Prometheus Posted May 10, 2004 Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 Was just curious as to how many people run the SETI application on their PC's? Also, what do you'll think of the program (as in SETI) itself? dinesh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Betsy Posted May 10, 2004 Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 Was just curious as to how many people run the SETI application on their PC's? Also, what do you'll think of the program (as in SETI) itself? I do. My main reason is that I hate to waste anything of value such as my unused computing power. SETI is interesting to a degree and I guess I'll stick with it unless someone has a better use for my unused computing power. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tryptonique Posted May 10, 2004 Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 Was just curious as to how many people run the SETI application on their PC's? Also, what do you'll think of the program (as in SETI) itself? dinesh. http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/download.html Is that the program you mentioned? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amagi Posted May 10, 2004 Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 SETI is interesting to a degree and I guess I'll stick with it unless someone has a better use for my unused computing power. Oxford Cancer and Smallpox Projects I would suggest this to be a far better use of your computer. I run this on mine. Although I have read about SETI@home's methods before, I can't remember the details. Still, its chances for any kind of success seem extremely dubious to me. Medical research is vastly more important than a futile search for aliens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Betsy Posted May 10, 2004 Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 Oxford Cancer and Smallpox Projects I would suggest this to be a far better use of your computer. Thanks. That sounds interesting. I'll look into it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prometheus Posted May 10, 2004 Author Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 Tryptonique: http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/download.html Is that the program you mentioned? yes, thats the one. I run it on my PC too. 121 data packets completed as of today And amagi, thanks for that link, i will also look into it. dinesh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidV Posted May 10, 2004 Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 My main reason is that I hate to waste anything of value such as my unused computing power. SETI is interesting to a degree and I guess I'll stick with it unless someone has a better use for my unused computing power. The power is not being “wasted” as much as “spent.” CPU cycles do use electric power, and wear down computer parts. For most people the difference is slight, but on my home-built gaming rig, it can noticeably raise room temperature, suggesting that money and hardware are being “wasted” on a mostly useless (in the case of SETI) pursuit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRoberts Posted May 11, 2004 Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 Google Toolbar also has a program you can get for it that is very similar. My computer is being used to analyze Protein Strains Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prometheus Posted May 11, 2004 Author Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 ....are being “wasted” on a mostly useless (in the case of SETI) pursuit. GC, why do you think it's "wasted"? Do you think SETI is pointless? And as far as gaming is concerned, SETI is always killed before I dive into a game dinesh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amagi Posted May 11, 2004 Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 About the usefulness of SETI, astronomer Terence Dickinson has said Searching for alien signals with radio telescopes will yield results only if other civilizations are staying at home making long-distance calls to their galactic relatives via radio frequencies. Radio-search advocates not only admit this but have enshrined the concept in what Princeton University physicist Freeman Dyson calls "a philosophical discourse dogma." He says the radio searchers assume "as an article of faith" that higher civilizations communicate by radio in preference to all other options. ... I do not object to someone's monitoring the cosmic radio dial; however, the public's perception of the activity is that researchers are attempting to eavesdrop on alien conversations, which is not what the radio quest is all about. Even if the galaxy were humming with alien radio communications, we almost certainly would not intercept any of them unless the transmissions were outrageously extravagant in signal power, which goes against the initial argument about the efficiency of radio communication. Signals directed from point A to point B in the galaxy would be undetectable unless we happened to be precisely between the two points--an enormous improbability. Our radio telescopes are far too weak to eavesdrop on conversations not focused in our direction. ... Despite the frequent use of the word "eavesdropping" in connection with the SETI programs, most of the searches have been limited almost entirely to finding either a superpowerful omnidirectional beacon or a narrow-beam signal intentionally directed toward us. Such a search strategy therefore assumes that extraterrestrials either know about us or are pumping a colossal signal in all directions in the hope that somebody is listening. From his book, The Universe and Beyond Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MinorityOfOne Posted May 11, 2004 Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 Such a search strategy therefore assumes that extraterrestrials either know about us or are pumping a colossal signal in all directions in the hope that somebody is listening. Now this made me laugh. They know about us how? By listening to our radio signals? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidV Posted May 11, 2004 Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 Do you think SETI is pointless? Yes, though it is a cool experiment in grid computing with useful applications in other areas. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James Adkins Posted May 21, 2004 Report Share Posted May 21, 2004 I have been running it for a little over two years with 3,585 work units returned so far. I am running the command line interface (no CPU cycles are spent on graphics, just computations) with a program called SETIQueue to cache work units. Both are installed as services so they are always running in the background not just when my screensaver kicks in. Running them as services also means they start back up automatically when the computer is restarted and run whether or not anyone is logged in so I haven't even thought about it in a few months. The SETI team is currently testing something called BOINC which I am thinking of switching to. It runs two Projects: AstroPulse - the search for pulsars, ET, and black holes and the Southern Hemisphere Search which is similar to the current SETI but uses a much newer radio telescope in Australia. The telescope in Arecibo is built into the crater of an extinct volcano to support it's massive weight and is therefore limited to a fixed portion of the northern sky. The dish in Australia is similar to the telescopes at the Very Large Array in New Mexico in that the dish can be moved, so it will be able to cover the whole southern sky. My interest in physics, astronomy, and science fiction made running SETI@Home irresistible. The chances of success are slim, but I find the whole thing interesting. I will check out the cancer and small pox projects. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
