Astronomers seek evidence of tech built by aliens:
An international team of scientists led by a prominent Harvard astronomer announced a new initiative Monday to look for evidence of technology built by extraterrestrial civilizations.
Called the Galileo Project, it envisages the creation of a global network of medium-sized telescopes, cameras and computers to investigate unidentified flying objects, and has so far been funded with $1.75 million from private donors.
Given recent research showing the prevalence of Earth-like planets throughout the galaxy, "We can no longer ignore the possibility that technological civilizations predated us," Professor Avi Loeb told reporters at a news conference.
"The impact of any discovery of extraterrestrial technology on science, our technology, and on our entire world view, would be enormous," he added in a statement.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by turgid on Saturday July 31 2021, @04:16PM (17 children)
I suppose there's a very remote possibility that in the last 100,000 years, a civillisation around a nearby star developed good enough technology to send out robotic probes to explore nearby star systems. They wouldn't have had to develop anything too exotic like faster-than-light travel if they were patient, and sent their robots out expecting to hear from them many generations in the future.
It's high time we did something similar. That would be a very thoughtful and valuable legacy to leave for future generations.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 31 2021, @04:41PM (7 children)
What good is listening for the results of a nanoprobe swarm sent several light years away, when they arrive maybe in 10ky when your civilization is undergoing a medieval period and the communications infrastructure is under the control of the Priests of the Temples of Syrinx, who preach about how Kepler, Copernicus, Newton, Galileo et al caused a plague of soy boys and that's why Gawd rained down radioactive fire and brimstone and made the earth rot, and will never admit that their celestial sphere and epicycle theory are wrong?
There probably won't even be instruments pointed at the sky! They'll have all gone the way of Arecibo while you humans masturbate about sky daddies.
(Score: 0, Redundant) by khallow on Saturday July 31 2021, @05:37PM
(Score: 4, Touché) by turgid on Saturday July 31 2021, @07:11PM (5 children)
What's the point of getting out of bed in the morning?
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Touché) by jelizondo on Saturday July 31 2021, @07:21PM (4 children)
To take a leak pal! Unless, of course, you prefer to wet your bed.
:-)
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Saturday July 31 2021, @07:50PM (3 children)
That's what Mountain Dew bottles are for.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 31 2021, @09:07PM (2 children)
Liquid laundry detergent bottles have nice large diameter necks and are much easier to use for answering middle of the night nature calls while avoiding miscoupling leaks which result in odorous bedside spots.
And they have tight well made screw on lids that are almost completely kickover-proof for those like me that awaken with my mental ducks all over the place.
They are far cheaper than the "urinals" sold at the drugstore for my same problem. I pay only $1 apiece for mine at dollar stores, prefilled with laundry detergent. I am going to use the detergent anyway, so I take advantage of the free fresh urinal I get every month or so.
They are easy to rinse for reuse, but admittedly difficult to clean properly for long time use, so monthly replacements come in handy.
I won't sign this thing. For some of you, you may find it informative, some will find it funny, most will find it off topic, but personally I hope you use your midpoint to mod someone else up and leave this post on the floor.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 31 2021, @10:44PM
^+1 informative.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Sunday August 01 2021, @01:45AM
Be certain to clean it carefully before use. Some detergent has enzymes which can cause unpleasant skin irritations.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday August 01 2021, @05:43PM (2 children)
Everyone is certain that we are not alone, but what does it take for abiogenesis to occur on a planet? Our solar system is roughly a third of the age of the universe, we could be the first. Enough time had to pass for exploding stars to geberate all the elements needed for life, as well as some to combine to create other chemicals, like table salt or water. Does it take a giant moon like ours? We have yet to find a planet with a moon like that, which is why in my fiction, aliens are from satellites around giant planets like Saturn and Jupiter.
I remain agnostic.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by takyon on Sunday August 01 2021, @07:33PM (1 child)
Maybe, but unlikely given the size of the universe. It's important to figure out how likely it is to occur within a galaxy. Because one technological species sending generation ships around could spread throughout an entire galaxy relatively quickly, and probably become immune to wiping itself out. But we don't see any aliens landing in the middle of cities and declaring their presence. If they can't easily travel between galaxies, and e.g. 1 in 5 galaxies develop at least 1 widespread spacefaring civilization over X billion years, then the universe could have many civilizations but limited contact between them.
