FW: Re: FW: SETI public: search for artificial lighting

• Previous message: LARRY KLAES: "SETI public: FW: HUBBLE AND KECK TEAM UP TO FIND FARTHEST KNOWN GALAXY IN THE UNIVERSE"
• Maybe in reply to: Pete Heist: "SETI public: search for artificial lighting"

>From: "Robert J. Bradbury" <bradbury_at_aeiveos.com>
>To: LARRY KLAES <ljk4_at_msn.com>
>CC: scot.stride_at_verizon.net, "Milan M. Cirkovic" <arioch_at_eunet.yu>, "Dr.
>Stuart A. Kingsley" <skingsley_at_coseti.org>, <david_at_funkyscience.net>,
><peteheist_at_yahoo.com>
>Subject: Re: FW: SETI public: search for artificial lighting
>Date: Sat, 14 Feb 2004 09:07:04 -0800 (PST)
>
>
>
> > >From: Pete Heist <peteheist_at_yahoo.com>
> > >Subject: SETI public: search for artificial lighting
> > >Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 15:50:03 -0800 (PST)
>
> > >This is a long shot, but I'm wondering- what about
> > >searching for artificial lighting? What if ET uses
> > >sodium vapor or mercury vapor lights, and they're on a
> > >huge, brightly lit planet with heinous light
> > >pollution? ... [snip].
>
>The problem is that even the largest scopes could probably
>not detect specific planetary light sources as distinct
>from the the amount of radiation from the star. This is what
>missions like the Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF) are supposed
>to try and do.
>
>There is the problem of resolution to point at the planet
>rather than the star and the fact that the quantity of
>radiation from the star simply dwarfs the radiation from planets
>below or even slightly above our level of development in
>the visible part of the spectrum.
>
>Then on top of that the window of opportunity is probably
>going to be very small -- except for civilizations with
>very slow development times the probable window where one
>goes from the level where you can construct the light
>sources suggested to the level where you no longer need
>them is perhaps at most a couple of hundred years. Most
>of the biological systems on planets are going to be far
>behind us or more likely (given the Lineweaver group
>work) far ahead of us.
>
>What you want to do is look for is stars going dark or
>high power sources of IR radiation (as Dyson pointed
>out 44 years ago(!)). They have larger detection windows.
>
>Robert
>
>

_________________________________________________________________
Create your own personal Web page with the info you use most, at My MSN.
http://click.atdmt.com/AVE/go/onm00200364ave/direct/01/

• Previous message: LARRY KLAES: "SETI public: FW: HUBBLE AND KECK TEAM UP TO FIND FARTHEST KNOWN GALAXY IN THE UNIVERSE"
• Maybe in reply to: Pete Heist: "SETI public: search for artificial lighting"

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.6 : Sat Feb 14 2004 - 09:28:39 PST