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Radio Astronomers Win Spectra 63

Posted by timothy from the international-slashdot-depts-union- dept.
General_Corto writes: "The BBC is currently running an article about the latest global allocations of EM spectrum for radio astronomy. The entire range from 75GHz to 275Ghz has been given to them alone, which should ensure that all their readings are free from earth-based interference. Apparently, "there is more energy at millimeter and sub-millimeter wavelengths washing through the Universe than there is of light or any other kind of radiation." Hopefully all those little green men out there use cellphones in that frequency range." You may also be interested in the home pages of the International Telecommunications Union and the International Astronomical Union.
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Radio Astronomers Win Spectra More

Radio Astronomers Win Spectra

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  • This reminds me of the first radio amateurs. They where assigned all frequencies above 300 kHz (wavelength shorter than 1 km) because the frequency was so high that (it was believed at that time) "the radio waves propagates as light" and thus could not pass any obstacles like trees, buildings and the horizon.....

    It could not have been more wrong, and today the radio amateurs are crammed into small segments scattered all over the RF spectrum.

    As soon as there is any legitimate need for these frequencies, I am sure that the history repeats.

  • Not about little green men (Score:3)

    by BeeJay ( 51918 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @02:05AM (#993538) Homepage
    Most comments on this story are about search for E.T.

    Have you read the article? I find nothing indicating that search for extraterrestial life is the intend of keeping those frequencies clear.

    It's about radio astronomy. To me, that means exploring the space, the stars, the galaxies, etc.

    Some comments indicate that we shouln't explore farther away than our solar system, because we will never go longer anyway... I think you totally miss the point of atronomy. It's not about "preparing a trip to mars", it's rather about exploring the world we live in - find out how things are, how nature works, and so on. The best and most useful results of science are often those of research that didn't have any really practical purpurse, but that is rather based on curiosity.

    While the more practical research is about finding "the answers", you could say that real research is about finding the relevant questions to ask.

    (I'm not an astronomer - although a Physics minor and Mathematics major.)

  • When you're talking about astronomical distances, most signals change after having been sent; they change quite a lot. And the microwave range is the best place to look for these forshortened signals. It's not that this is the best range to send a signal in; it's that this is the best range to receive a signal in, since this is the range most signals will be in after travelling such great distances. And our signals will be in this range, too, by the time they reach the little green men with the headphones on.
  • bah..

    given the right conditions .. god becomes redundant

    life started on this planet aproximatly 1 and 2 billion years after the conditions became suitable for it to start... life didnt happen overnight..

    go read the blind watchmaker...

    and anyway.. religion is all about control.. not god.. get people to fear something, and youve got them, thats why the church was in such a position of power for so long.. religion != faith.. you can have faith without the religion.. i belive in god, i dont belive in a religion

    dms0

  • Why Radio astronomers need protected wavelengths (Score:5)

    by tjwhaynes ( 114792 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @03:27AM (#993541)

    IWARA - I Was A Radio Astronomer!

    For all of you unadventurous souls who seem to believe that giving specific wavebands to astronomy is a waste (and yes I am aware that the article merely points out that the current astronomy wavelengths are going to remain protected) I think I ought to explain why radio astronomy can't function without this protection. Here's a little demonstration:

    Put your pen on the floor - a bic biro will do. Lift it above your head. You have just used up more energy than the entire collection of radio telescopes on the surface of the earth has ever collected from the sky. The base unit of energy for most radio astronomers is the Jansky - often written Jy - which is equivalent to 10^{-26} W m^{-2}. Most of the radio objects in the sky have intensities of less than 1 Jy. A few reach up into kJy.

    Now consider a mobile phone. These stick out a few watts of energy. So they are about 26 orders of magnitude more powerful than the average radio source appears in the sky.

    Any terrestrial transmitter dwarfs the emissions we get from the sky by design. For communications, the radio emissions are background noise to be squashed under the signal. If we are to further our understanding of physics, and radio astronomy provides a unique testing crucible to test the theories against, we need protected bandwidth.

