On Sun, 27 Aug 2006 21:31:42 GMT, "Eric" <nospam@nospam.noo> wrote:

(Its easy to forget the real purpose of Boinc/SETI and just think its just 
about trying to make big numbers and pretty graphs with lines that go down.)

I was thinking ("Oh no..", you say!), what if there are other civilizations 
out there doing their own version of "SETI", but like us, they are just 
listening and not transmitting?  Everyone is watching the water hole, from 
the woodline with binoculars, but nobody is going up to it to take a drink?

I know we transmitted some short burts a long time ago, but has there ever 
been any consideration to do something more interesting such as:

Get a group of astronomers, biologists, RF engineers, etc together to come 
up with the best "candidate locations" to transmit to.  Good "candidate 
locations" would be relatively near places with star systems that show 
indirect evidence of planets, that show a spectral analysis possibly 
compatible for what we think life "may" be able to adapt to, that have been 
around for long enough for life to evolve "as we know it", and is feasible 
(given our technology, or perhaps where we think our technology will be 
within a few centuries) that we could detect our own transmitted signals 
from.

Surely, there has to be places out there that meet this criteria?  Get all 
the right people together and mind crunch for "candidate locations".  It 
wouldn't be perfect, as much would be in the realm of possibility, but its 
the best that can be done.   Key being "life as we know it", as thats the 
best we can do.  (For all we know, there could be smart metal organisms out 
there that drink liquid nitrogen.)

Even if it took centuries or a millienium for a "round trip", thats still 
centuries or a millienium sooner than not doing anything at all.

(Hopefully our signals wouldn't be a dinner bell to some slimey green aliens 
who would come and eat our descendents though.)

UMmmm we are listening for a signal to come thru on a specific band,
but we are transmitting on a bunch of other bands all the time. We are
beaming signals to satellites that miss some of the signal and it goes
right on by, stopping only when it hits something. No it is not fast
but it is going. Think HBO, ESPN, CNN, etc.