"Lambchop" <holy_saiyan1@_(REMOVETHIS)_hotmail.com> wrote in message news:2uaq2bF28apqmU1@uni-berlin.de...

As I understand it, SETI was never really concieved as one of those things
that are undertaken because there's a "good chance" that success will be
gotten.

That's true. We knew that chances are low that we will detect a beacon, at least with the current (pioneering) projects.
To use Werthimer's words : We are just getting to know how to do this (SETI). We are virtual new-comers.

Still, I think a reality check about the odds of detection is in place.
So, what I wanted to show in this posting is that the likelyhood of ET transmitting beacon signals around 1.42 GHz (water-hole)
might be extremely low(0.001%). If this is indeed the case, then no matter what kind of sophisticated system we build here for
reception, we won't detect any beacon.
We COULD detect ET radar signals in the microwave area (separete posting two weeks ago), but according to my calculations (open for
feedback!) probably no beacons.

For all we know, Earth might be the last house standing or the
first house to be built and moved into.  We might be the earliest
intelligence in the galaxy, or we might be the oldest remaining intelligence
in the galaxy.

Possible, but with 100billion stars out there, with 12billion years of history, and a long long time ahead of us, it seems much more
likely that we are somewhere in the middle of the bell-curve (if that exists) for technology civilisations. There should be others
out there.

If not, in 2 billion years Andromeda will 'slam' into (merge with) our galaxy, effectively doubling the number of stars, and
triggering new start creation once again. Of course, by then, our teeth won't hurt any more. But we will certainly not be the last
civilisation.