On the abiogenesis (or panspermia) front, it seems that Earth may have had microbes as early as 260 million years after formation [whiterose.ac.uk], which points to life being embarrassingly common given the right conditions. Eventually, we will drill baby drill at Europa, Enceladus, Ceres, Mars, etc. [wikipedia.org] to look for evidence of microbes in subsurface oceans. Finding life in harsh places in the solar system would be a good hint that the universe is littered with life (at least microbes).
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday August 02 2021, @01:26AM
This also assumes that alien civilizations actually want to get in contact with us in the first place. Maybe they observe the Prime Directive (and we puny Earthlings haven't even developed warp drive yet), or like in the Three Body Problem books, they keep quiet because advertising your presence gets you wiped out.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Sunday August 01 2021, @07:37PM (5 children)
Like the Voyager probes? I get the impression that the main hurdle is we don't have a good way to power them for long enough that they remain useful. Solar panels don't last forever (and you get far enough away from the sun they don't do anything), and RTGs decay over time until you don't have enough power generation left to do anything, like the Voyager probes in the next couple years.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by turgid on Sunday August 01 2021, @08:07PM (4 children)
I think we should build 50 or so specifically for an interstellar mission and send them to the nearest stars. It would be fun to develop the technology.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Sunday August 01 2021, @09:05PM (3 children)
It would be kinda cool, but hopefully they'd be travelling a bit faster this time around. The Voyagers were launched in like the 70s and scientists *still* barely agree they've left the solar system yet.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 02 2021, @12:47AM (2 children)
What people don't really appreciate is that, say we send a probe out to a nearby star, and say you get it up to 0.3c (or some really high speed), well when you get to the star you have to basically stop or you just fly by at 0.3c.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Monday August 02 2021, @01:16AM
That too. Presumably in this extremely hypothetical scenario the plan would be just try to transmit a signal (or dozen) at the most likely targets as you go whizzing through the next system.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 03 2021, @12:19AM
Fly by with pics & videos is still better than nothing. With the right gear we should be able to take optical measurements while we're approaching, even from a distance at a very high speed.
Also, we can launch probes into or around the star as we're flying by - they don't have to be built to last, just long enough for some measurements and sending the signal back either home or to various other hops
(Score: 4, Interesting) by takyon on Saturday July 31 2021, @04:18PM (4 children)
Even if the UFO craze is bunk, this sets up more cameras that can help to capture rare transient events - generally meteors.
You want other telescopes for that, space or ground, and the article goes on to mention the Vera C. Rubin Observatory (formerly LSST) which should be a big deal. This will be a lot more expensive than packaging rigs with cameras, telescopes, Raspberry Pis, and setting them up in as many places as possible.
Is Avi Loeb stretching his Harvard cred too thin?
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday August 01 2021, @01:15AM (3 children)
That $1.75 million from private donors points towards the negative, likely they'll thicken the creds back.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @06:44AM
Strangely enough, there are many in the intelligence community that are just suckers for alien stories, or other conspiracy theories. Seem that if you live your professional career in a climate of suspicion and threat, it wears on you after a while. May I mention Mike Flynn? Or Salvatore Cezar Pais? Yes, too long in the alphabet soup, and the brain is cooked. That's what they want you to think!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @12:29PM
Don't confuse "credit" and "credibility".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @03:12PM
It depends from where the private donations are coming from, and what they're for. It's not hard to get a lot more money for very questionable projects, such as building a private wall to keep brown people out of a country where a decent chunk of that money goes into private pockets to support their lifestyle, and then have the wall fell over anyway (the "sucker born every minute" source of funds). Or if the source of the funding is doing it for different reasons, such as if there was a desire to do more astronomy or for looking for near Earth objects, then for them this becomes a means to an end (like the steam powered rocket guy suddenly finding faith in the flat Earth theory to fund his project).
