Profile: David Ledgere

Personal background
I live in Fairfax, Virginia, and work as a financial systems consultant for the Social Security Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency. I suffer from Parkinson's Disease and expect to retire in the next year or two.

I am an Acadian (meaning that my ancestors emigrated from Poitou/Charantes in France to Nova Scotia in the 1600's. We were deported by the British in 1755. My ancestors eventually made their way back to New Brunswick ca. 1770 and to the US in the depression.

I grew up in New England. As a youngster I was always at the top of my class and was fascinated by Astronomy as far back as I can remember. In college I was shocked to find that a 790 on the SAT math score put me at the bottom of my class. Fortunately, I figured out that consuming the results of science can be a lifelong thrill, even if one is not meant to "do" Astronomy. I pursued my interest in improving government, earning a master of public policy degree from the JFK School of Government, Harvard University.

I am married and have six kids who share my interest in science. I lost two other children, one term stillborn and one to Leukemia. The latter, "Pip", in one of his last conversations with me said "I want to be an astronaut when I grow up, Dad." Thanks to NASA, his name, along with many others was digitized and loaded on a DVD which was embarked on the Cassini probe now approaching Saturn. Pip was 5 when his body finally failed him. He was the wisest, bravest person I have ever known.
Thoughts about SETI and SETI@home
I think that the current evidence suggests that about half of all stellar systems like the Sun are multiple systems. A large part of the remaining stars seem to be turning out to have gas giants close in. So earthlike worlds (ones with oceans) may be a vanishingly small remnant. Still, that would leave millions of habitable systems in this galaxy, so where are they?

One of the greatest weaknesses of our planet's governments and economies is that they plan only a few years into the future. Whenever I tell someone about the flight plans for the remaining useful life of the Voyager starships (to return the first direct measurements from interstellar space (outside of the heliosphere) in 2029 to 2033, they seem ...what? awestruck? baffled? bored? I hope that we find a civilization light-decades from here. Any further and the general public will be inspired for one or two days and then relegate the new discovery to the dustbin of history.

I run SETI@home beause I don't have direct access to Arecibo! What greater quest could there be? I am descended from Guillaume Trahant, Knight of the Round Table and Keeper of the Holy Grail. I am merely continuing the quest.
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