"Bjorn Damm" <bjornd.invalid@rixmail.se> wrote in message 
news:441abffa$1@usenet.zapto.org...

S@H is soliciting money.
Today i received this e-mail from them:


...

But all these successes are just a beginning. As you are aware, SETI@home
has successfully transitioned to operating under BOINC. Because of this,
new searches are on the horizon for SETI@home.

Successes?
There's been more than enough time to find something, if the original 
concept were valid..

Here's why they won't:
1) Radio is a very inefficient means of communication in space. 
Particle-beam signals are better for point-to-point communications, but they 
are difficult to intercept.

2) A civilization, were it inclined to beam a radio signal off into space, 
would not know to point it at earth.

3) An advanced civilization, if it follows the normal rules of common sense, 
would not want to advertise it's presence to more advanced civilizations. 
The Incas wouldn't have invited the Spaniards into their lands in 
retrospect.

4) The age of the universe is at least 11 billion years old. We are likely 
to be broadcasting radio waves for a little over a century. The odds of two 
civilizations intercepting each others' radio signals is a little like two 
bullets colliding over a mountain, shot at random times, every thousand 
years or so.

5) We look for patterns in incoming radio waves.  Carrier frequencies aren't 
necessary, even today. Repeating data is inefficient, and advanced 
civilizations probably wouldn't use it.  In fact our own transmitted data is 
more and more resembling random noise. If you listen to an intercepted 
digital cellphone signal nowadays, it sounds like static.

6) As Michio Kaku often says, we are a "type zero" civilization. We have no 
status.  If a type 1 or 2 civilization were to visit us, they would benefit 
as much by communicating with us, as we would by talking to an ant hill.