I thought it was interesting for a short summary of the issue , but I would love to hear your ideas on why it was 'very biased and limited'.
Well he constructed his idea by what felt to me massive confirmation bias. He cherry picked examples and ideas to fit his argument and missed other what I consider more logical reasons for the arguable silence. All through it he grabbed random numbers to construct his ideas.
One of the biggest problems I see for detection of ET is much more mundane. I did the math for this once somewhere which I don't have handy. But it went something like this.
I took the age of the universe and scaled it to an earthly distance o Melbourne to johanisburgh in sth Africa. If we say earth has been sending radio signals for 110 years our earliest signal was about 1mm from Melbourne. So even a civilization with 1000 years radio its a tiny few MM of radio transmission on its way to sth Africa. Given the directional nature ay radio astronomy. Seti would have to be looking at the exact right direction to catch a comparatively tiny burst of radio in the hope the packet happens to arrive at the time we are looking in the right direction at the right time.
I am a believer as you know but I will be surprised if seti ever hears anything at all. But not because there's Noone out there.
One of the biggest problems I see for detection of ET is much more mundane. I did the math for this once somewhere which I don't have handy. But it went something like this.
I took the age of the universe and scaled it to an earthly distance o Melbourne to johanisburgh in sth Africa. If we say earth has been sending radio signals for 110 years our earliest signal was about 1mm from Melbourne. So even a civilization with 1000 years radio its a tiny few MM of radio transmission on its way to sth Africa. Given the directional nature ay radio astronomy. Seti would have to be looking at the exact right direction to catch a comparatively tiny burst of radio in the hope the packet happens to arrive at the time we are looking in the right direction at the right time.
I am a believer as you know but I will be surprised if seti ever hears anything at all. But not because there's Noone out there.
Any redio transmission is likely to be highly diluted by the time it got here. And even if the transmitting antenna was arranged for as tight a beam as possible, it would still have spread out a lot.
One has to assume that any transmission sent out would be sort of random. I.e no particular target in mind.
One has to assume that any transmission sent out would be sort of random. I.e no particular target in mind.
Yes and to have the best chance of receiving it we would have to be looking in the right direction in the right time frame for the sending civilization.
The universe is about 46.5 billion light years across.
Lets imagine a listening in civilizations in the center of the universe so that makes them 23 billion light years from the edge of the universe.
So a civilization that has been transmitting radio for 1000 years has a packet of radio 1000 light years across barrelling out through space. If that civilization dies out for some reason then that 1000 light year window stops transmitting. All we have to watch out for is a packet of radio 1000 light years across between here and the edge of the universe.
1000ly / 23 billion light years is 4.3x10 -8
0.00000043th of the universe.
That's if that 1000 light year packet of radio hits us while we are listening.
And that we have our antennas pointing in the right direction.
Seti was founded in 1984 so it is about 36 years old.
In its early days it was very humble, but lets be generous and say it has had todays capabilities since its creation.
So we have been listening for 36 years, to find a radio signal from an arguably random direction, that may or may not be bigger than 1000 years across, that may or may not have left sometime in the last 23 billion years?
That has dissipated an unknown amount, on an unknown but guessed frequency from a civilization with assumed technology.
And people ask, why have we not heard ET yet :)
I am hopeful, but would be surprised if SETI ever hears anything.
But you wont here without listening so go SETI.
In an odd way it is exactly the opposite to what we want when there are flares from the Sun.
It that case we hope the Sun is not 'pointing' directly at us when the flare is released.Particularly if it is a big one. As we will be hit eight minutes afterward.
It that case we hope the Sun is not 'pointing' directly at us when the flare is released.Particularly if it is a big one. As we will be hit eight minutes afterward.
Prison Planets: Could the Kessler Syndrome Explain Why We Haven't Heard from Aliens? - The Daily Grail
Could cascading collisions between orbiting satellites and spacecraft create a debris field that locks alien civilisations into their own planets?
www.dailygrail.com
But things aren’t exactly what they seem when it comes to the latter case of the orbital space around the Earth. And this is because of an effect that’s become known as the ‘Kessler Syndrome’, given that name based on a seminal paper co-authored in 1978 by astrophysicist and NASA scientist, Donald Kessler.
Its a good point. Thete has to be some point where it is just too hard to pass through it all. Elons satellite array is all good in principle but it adds to the crowding. I have often wondered if a huge deflection plate could be constructed and systematically be positioned to collide and deflect with unwanted junk sending the rubbish back to burn up on reentry.