New way to look for intelligent life within 30 light years

[groovychk]

Originally published at Twixel.net. You can comment here or there.

If there are clever aliens out there, we may learn about them

Washington - Is there intelligent life on other planets? If so, what do space aliens watch on TV?

Astronomers plan to search 1 000 nearby stars for television broadcasts and other signals that could indicate extraterrestrial life, the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics said today.

The project, planned for early 2008, would use a new radio telescope to search for radio traffic similar to that found on Earth.

Current efforts to find extraterrestrial life look for messages deliberately beamed across space - an approach that would miss any civilisation that does not advertise its existence as Earth’s does.

The new effort would search a portion of the electromagnetic spectrum used on Earth for more mundane purposes - radar, television and FM radio broadcasts.

“We may pick up spurious signals from people that never meant for us to hear them and get an inkling that something’s going on,” said David Aguilar, director of communications at the centre.

The project will be able to detect Earth-like radio signals within a distance of 30 light-years, which encompasses about 1 000 stars.

The project will be formally presented at a conference of the American Astronomical Society in Seattle on Wednesday. - Reuters

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Very Cool!

http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=3616600

Comments

[dagulfsghost.livejournal.com]

They will just pick up crap we have shot into space. I doubt aliens would be broadcasting in FM lol!

[groovychk.livejournal.com]

Hehe - Indeed. I'm searching for details. I'm certain that the article is way over-simplified for the idiot masses. If they do have FM then I'm sure Clear Channel already covertly owns most of the alien stations and are playing the same stuff you hear here. :->

[dagulfsghost.livejournal.com]

lol! And the ET's are only allowed to broadcast Hip Hop

[groovychk.livejournal.com]

Then again - maybe all that radio static is their avante-garde public radio music.