| Personal background |
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Dave Hinerman, a.k.a Hinermad
Born in 1960, the oldest son of a Navy radioman. I've been interested in electronic communications ever since I could turn the knobs on the TV. I was introduced to electricity at a young age; when I was 4 I stuck an electric shaver cord in my mouth while it was full of water. I guess I had a taste for power.
I grew up in Southeastern Ohio, the Appalachian foothills, Nelsonville to be precise. (Birthplace of Sarah Jessica Parker, too, although I've never met her.) I studied electronics at the local college. It was either that or farm machinery maintenance. I got a ham radio license in my teens. I'm hoping to set a record for the longest distance contact with SETI@home.
Now I'm a software engineer, writing embedded software for electronic instruments and giving the hardware engineers fits.
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| Thoughts about SETI and SETI@home |
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Let's take these in order:
Do I think extraterrestrial life exists? Yes. I hope very much that we can make contact. As to "when" and "how" we'll discover it, I have no idea. I think the revelation that "we are not alone" will be a shock, but I don't think we'll see the mass panic that some people seem to expect. One thing I REALLY want to learn from E.T. is about his spiritual life - who or what does he worship?
Should humans transmit a beacon? We already have! Earth is such an electrically noisy place (as I'm sure you're aware if you read about the measures SETI@home goes through to reject terrestrial interference). As for a signal coded for others to notice, I think it's a good idea. I'd include basic information about our biology, the kind of environment we inhabit, some examples of our art and expression. Not much need to include our location - they'll figure it out.
Why do I run SETI@home? I got tired of looking for intelligent life on Earth, so I turned my search elsewhere. (Grin) Serously, to try to help answer THE question: "Are we alone?" Also, I like idea of taking part in a distributed computing project. Even if S@h doesn't identify any intelligence, it's demonstrated the feasibility of huge cooperative computing projects.
I approve of the way the project is being run. There are rules, certainly, that might seem restrictive but there's a good reason given for every one. The openness, the efforts to keep us aware of what's happening, what results are appearing, makes me feel that every contribution, no matter how small, is appreciated.
All I can suggest is to "keep the pipe full" with projects for the future. There's a lot of momentum in the 2 million users who are willing to contribute their own time and CPU cycles to what seems like a long shot. SETI@home has done an excellent job of calling us together - give us the job, we can do it!
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