source Posted May 21, 2004 Report Share Posted May 21, 2004 I used SETI until I got my portable computer. It's just too hard on my processor and consequently batteries. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AwakeAndFree Posted May 21, 2004 Report Share Posted May 21, 2004 There are many applications using the same grid principles of SETI@Home, while actually contributing to cancer research, aids research, and other more burning issues. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R.T. Brooke Posted December 8, 2005 Report Share Posted December 8, 2005 There are many applications using the same grid principles of SETI@Home, while actually contributing to cancer research, aids research, and other more burning issues. I happened to google this forum and am happy to be a new member. Over in SETI there is an Objectivists team I founded years ago. I noticed that there seem to be a few people that run that program so here is your invitation.... For the next day or two, however, they are upgrading their servers so you it may be a bit slow downloading or uploading the data. They've instituted a whole new distributed computing platform Called 'BOINC' which allows you to select several of about 10 or 12 different projects that you wish to donate your spare computer time to. Once it's installed it pretty much is 'hands free'. It runs itself. www.setiathome.com Hope to see a few of there......once you've downloaded what you need go back to the main site above and at the top of the page click 'teams' and join the Objectivist team. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Felix Posted December 8, 2005 Report Share Posted December 8, 2005 There's a nice article, partly about the value of the SETI project, on Michael Crichton's website. Here's the link and a short excerpt: A signal is received, to great excitement. It turns out to be false, but the excitement remains. In 1960, Drake organizes the first SETI conference, and came up with the now-famous Drake equation: N=N*fp ne fl fi fc fL Where N is the number of stars in the Milky Way galaxy; fp is the fraction with planets; ne is the number of planets per star capable of supporting life; fl is the fraction of planets where life evolves; fi is the fraction where intelligent life evolves; and fc is the fraction that communicates; and fL is the fraction of the planet's life during which the communicating civilizations live. This serious-looking equation gave SETI an serious footing as a legitimate intellectual inquiry. The problem, of course, is that none of the terms can be known, and most cannot even be estimated. The only way to work the equation is to fill in with guesses. And guesses-just so we're clear-are merely expressions of prejudice. Nor can there be "informed guesses." If you need to state how many planets with life choose to communicate, there is simply no way to make an informed guess. It's simply prejudice. By the way, the speech is called: Aliens Cause Global Warming. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMeganSnow Posted December 8, 2005 Report Share Posted December 8, 2005 I'd just like to know what they plan to do if they find some aliens before I help them do it. Although, it's not like it's useless: looking for peculiar radio emissions might lead to all kinds of discoveries, whether of alien civilizations or whatever. I'd say, it's likely of value to you if you're interested in astronomy or science fiction, less if you're not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
softwareNerd Posted December 8, 2005 Report Share Posted December 8, 2005 Personally, I don't like to have more stuff running on my computer than I need. One more program means one more potential source of a virus etc. However, I can understand the motivations in wanting to use all the idle computer resource! For anyone who doesn't see the point of SETI but would like to investigate similar projects: Google has some similar projects which they claim will help scientific research. I haven't checked them out, but I know they exist. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Everett Lamplighter Posted September 20, 2006 Report Share Posted September 20, 2006 There may be more potentially beneficial screensavers to run on your computer, however I've been a dedicated advocate of SETI initiatives for over 13 years -- SETI pioneer, Frank Drake's book, Is Anyone Out There? cinched my support. It may be a long-shot, and I do not currently run the Berkeley program's screensaver, but I believe that the universe is most likely rife with life -- it may even contain an E.T. civilization close enough to us in order to allow two-way communication. I base this belief on several properties of the universe: the fact that it's capable of learning about itself, its rich baryonic structure / chemistry, the structure of solar systems / galaxies, the values of the dimensionless fundamental constants etc. I'm veering into a crash w. the weak anthropic principle. But I am often compelled to see a universe "designed" to produce life. SETI'll either fail and never find anything or it'll discover something of immense importance to our understanding of the universe. I think it's a good gamble to make. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert J. Kolker Posted April 30, 2007 Report Share Posted April 30, 2007 There may be more potentially beneficial screensavers to run on your computer, however I've been a dedicated advocate of SETI initiatives for over 13 years -- SETI pioneer, Frank Drake's book, Is Anyone Out There? cinched my support. It may be a long-shot, and I do not currently run the Berkeley program's screensaver, but I believe that the universe is most likely rife with life -- it may even contain an E.T. civilization close enough to us in order to allow two-way communication. I base this belief on several properties of the universe: the fact that it's capable of learning about itself, its rich baryonic structure / chemistry, the structure of solar systems / galaxies, the values of the dimensionless fundamental constants etc. I'm veering into a crash w. the weak anthropic principle. But I am often compelled to see a universe "designed" to produce life. SETI'll either fail and never find anything or it'll discover something of immense importance to our understanding of the universe. I think it's a good gamble to make. The closest star system is Proximi Centuri. That is about 4 ly distance. How interesting do you think a conversation with an 8 year latency is likely to be? It gets to be much worse than that in very short order. The real problem is our life span. Humans live (these days) about a hundred years (order of magnitude). That would mean our conversations with the Centuri-ites could go about 4 to 6 rounds, then the conversation participants die. That is way too short for us to have interesting conversations with ETs especially ETs with longer life spans. We are cursed with king sized curiosity and aspirations and a pint sized life span. Bob Kolker Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidV Posted April 30, 2007 Report Share Posted April 30, 2007 The closest star system is Proxima Centauri. That is about 4 ly distance. How interesting do you think a conversation with an 8 year latency is likely to be? Eight years just to talk to an extraterrestrial intelligence and totally revolutionize our understanding of civilization and the universe? BORING. I'm going to see what's playing on Spike TV. Seriously, all my computers run Folding@Home, which has led to something like 100 published papers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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