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| Personal background |
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My main interest in life is understanding the (suspected) illusion of self-existence. I go along with the Buddhist point of view that what we assume to be a permanent self is an illusion. Nothing exists independently of the causes that produce it. If really true, this would solve a lot of personal problems. The Buddha struggled with this mystery for about six years before solving it. My own quest is taking longer than his and sometimes I have gotten discouraged, but I haven't given up. I have spent the past eight years mostly as a homeless desert hermit (in the arizona sonoran desert far from city lights) under starry skies without a roof, or hiking long-distance twice from mexico to canada along mountain crests (thru-pct 1994, thru-cdt 1999). But lately because of advancing age and a bad knee I have rented an apartment and bought a computer, trying something new.
Everything that occurs on a quest, such as hiking to Canada, is experienced finally as a thought, be it pleasant, painful or neutral. The seemingly solid sensations that are experienced by our senses, in the end they are only just thoughts. Even negative thoughts of discouragement or regrets for the past are only just thoughts. I keep patiently sifting through all this mental noise looking for something real. The seti search for extraterrestrial intelligence "out there" seems a bit ironic to me considering that my own existence is in question "in here". The seti search is like an external quest paralleling my inner quest, so it interests me as a model of my own quest.
Even if we do not learn anything about intelligence in outer space, we may learn something about intelligence in inner space.
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| Thoughts about SETI and SETI@home |
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1. I think extraterrestrial life exists, probably even intelligent life. If we are truly alone in the six realms of the universe that would be remarkable. But as long as we believe that "we" are "here" and "they" are "there", we may be groping in the dark without a clue. We don't understand how we might already exist there. It may also be possible that the reason we have not heard from intelligent life is that intelligence may contain the seeds of its own destruction, or it may evolve into a state of existence we cannot perceive. We may be like frogs by a pond listening expectantly for other frog croaks, while meanwhile the rumble of a distant airplane that may reach our hearing is mistaken for thunder before rain.
2. Useless to transmit, maybe even dangerous. A beacon would not be understood as intended. If other civilizations are not transmitting their beacons, maybe we should ask ourselves why not.
3. I run seti@home to share in a project with other fellow humans or to try out an interesting idea. I don't expect a signal to be detected but we may learn something by trying.
Suggestion: SETI is a global project unifying the world. Logically the appropriate government to fund it is not the United States but the United Nations. |
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