Bad News for SETI?

[Rudy Toody]

This was published moments ago.

 

[Spacehead]

Where are the S@H WUs coming from these days? Aracibo still?

 

[Wiz]

I actually heard Seth on the radio news saying they were simply out of money.
Very sad.

 

[Wiz]

If you take the major computer outages of the last week (Sony & Amazon) and this into account and know anything about the date and "judgement day" it might start to get a little scary.

At least for the deeply paranoid among us...

 

[Lightflash]

Very unfortunate for the Seti crowd.:\

 

[postmortemIA]

good news for rest of us... and double post.

 

[VirtualLarry]

It would be rude of me to badmouth another DC project, but let's just say I was never a fan of SETI's mission. At least now, more computers can be focused on projects with real science, and tangible goals.

 

[zzuupp]

I'm sorry to see any project go. However, it was never anything I felt was worth doing.

 

[Drsignguy]

Bummer to hear this has happened. Even though it was difficult for me to grasp the concept of searching for ET Life, still it was one of my first DC projects. I did it because it was fun seeing what my rig could do. Now, I do it for a cause. Sorry to hear about this.......

 

[jibberegg]

I think there's definitely an inspirational aspect to the program. You can have kids install this stuff on their PCs and suddenly they're hunting for aliens in their spare time. If that's not a cool hook to a geeky kid then I don't know what is.

STEM FTW.

 

[beginner99]

It would be rude of me to badmouth another DC project, but let's just say I was never a fan of SETI's mission. At least now, more computers can be focused on projects with real science, and tangible goals.

Of course chance of finding ET is very, very small if not 0. However the actually impact would be huge. But then I wonder if it ever would make it to the public, if something was found. Probably not. Still it is real science.

Is folding@home "real science" or what to you mean by "real science", applied science? I'm a biologist and I'm a little doubtful how much this actually helps. Alzheimer isn't exactly such a huge issue on global scale compared to like malaria. But it is understandable. Malaria patients in general can't afford any cures anyway so no incentive to develop.

 

[geecee]

Does this actually mean the end of SETI or SETI@home? It doesn't seem like it as the article says at the bottom that other radio telescopes continue to operate and collect data (i.e. Arecibo in PR).

 

[petrusbroder]

As I read this, it is the SETI-program which will be cancelled.
Nothing is said about SETI@Home.
I'll go on looking ...

 

[petrusbroder]

OK, here is the the Q & A about the shut down of a telescope array which the Seti-institute operates.
Seti@home and the SETI-institute have no funding in common.
Seti@home will continue, because they get the data from Aricebo-telescope and not from the shut-down telescope.

OK, folks, continue crunching seti@home ...

 

[Sunny129]

Despite the shutdown of the Allen Telescope Array, the search for E.T. will go on using other telescopes such as a dish at Arecibo in Puerto Rico, the largest radio telescope in the world, Shostak said.

The difference, he said, was that SETI researchers can point the Arecibo telescope at selected sites in space for only about two weeks a year.

While the telescope in Northern California is not as powerful, it could be devoted to the search year-round.

"It has the advantage that you can point it where you want to point it and you can keep pointing it in that direction for as long as we want it to," Shostak said.

The dishes also are unique in the ability to probe for signals from extraterrestrial civilizations while gathering more general scientific data.

"That made the telescope a double-barreled threat," said Leo Blitz, a professor of astronomy at UC Berkeley and former director of the observatory that includes the Allen Telescope Array.

the bolded text is my biggest concern, as that was my biggest incentive to participate in the project - the fact that it looked for more than just extraterrestrial intelligence. i believe these are specifically the Astropulse WU's, b/c the Enhanced/Multibeam WU's search for extraterrestrial intelligence only...correct me if i'm wrong.

 

[Rudy Toody]

OK, folks, continue crunching seti@home ...

I changed the thread title to reflect this new information. Thanks, Peter.

 

[Wiz]

Truly I am dubious that anyone here would be doing distributed computing if it were not for Seti@home.
I've always said, and I am sure someone could search the archives here, that the greatest scientific impact of the seti@home program is to the field of distributed computing itself.
Don't be so quick to dis something without taking it's history into account.
Also before you get high and mighty, tell me one case of cancer or alzheimers your project has CURED. One, just one is all I'm asking for.
What - you say the seti program hasn't discovered one alien?
Also true.
The Seti@home program did pave the way for EVERYTHING you are doing in DC.
Don't ever forget that.

 

[Sunny129]

Truly I am dubious that anyone here would be doing distributed computing if it were not for Seti@home.
I've always said, and I am sure someone could search the archives here, that the greatest scientific impact of the seti@home program is to the field of distributed computing itself.
Don't be so quick to dis something without taking it's history into account.
Also before you get high and mighty, tell me one case of cancer or alzheimers your project has CURED. One, just one is all I'm asking for.
What - you say the seti program hasn't discovered one alien?
Also true.
The Seti@home program did pave the way for EVERYTHING you are doing in DC.
Don't ever forget that.

+1

isn't it still the most popular DC project to date?

