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Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#41

Post by anewhope »

timwaagh wrote: post #32
Mirioron wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it isn't so easy to say that what the US military does is a waste of your money. A lot of US foreign policy is about "free trade" that's beneficial to the US. If you were to cut off the US military then you'd likely have consequences for global trade. Perhaps you're right that it's a waste of your money, but I think that this is not at all a straightforward conclusion. Eg imagine if Iran just decided to stop…

The Iranian navy is mostly famous for its usage of rubber dinghies. That's not a serious threat that needs 10 supercarriers to counter. If they decided to change that, then no problem, nobody wants the strait blocked so it will be easy to find allies to pressure the iranians into a deal. The panama canal doesn't need that either. It should be in range of US based aircraft. Current US spending can only be justified by…

It’s not clear the force size you suggest would result in a stable equilibrium. You’re missing one key justification: the ability to dissuade future military competition. A defense force the size of Spain’s would face substantially more threats given the value of US targets and interests, so we’d then need to increase spending. It’s hard to predict what that world would look like. In the past it wasn’t great. Outspending everybody else from the get-go works.

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#42

Post by chr1 »

onetimemanytime wrote: post #22

I'm all for it. Poverty and inequality will "never" be solved and a tiny fraction of our GDP going to this, will not be be felt. On the other hand, it may change our life, maybe even short term...money on research can bring results.

While i agree that shooting down any research with "think about poverty" is a bad argument, I think there are still much more important ways to spend money than this: anti-aging drugs developed by sens.org, gene drive to kill mosquitos, any technologies to build colony on mars etc . This is why it is important to have many people deciding for themselves on what to spend their money. If there are enough people who are interested in finding aliens they can redirect their part of GDP, but there should be a way for others to not be forced to spend their tax money on it.

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#43

Post by glutamate »

onetimemanytime wrote: post #36
rs23296008n1 wrote: post #25

The US hasn't even stabilised its environment, healthcare and any number of other important areas of basic human needs. Money for finding extra-terrestrial life would be better spent on earth fixing the mess. Or use it to get us to mars. At least that fits with a "plan B" since humans existing "only on earth" is still a bad idea. Same goes for moon exploration / asteroid mining. Good ideas. Raw resources shouldn't be…

>> The US hasn't even stabilised its environment, healthcare and any number of other important areas of basic human needs. Money for finding extra-terrestrial life would be better spent on earth fixing the mess. USA spends more on healthcare than (prob) anyone else. Basic needs will never be solved, as the yardstick will also move. >> Money for finding extra-terrestrial life would be better spent on earth fixing the…

> USA spends more on healthcare than (prob) anyone else. Basic needs will never be solved, as the yardstick will also move.

Agree, in a privatised healthcare system the fee-for-service problem will indeed prevent basic needs from ever being met.

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#44

Post by inviromentalist »

rs23296008n1 wrote: post #25

The US hasn't even stabilised its environment, healthcare and any number of other important areas of basic human needs. Money for finding extra-terrestrial life would be better spent on earth fixing the mess. Or use it to get us to mars. At least that fits with a "plan B" since humans existing "only on earth" is still a bad idea. Same goes for moon exploration / asteroid mining. Good ideas. Raw resources shouldn't be…

I'm with you, despite the negative response I get.

Appeal to billionaires as the article mentions. It's more accountable and doesn't suck up money that goes to people who need it.

Counter- the US government has decided the budget is unlimited. Bombs and cronyism will outpace beneficial spending, so we might as well invest in everything useful before the upcoming monetary crisis.

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#45

Post by Razengan »

kilroy123 wrote: post #10

I often imagine there is something like "subspace" or faster-than-light communication, and species across our galaxy are a bunch of chatterboxes chatting away. The only problem is we don't know how to tune in to join the conversation. I still think we should keep trying to find them, though.

> I often imagine there is something like "subspace" or faster-than-light communication, and species across our galaxy are a bunch of chatterboxes chatting away.

I like to imagine, for the science fiction that I might write, a hypothetical phenomenon that allows instantaneous communication between two points (objects/particles/portals) but only after they have been "synced" or "bound" with each other, which must be done during physical contact.

So, you might construct two such "hyperspace modems", bind them with each other, then incur the initial cost of physically transporting one of them to another star system however many light years away, which may take years or decades but once it's there, communication between the two points would be instantaneous.

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#46

Post by [deleted] »

lovemenot wrote: post #16

It always feels to me like so much hubris. Humans are unique on this planet, (we humans have determined it so), by virtue of our so-called intelligence. Not only does this intelligence make us unique on this planet, but the nature of that uniqueness is itself unique across the galaxy and beyond. Intelligence is the thing worthy of discovery. So we go actively looking for other living species which exhibit that precis…

[deleted]

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#47

Post by Razengan »

We have already found alien species.

Right here on this very same planet:

Dinosaurs.

We would have never even known about their existence if we had not chanced upon their remains.

So it's not just the vast distances of space that separates species from each other, it's also incomprehensible stretches of time.

Just from the amount of variables involved and their ranges (the number of planets, the extreme environments in which we have already observed life), it's obvious that we are not alone.

BUT we may never meet anyone.

Just like how there's billions of people on Earth but millions die alone, to use a topical metaphor given Valentine's Day. :)

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#48

Post by valgor »

I think some commenters are forgetting how science is done. Just because you are researching X does not mean your only output is X. An investment into SETI is an investment in science and technology. All the arguments on this forum about why we should not allocate funds to SETI can be used in the same manner for why we should not investment in pure mathematics or any other potentially "useless" human endeavor. SETI researchers will come up with novel ways to solve their problems and invent new technologies along the way, the same as every other branch of science and engineering. It's how we got SETI@home and now boinc is used for lots of problems like protein folding (1).

Plus, for those of us that have read Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu (2), we understand that SETI research is the biggest gamble in scientific research. High risk with the highest reward. What could fundamentally change humanity more than definitively finding intelligent life out there?

Lastly, some commenters need to go read Carl Sagan's Contact. He goes over all of this nay-saying!

[1] https://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/ [2] https://www.amazon.com/Three-Body-Problem-Cixin-Liu/dp/07653...

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#49

Post by lowdose »

kilroy123 wrote: post #10

I often imagine there is something like "subspace" or faster-than-light communication, and species across our galaxy are a bunch of chatterboxes chatting away. The only problem is we don't know how to tune in to join the conversation. I still think we should keep trying to find them, though.

When we find them there will be people that want to initiate contact. For centuries we were convinced the shark was the Apex predator of sea. I'm not really looking forward to the day we come across the orcas of the universe.

Re: Astronomers want public funds for intelligent life search

#50

Post by lovemenot »

valgor wrote: post #48

I think some commenters are forgetting how science is done. Just because you are researching X does not mean your only output is X. An investment into SETI is an investment in science and technology. All the arguments on this forum about why we should not allocate funds to SETI can be used in the same manner for why we should not investment in pure mathematics or any other potentially "useless" human endeavor. SETI r…

Some wonderful fiction quoted here. Let me quote another great fiction writer:

“Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?”

― Douglas Adams

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