will be the only way for
continued survival.

Thank goodness technology will always advance to give sentients a way out,
if only temporary.

It's not running away, it's the only way.

Chicken Stacker,
In posting this thread, you asked the most intelligent question of all; "Is SETI@home about finding ET anymore?"

I'm glad you asked it and i hope you get some idea from the discussion's here what the current state of play is with SETI@home.

In your last two messages, you speak with great wisdom. I tend to agree with your sentiments. In the long term, survival will be down to what species can propagate farthest and fastest through out the galaxy's.

I also think that in the long run, some other group other than SETI@home will discover ET, and it will happen by accident as a by-product of something else they were researching. But keep crunching SETI@home, its a great way to "Participate". Other than distributed computing, SETI@home has at least raised awareness about searching for other life.

John.

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I actually do care about the ideas behind distributed computing. The paper I'd really like to see is on the social aspects of distributed computing -- what makes people so incredibly dedicated that they'll spend thousands of (dollars/euros/spacebucks/etc.) to gear up for the search.

Agree!!!

Europeans and Yanks won't admit it(most don't know) the Chinese are the first to circumnavigate the World and they "discovered" America and quite a few other Continents in the early 1400s. Possibly they came to North, Central and South America much earlier(800-1000 years ago). Gavin Mendies proves it in his books 1421 and 1433. One of the many proofs is a certain species of chicken endemic to China found in many of the Countries, us Old Worlders supposedly discovered first. No, I'm not a chicken expert.

Their descendants will most likely go off-Planet more sucessfully than others, with us Paddies, Scots, and others in their wake. I wonder if they have their own SETI.

Anyways, thanks Qui-Gon and Johnney Guinness for you kind thoughts.

I started BOINC again. I want to get to 100,000. For the Sickness, you know. ET can go to...wherever it goes.

My apologies to any descendants of Atlantis who can disagree because of their knowledge to the contrary.

Europeans and Yanks won't admit it(most don't know) the Chinese are the first to circumnavigate the World and they "discovered" America and quite a few other Continents in the early 1400s. Possibly they came to North, Central and South America much earlier(800-1000 years ago). Gavin Mendies proves it in his books 1421 and 1433. One of the many proofs is a certain species of chicken endemic to China found in many of the Countries, us Old Worlders supposedly discovered first. No, I'm not a chicken expert.

Their descendants will most likely go off-Planet more successfully than others, with us Paddies, Scots, and others in their wake. I wonder if they have their own SETI.

Anyways, thanks Qui-Gon and Johnney Guinness for you kind thoughts.

I started BOINC again. I want to get to 100,000. For the Sickness, you know. ET can go to...wherever it goes.

My apologies to any descendants of Atlantis who can disagree because of their knowledge to the contrary.

I already knew that, But of course the Norse discovered America before anybody else from Europe or Asia in 1000AD, Over 400 years before the Chinese or Columbus.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

It is Gavin Menzies, not Mendies. Sorry G.M.

Glad you knew it Joker, but the Basque were in North America before the Vikings.
Around 800 AD.

And the first footers on N.A. soil were actually Europeans of 25,000 years ago.
They came across the Atlantic Ice Bridge. So, they were here before the Siberian Indians.

Again, I apologize to the descendants of Atlantis who know better.
Also, I apologize to ET, who knows better than all.

OK. But America was known to Europe only after the voyages of Colombo. Giovanni da Verrazzano and John Cabot (Giovanni Caboto). This is history.
Tullio

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As the pixels glare and seer into my eyes bringing me closer to your essence, I wonder what can be driving us to tap upon these plastic squares of needful communication across the great digital divide which has become this fine and putrid part of our being. Space is not just the vast darkness above us on this night, concealing great distances and undiscovered wonders, but a black dark soul not connected to anything, yet screaming out for that touch that binds two to become one yet separate entities of searching lost nomads of the moon's domain.
-Copyrighted 2007 Chicken Stacker

Well, I'll leave it at: It's about discovery. We for ET, ET for us. Or not.

It may not be the hostile acts of sentients which stop all discoveries, or
the cataclysmic, but the little microbes who will destroy all attempts, and
possibly, are the ETs for all sentients to begin with.

Go small my fellow sentients, go small.

It is Gavin Menzies, not Mendies. Sorry G.M.

Glad you knew it Joker, but the Basque were in North America before the Vikings.
Around 800 AD.

And the first footers on N.A. soil were actually Europeans of 25,000 years ago.
They came across the Atlantic Ice Bridge. So, they were here before the Siberian Indians.

Again, I apologize to the descendants of Atlantis who know better.
Also, I apologize to ET, who knows better than all.

Sorry CS, But this link Here and Here disputes that, They were 2nd, Vikings 1st(Norse). So If You have the link, We'd love to read It.

http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_North_America

The Farfarers: Before the Norse wiki wrote:

Canada

It is now an established archaeological fact that the Vikings sailed from Greenland to Newfoundland, Canada (which they called 'Vinland'). Mowat theorizes that the Albans did this first. He claims to have found low stone walls shaped to provide a foundation for upturned boats (used as dwellings) on pebble beaches in Ungava (northern Quebec) and Labrador. He further argues that the Albans settled in Newfoundland.

Finally, Mowat suggests that the Albans were gradually driven into hiding as the Vikings, and later the Basques and English, settled Newfoundland.

But so far ET hasn't made much if any mark in the current historical record.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

Glad you know Joker. I don't do Battle of the Links. Or Books.

I admit I know nothing. I give up. Uncle.

I'll ask R. Daneel Olivaw when I see him. I'm sure he knows.

Or the next time an Ethical visits me.

Lazarus Long once told me.....heck, what's it matter.

Just dust like Carl in The End. Eh, Jim?

Just arrived from Nature magazine:
SETI
Tullio

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For me, Nature has the last word.

Except to say: As the Quantcrobes surf on their strings from brane to brane
and we continue to look for the passageway out of this realm, me and the
frakking descendants from Caprica will search for ET, except on those certain
days we can't.

Appreciate the participation. Would like to see 1000 views. If not, so
be it.

Good day/night. Good luck and here is a stock tip: CPST and PPHM.