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Basically, what the last several decades has shown is that while they're probably out there, we won't find aliens until we make serious attempts to look, rather
by mapt 12y ago
Basically, what the last several decades has shown is that while they're probably out there, we won't find aliens until we make serious attempts to look, rather than token efforts.
That means funding astronomy an order of magnitude more than we do now, and flat-out demanding that we mitigate risk and reduce R&D cost-share by building ten to a hundred of everything. Presently we spend a decade and a half perfecting a design's technical aspects and securing funding only to build one unit over five years, with a 70% chance of scaling back that unit or stretching out construction by five more years because of insecure funding late in the game. We should instead spend 3 years designing, 2 years building a prototype and iterating, and 5 years building and installing a large number of production-run units, before moving on to the next design.
Nearly every instrument on every large telescope today is 'couture', with at most 2 units in existence. Telescopes designed for mass replication, like the ATA or PAN-STARRS, end up getting their funding cut off for further units as soon as first light is reached on the prototype, because of the perverse incentives and interests associated with astronomical research.
It also means devoting actual resources to SETI, instead of having it be something tenured professors do as a hobby, with nearly zero funding.
- ZanyProgrammer 12y agoAnd yet, if alien civilizations are using a method of communicating other than radio, it won't matter how much resources and funding we devote to SETI (often assumed to be the same as radio astronomy).
- imglorp 12y agoDon't forget optical. https://seti.berkeley.edu/opticalseti https://seti.berkeley.edu/opticalseti
- pharke 12y agoWe have to use what we know, but with a serious effort towards discovering communicating civilizations other methods could be explored. I'm sure the people working on gravitational wave detection would love the boost of interest they could receive as part of a search for exotic forms of communication.
- pvaldes 12y agoThis idea could sound controversial probably, but maybe spacial agencies should focus in the more accesible planet by far. Maybe some of this talent, team and resources, could be destinated instead to save the thousands of critically endangered earthlings that are vanishing and can't wait a decade. To burn all the ships to find a new bacteria in mars will be very interesting of course but also a bad choice in terms of huge costs/uncertain real benefits. Maybe the funds could be spent into how to solve the nuclear residues problem, how to design a catascope to look under yellowstone or inside the etna, how to predict and minimise the next fukushima/three mile island, or how to study sea currents and discover if those yummy school of anchovies from japan will cause you a leukemia in two years. Just an opinion