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| Personal background |
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I'm 54 years old, a private pilot for the last thirty years, and have done a fair amount of database development although at present I'm not employed as a programmer. I work for a large instrument company that is based in San Jose CA, and we as a company manufacture numerous types of mass spectrometers.
At the present time I reside in the Akron Ohio area and have also lived near Atlanta GA some years ago.
There are three PC here at home, and two of these are running SETI@Home. The third one will probably the program in the next few days. |
| Thoughts about SETI and SETI@home |
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There is no doubt in my mind that not only extraterrestrial life exists, but that there must be life elsewhere that has developed intelligence. It seems utterly impossible that other forms of intelligent life have not developed elsewhere.
Although it seems to me that the parameters of the SETI@Home search are well chosen and thought out, it still remains possible that we on Earth do not possess the TYPE of intelligence, or even possibly the TYPE of technologies that would result in the discovery of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe.
Although certain features of the cosmos seem to indicate that intelligent beings may well choose certain frequencies to facilitate communications over interstellar distances, it certainly could be that THEIR TYPE of intelligence and technology would not result in the same conclusions that seem so plain to us.
Given these thoughts I do not feel as if any sort of prediction on when ETI may be discovered if at all. I do again maintain that we must continue to search for ETI on a continuing basis using all reasonable resources.
It seems unwise, at least at this time, for earth to even consider transmitting any signals on the order of a "beacon" along the thought lines considered in the SETI@Home search theories. Since we have absolutely no idea whatever regarding the motivations of possible ET civilizations, to do so could conceivably be courting disaster at a future time, even though possibly many years in the future. We should continue to SEARCH for evidence of other civilizations before any consideration is given to returning the message.
Anything is possible, and particularly so when NOTHING is known at present.
I run SETI@Home because it seems to be the thing to do. The SETI is a massively complex and expensive project which in my opinion is not funded nearly well enough. The sum power of millions of home computers is well spent and the costs are spread so thinly among home users that to a given individual the expenditure approaches nil.
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