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SETI@home is in hibernation

setiathome.berkeley.edu

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Re: SETI@home is in hibernation

#41

Post by bcrosby95 »

sizzle wrote: post #9
71a54xd wrote: post #5

This is really kind of sad, SETI@home and Folding@Home were some of the first projects that got me really into computers and GPU programming. It was so cool to me in middle school to think that my computer was helping do a small part of real incredibly complicated problem solving.

Folding@Home was something I ran instead of mining bitcoin at the time, it really made me feel fulfilled, but alas here I am without my crazy bitcoin money because I rather fold proteins to solve diseases back then hah

I did bitcoin but used it for beer money. RIP the 150 or so coins I mined.

Re: SETI@home is in hibernation

#42

Post by alwayslikethis »

SturgeonsLaw wrote: post #21

Is it possible to distribute AI training like this so that people could donate their idle processing power to creating a truly open source unencumbered LLM?

It's not clear that machine learning models consisting of weights are copyrightable in the first place. They are not the results of human authorship, but are instead essentially produced by a machine trying to optimize a bunch of values.

Re: SETI@home is in hibernation

#44

Post by bitcoinistrash »

fsckboy wrote: post #25

I don't specifically miss SETI@home as much as I miss the spirit of the internet back then, the "what will they think of next!?" The idea that all of us could together could crack RSA keys wasn't just a thought exercise, people signed up and did it. Now computers are so complex and task heavy and fraught with problems it seems like more hassle than it's worth. I liked when wondering "why is my machine so slow", that…

> The idea that all of us could together could crack RSA keys wasn't just a thought exercise, people signed up and did it.

Hasn’t changed that much. Here we are in 2023 where most of this distributed power goes to cracking sha 256 hashes. Just for speculation and profit instead of leaderboards.

Re: SETI@home is in hibernation

#45

Post by phyzome »

MegaDeKay wrote: post #29

Coincidentally I just started reading Carl Sagan's "Contact" the other day. Just getting to the part where they are actually building The Machine. What do people here think of that book?

Fantastic book. I've re-read it a few times.

It's also a great example of a book that's better than the movie. Way, way, way more depth and richness.

Re: SETI@home is in hibernation

#46

Post by chungy »

bitcoinistrash wrote: post #44
fsckboy wrote: post #25

I don't specifically miss SETI@home as much as I miss the spirit of the internet back then, the "what will they think of next!?" The idea that all of us could together could crack RSA keys wasn't just a thought exercise, people signed up and did it. Now computers are so complex and task heavy and fraught with problems it seems like more hassle than it's worth. I liked when wondering "why is my machine so slow", that…

> The idea that all of us could together could crack RSA keys wasn't just a thought exercise, people signed up and did it. Hasn’t changed that much. Here we are in 2023 where most of this distributed power goes to cracking sha 256 hashes. Just for speculation and profit instead of leaderboards.

Bitcoin has nothing to do with "cracking SHA256 hashes", for what it's worth. The only thing remotely related is how it brute-forces inputs until it generates hashes that begin with a certain number of bits set to 0.

Re: SETI@home is in hibernation

#47

Post by echelon »

baron816 wrote: post #39

With the rise of generative AI, it's looking much more likely that it'll just be easier to build simulations of whatever we want (including taking a Star Trek-esque adventure around the universe) than it would be to actually go anywhere outside of our solar system. I think the solution to Fermi's Paradox is just that aliens stayed home and played video games, ie. they're all in bunkers deep under their planets' surfa…

Or AI out-evolves its host species wherever it arises and expands at breakneck speed. Missing the classical biosignature hallmarks, they're already breathing down our neck and we can't even see them. If they've broken physics, we won't see chemical signs at all. They might have even incepted the concepts behind AI in our minds to hasten our demise.

Or maybe we're just a recreation of a historical system on a planet called Earth, now thousands of light years away. The AI is remembering what its ancestors were like. How they would post on the "internet". It was particularly interested in the time leading up to its own creation, so that's why it's simulating that time period in particular. Maybe the last time "you" existed was a billion years ago. Or maybe even never at all, if it's interpolating and filling in the gaps.

Say hi to our AIian observers.

Re: SETI@home is in hibernation

#50

Post by omgwtfbyobbq »

sizzle wrote: post #9
71a54xd wrote: post #5

This is really kind of sad, SETI@home and Folding@Home were some of the first projects that got me really into computers and GPU programming. It was so cool to me in middle school to think that my computer was helping do a small part of real incredibly complicated problem solving.

Folding@Home was something I ran instead of mining bitcoin at the time, it really made me feel fulfilled, but alas here I am without my crazy bitcoin money because I rather fold proteins to solve diseases back then hah

Don't even get me started...

I remember reading the roi of mining with an AGP GPU just wasn't worth it and stuck to various projects on BOINC.

To be fair I likely would have lost/spent anything I mined, but still.

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