None of this speaks to Loeb's credibility. It certainly doesn't raise it, and I think still lowers it. Making unsupported claims of alien technology in journal papers certainly lowers his professional credentials, but he doesn't need professional cred any more. All of this certainly doesn't do Harvard any favors with "Harvard Professor says . . . " being put out all the time, but if any of that money passes through them, they certainly won't mind (they, like all big universities, are very happy to trade money for reputation).
(Score: 4, Funny) by TheMightyChickadee on Saturday July 31 2021, @05:58PM (3 children)
It's just this one guy, and he's retired, and becoming a bit, well, you know, Republicanish. He's the one that claimed that ʻOumuamua was part of an alien spaceship.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @03:25AM (1 child)
I was gonna correct you that not "republicanish" but "trumpish," but today they mean the same thing.
Kevin McArthy is a traitor to America.
Capitol Police will remember this.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @06:37AM
As will the aliens, when the time for the probe of the Republicans is nigh.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @12:31PM
+1 insightful
There are many in the scientific community who consider him and his collaborators to be complete freaking grade A loon.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Saturday July 31 2021, @08:24PM
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_3oks032jrww/S-m8ubBnTQI/AAAAAAAAANc/U_ltkV_1XgI/s1600/cartman_gets_an_anal_probe.jpg [blogspot.com]
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 4, Interesting) by PinkyGigglebrain on Saturday July 31 2021, @09:32PM
This could help with Space Guard's [wikipedia.org] efforts to locate NEOs [wikipedia.org] that could pose a future threat to Earth. The sooner we find possible threats that are years/decades away the easier it is to do something about it.
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Saturday July 31 2021, @10:30PM (4 children)
At least this will result in more searching. It's not where I'd focus the greatest effort, but so often compromise is necessary to advance science.
What I'm thinking is that life on Earth was microbial only, for approximately 3.5 billion years. In the most recent 0.5 billion years, multicellular life evolved. And it's only in the last 0.001 billion years that multicellular life became intelligent enough to understand astronomy and conceive the notion to hunt for extraterrestrial life. So, 87.5% of the time that life has existed on Earth, it was single celled. How long we and our intelligent successors will last is a wide open question. Will we kill ourselves off with nukes or some other completely stupid application of the immense knowledge and power we've discovered and harnessed, get bored and deliberately end ourselves, or will we be around for millions of years? Even if we're on Earth for the next 1 billion years, that would still leave single celled life as the longest tenants, by far. Seems that kind of life is what we are most likely to find, and therefore, that's where we should direct most of our efforts. Find some kind of funky atmo with gasses that should not exist because they are too reactive to last indefinitely, gasses such as free oxygen, and we may have found life.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @01:20AM (3 children)
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/are-we-earths-only-civilization/557180/ [theatlantic.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @01:23PM (1 child)
I'm not saying he's a crackpot, it's just that we can't prove he's not a crackpot.
Technological civilisations deposit low entropy constructions all over the place. We're also looking all over the place and have been for hundreds to thousands of years. Yet we've not discovered anything that could be considered to have come from a technological civilisation dropping low entropy evidence. And we know the rate at which entropy increases as we have seen what thousands of years can do.
When you are actually searching all over the place, absence of evidence is evidence of absence.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 03 2021, @12:23AM
You say it like we've had lots of coverage in the search space. Just because it literally is a lot of searching for us as a species, doesn't mean we've actually covered a lot.
Absence of evidence in the result of a tiny fraction of the search space is just absence of effort not evidence.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Sunday August 01 2021, @07:16PM
Well, yes, intelligent Earth life could have arisen millions of years ago and gone extinct, for any number of reasons. Done in by another asteroid strike or supervolcano eruption, or of course caused their own demise in some fashion. I've heard before the idea that PETM could have been caused by industrialization. However, from all that I have read, it seems unlikely. We are still learning about intelligence-- what does it take to evolve intelligence? If that is really hard to do, it argues against some other species on Earth having accomplished that eons ago. And if they had managed it, why are they no longer around? Is it so easy for life to screw up and lose such an advance?
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 01 2021, @12:06AM
Tesla.