"Eric" <none@nospam.not> wrote in message news:_kWzf.21092$tK4.13935@tornado.ohiordc.rr.com...

Since it is more likely that ET will hear us than we will hear him, I think

Well, that remains to be seen. Our early strong radio signals are now underway for only 60 years or so.
So we can so far only conclude that no ETI further away than 60 Light Years will have heard us.
That is only a few hundred star systems..

If they DID hear us and send a reply which we will receive tomorrow ;o)
then they will be within 30 light year range. The absense of any obvious signal
thus indicates that either ETIs prefer to remain silent, or (more obvious) there
are no ETIs with more advanced technology then us in a 30 light year radius from Earth.

Still, that (30 LYs) does not even cover 100 star systems, but it is interesting
to note that our early radio signals might be received (and answered?) by
nearby ETIs (if there are any). We better pay close attention to nearby stars
that have been in our 'wave' of early radio and radar transmissions.



We on the other hand are listening to thousans of star systems hundreds of light
years away, and with seti@home even listening to a good portion of the entire Galaxy...
Billions and billions of star systems (to use Carl Sagan's terminology).
If some ETI, anywhere in the Galaxy has super-high powered radar for
some reason, then there is a chance that we WILL detect these
signals at some point in the future.

Maybe we already did receive them with seti@home, but discarded the signals as noise, since they
do not repeat...

Keep on listening

there should be a coordinated effort to get every radar in operation to
shoot at the sky for a few seconds simultaneously.  (I know it would never
happen, but..)

Wheather radars send pretty strong signals out into space almost constantly.
And there are MANY wheather radar stations on planet Earth.

And then there is the occasional phenominally powerfull planet/asteroid radar
systems that we sometimes switch on..

Providing ET doesn't show up and eat our descendents, seems the chance for
success would be greater than listening to the static...

We are noisy in the microwave spectrum. Especially with radar.

And one thing is for sure : if we do not listen, then we will never know what is out there.
(unless ETI comes and eats us..)