 

[petrusbroder]

Truly I am dubious that anyone here would be doing distributed computing if it were not for Seti@home.
I've always said, and I am sure someone could search the archives here, that the greatest scientific impact of the seti@home program is to the field of distributed computing itself.
Don't be so quick to dis something without taking it's history into account.
Also before you get high and mighty, tell me one case of cancer or alzheimers your project has CURED. One, just one is all I'm asking for.
What - you say the seti program hasn't discovered one alien?
Also true.
The Seti@home program did pave the way for EVERYTHING you are doing in DC.
Don't ever forget that.

+2

I agree.

I have started Seti@home again, after a few months of pause. Let's see if the server problems which plagued the project are better now ... :\

 

[Sunny129]

OK, here is the the Q & A about the shut down of a telescope array which the Seti-institute operates.
Seti@home and the SETI-institute have no funding in common.
Seti@home will continue, because they get the data from Aricebo-telescope and not from the shut-down telescope.

OK, folks, continue crunching seti@home ...

well your confirmation is official...taken from the SETI@Home news sub-forum:

As noted in the Scientific American and elsewhere, the Allen Telescope Array was recently forced into hibernation. While we are sad to see this happen, SETI@home receives its data elsewhere, so our project is not directly affected. Dr. Eric Korpela wrote a helpful Q&A about this in the SETI@home Staff Blog.

 

[Pokey]

This made ME think!!…………..

I started with Seti; without a doubt it was the “egg” so to speak. I’m now doing Folding, with the same personal success rate……………. Zero. :\

I lost interest in Seti mainly because it finally occurred to me that given the monumentally incomprehensible distances involved, any intelligent being capable of sending a signal would be extinct by the time we receive it, or vice versa. (IMHO)

The appeal of Folding, though, or any other project, (name your poison) must lie in the fact that some modicum of success at least appears possible.

I for one will always have a soft spot for Seti…………… and I am glad to see that Arecibo is still staring out into space, and my little Mac-Mini can keep on looking for ET.

 

[bryanW1995]

It would be rude of me to badmouth another DC project, but let's just say I was never a fan of SETI's mission. At least now, more computers can be focused on projects with real science, and tangible goals.

While there are certainly many valuable projects out there, I hardly think that SETI isn't "real" science. Besides, even with projects like milkyway giving ridiculous credits for the past couple years, SETI has remained very popular among DC users around the world. Do I think that finding a cure for cancer is a more noble goal than searching for aliens? Sure, but what about finding a prime number with 100 zeros, or figuring out the 3n + 1 conjecture? Many, possibly even most, DC projects are simply pet projects for academicians who don't have the supercomputer time to solve their problems. SETI is much more than an academic pursuit, though I admit that it's probably a long shot that any of us will see the results in our lifetimes. And people can wrap their minds around such a simple goal: to find out if we're alone.

Personally, as long as they keep offering up WU's I'll keep crunching them.


edit: just read Eric Korpela's Q/A about it, this part caught my attention:


The expansion to 350 telescopes will take much more money than the I will ever have known anyone who knows anyone who has. It may even approach the cost of that F/A-18. I'd love to see it happen, but I'm understandably pessimistic. If I were a billionaire and had 60 million burning a hole in my pocket, then I might fund the expansion. Assuming I didn't blow it all on ninja supermodel robots first.


I believe that's called gallows humor, though fortunately it is not for seti@home...

 

[VirtualLarry]

Truly I am dubious that anyone here would be doing distributed computing if it were not for Seti@home.
I've always said, and I am sure someone could search the archives here, that the greatest scientific impact of the seti@home program is to the field of distributed computing itself.
Don't be so quick to dis something without taking it's history into account.
Also before you get high and mighty, tell me one case of cancer or alzheimers your project has CURED. One, just one is all I'm asking for.
What - you say the seti program hasn't discovered one alien?
Also true.
The Seti@home program did pave the way for EVERYTHING you are doing in DC.
Don't ever forget that.

I thought distributed.net preceded Seti@Home? No?

 

[beginner99]

I thought distributed.net preceded Seti@Home? No?

No idea, but Seti made DC popular. At least it was the first time i heard about such an idea.

I ran it on a Pentium 1 200 Mhz and Pentium MMX 233 Mhz, later on 2 P4 PCs.

I think my i7 i bought last summer took about 4 Month to double the previous like 10 Years efforts. The HD 5850 with Milky way, did not check, but probably couple of days.

EDIT:

I just checked, joined in early 2000!

 

[Rattledagger]

It would be rude of me to badmouth another DC project, but let's just say I was never a fan of SETI's mission. At least now, more computers can be focused on projects with real science, and tangible goals.

Hello kettle, I'm pot, you're black.


As for doing "real" science, you've overlooked the very important fact that due to SETI@home developing BOINC, there's over 50 active BOINC-projects having 160 k active users that does not run SETI@home. Without BOINC, chances are less than 5 of these 50+ active projects would ever have been released, so majority of the 160 k active users wouldn't run any projects at all.

Folding@home's way of doing things is very inefficient, since example adding GPU-support to FAH-client means only FAH can use GPU for crunching, while adding GPU-support to BOINC-client means atleast 6 projects can use GPU crunching and more projects can be added in the future. This duplication in the development of both client and server-code wastes both time and money, time and money that would have been better spent on other things, like example cutting-down on development-time on a more stable, and better optimized FAH-Ati-core.