On Sun, 20 Nov 2005 18:03:56 -0800, Earle Jones <earle.jones@comcast.net>
wrote:

In article <dlif06$cts$1@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
Russ Childers <childers.2@spamblock.osu.edu> wrote:

al wrote:

"Russ Childers" <childers.2@spamblock.osu.edu> wrote in message
news:dlg3fd$77n$1@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu...

al wrote:

"catshark" <catshark101@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1132092937.672415.30210@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...

Added newsgroup, sci.astro.seti, alt.sci.seti

<snip>

After all, as SETI shows, scientists would love evidence of

extraterrestrial

life.

Aha SETI. What are they looking for exactly?

SETI is the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence.  SETI researchers
are currently looking for electromagnetic signals not produced by known
natural sources.

They are assuming that someone is out there tirelessly sending signals

that

will reach us after they are dead and maybe after their civilisation is

dead

Yes, some SETI researchers assume civilizations are sending out beacons,
to make their detection easy ... but there is the possibility of leakage
signals being detected, too.

In any event, SETI researchers are *assuming* that intelligent
civilizations *may* produce signals which can be discerned as
non-natural (military radar, for example).

and they are using a form of communication that is useless for

interstellar

distances.

Are you referring to the speed-of-light limitation on radio, optical,
and gravity waves?

A good start.

Until we can detect faster-than-light communication, we are stuck
with radio, optical, and gravity waves.

I think that the last thing SETI want is to contact ET.

The *first* thing SETI researchers want is to *detect* an
extraterrestrial civilization.  "Contact" will likely be
taken over by politicians once detection occurs.

Maybe you can enlighten me?

If we do not search, we will not find.  Plus, if "ET" is found,
SETI will not stop:  there may be millions of detectable civilizations
in the Milky Way, so SETI will continue after the first "ET" is found.

SETI researchers do not have *faith* that ET civilizations exist, for
if that were the case, why bother searching?  Instead, SETI researchers
*hypothesize* that ET civilizations may exist, and are looking for facts
to back that up.

I think that you should look to history and the people who have claimed to
have received contacts,

Tesla and Marconi for instance and a fair number of others. The trouble is
that Tesla used a different medium to SETI and Marconi used Tesla's
equipment.

Could you provide references, please?

If you do not look in the right place and with the right equipment you are
wasting your time.

How do we know what the "best place" is?  The Galactic Plane is a good
starting point, because of the density of stars.

We do not know what equipment an ET civilization will be using, so we
might as well use what we know about.

Also, what if we're looking in the "right place" with the "right
equipment", but at the "wrong time".  Are we still wasting our time?
The only way we are assured of not wasting our time is to not do
SETI at all.

The only reason that we don't use Tesla type equipment is because of greed.

What "Tesla type equipment" are you referring to?

*
How did Nicolai Tesla get tied up with the UFO, ET, Roswell, etc. 
idiocies?

Tesla was a helluv an engineer (I'm from Georgia Tech, so I know one 
when I see one!)

He had something over 700 patents and single-handedly put the world 
on to an AC power distribution basis, over the complaints of such as 
Thomas Edison.

At some point in his later career he demonstrated what could be done 
with very high voltages, which he generated with his "Tesla coil".  
Someone called this the "Death Ray" and proposed all sorts of bad 
things that could be done with it.

Was Tesla himself crazy?  Or just some of his followers (see above:
"The only reason that we don't use Tesla type equipment is because 
of greed."

What little I know of Tesla does indicate that he was "differently saned"
though hardly a kook.  But his adoption by the tin-foil hat crowd comes
from some things he, himself, did and said.  This is just one of many links
that report the same story:

   In the Colorado Springs lab, Tesla recorded what he concluded
   were extraterrestrial radio signals and announced his findings
   in some of the scientific journals of the time. [5] His 
   announcements and data were rejected by the scientific community
   who did not believe him. He notes measurements of repetitive 
   signals from his receiver which are substantially different from
   the signals he had noted from storms and earth noise. Specifically,
   he later recalled that the signals appeared in groups of clicks 
   1, 2, 3, and 4 clicks together. He stated in the article "A Giant
   Eye to See Round the World", of February 25, 1923, that: 

     "Twenty-two years ago, while experimenting in Colorado with a 
     wireless power plant, I obtained extraordinary experimental 
     evidence of the existence of life on Mars. I had perfected a 
     wireless receiver of extraordinary sensitiveness, far beyond 
     anything known, and I caught signals which I interpreted as 
     meaning 1--2--3--4. I believe the Martians used numbers for
     communication because numbers are universal."
  
   Clearly, Tesla felt the signal groups originated on the planet Mars.
   In 1996 Corum and Corum published an analysis of Jovian plasma torus
   signals which indicate that there was a correspondence between the
   setting of Mars at Colorado Springs, and the cessation of signals 
   from Jupiter in the summer of 1899 when Tesla was there. Further,
   analysis by the Corums indicate that Tesla's transceiver was 
   sensitive in the 18 kHz gap in the Kennelly-Heaviside layer which
   would have allowed that reception from Jupiter. Therefore, there is
   evidence the signals Tesla noticed came from Jupiter, among other
   possible sources. Tesla spent the latter part of his life trying to
   signal Mars. 

   It is important to recognize that when he says he "recorded" these
   signals, it is meant that he wrote down the data and his impressions
   of what he had heard. He did release reports at the time. Tesla's
   initial announcement of the existence of extraterrestrial radio 
   signals was in 1899. In March of 1907, Tesla wrote about signaling
   to Mars in Harvard Magazine and how it was a problem of electrical
   engineering. Additional descriptions come from remembrances twenty
   years later. All this was met with resistance and disbelief by his
   contemporaries. 
   <http://www.crystalinks.com/tesla.html>
 
-- 
---------------
J. Pieret
---------------

In the name of the bee
And of the butterfly
And of the breeze, amen

               - Emily Dickinson -

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