    Cheers,

    Toby Haynes

  • I was correcting the article posted on slashdot, which asserted:

    The entire range from 75GHz to 275Ghz has been given to them alone, which should ensure that all their readings are free from earth-based interference.

    This is incorrect and a misreading of the BBC article.

  • ......this has got to be a troll.
    "A small number of astronomers will benefit from this move, at the expense of the rest of the world's population. "
    OK, people are hungry because radio astronomers are looking in a certain frequency range. Free the spectrum, feed the world. I see the logic now.
    "'It is a win for science'. This is a very naive attitude. It is a win for astronomy, nothing more."
    Good one, since astronomy isn't actually a science. Jeez.
    Could go on, gotta work.
  • As a Tech Plus Amateur Radio liscense from the FCC i wonder how this will affect us. As a license holder i have allready been promissed access to some of these frequecys. Does this decison overrule thoses. I am now not allowed to use them. And how does a single international organization have control over this process of distributing banwith. Seems like a mighty large chunk to one group.

    Scott Wolf
    Network Administrator
    AGINET
    admin@aginet.com [mailto]
  • We have all sorts of encryption and compression to keep our wireless communications secure...to aliens we must just seem like line noise...
  • The reason we watch at these frequencies is that the Earth's atmosphere is transparent to radiation at those frequencies. There's no reason to perform searches at frequencies that won't get through the atmosphere (like particular UV frequencies, except when there's a hole in the ozone!)

    Unless the little green men have a vastly different ecology (not carbon based, don't require oxygen/water, etc. and thus a wildly different atmosphere) it is very likely that they are searching the same frequencies as we are.

    That would suck!

    Eric
  • Does this seem fair or reasonable?
    Yes. This does seem fair and reasonable. Don't worry about your precious bandwidth, Lita. As happens with all real-estate, this radio frequency real-estate will get sold off as it becomes more valuable.

    I'm not saying that they are going to build a StarBucks coffee shop right in the middle of 150GHz. This only happens with property. It'll become allocated as needed to whomever will pay for it.
  • Yeah, that's why I'm an astrophysicist.... :-)
  • Why bother scanning the skys all the time, there is too much to look at and not enough processing power to cover everything properly.
    More to the point, looking for ET in radio waves is, to quote the late Terrence McKenna, as culture-bound a project as searching the galaxy for a good Italian restaurant.
    I mean some guy finds a planet that is so far away we will never go though. Does it really make a difference to us ?
    If this isn't a troll, it's stupid enough to fool me. I mean, so someone made a machine the size of a house that can add. What good will that do ordinary people?

    Boss of nothin. Big deal.
    Son, go get daddy's hard plastic eyes.

  • What a waste of bandwidth. (Score:3)

    by Lita Juarez ( 201217 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @01:16AM (#993550)
    I feel really angry about this. Bandwidth is an already scarce resource, and for them to waste a full 200GHz for this sort of research seems criminal. As the demand for wireless telecommunications for consumer use continues to boom, it seems crazy that they are devoting such a large slice of the spectrum to what will probably be fruitless research. A small number of astronomers will benefit from this move, at the expense of the rest of the world's population. Does this seem fair or reasonable?

    The BBC article says "It is a win for science". This is a very naive attitude. It is a win for astronomy, nothing more. Surely science would benefit more if governments were to fund their scientists properly - astronomy is just a very small branch of science, and is a branch of science which does little to address the world's problems. This is just a token attempt by the governments of the world to try to show their commitment to science.

  • One of the main points of looking for ET is that it finding ET will answer one of the questions that has been bugging mankind for eons: Are we alone?

    If we can find life somewhere else it may answer many theological and scientific questions. It also puts human kinds aparent "uniqness" into perspective. Just imagine what the worlds reaction would be to the news that life had been discovered outside of our solar system...

  • Launch a thousand small craft with a solar sails(sic) towards the most promising targets

    Grand idea, but a solar sail, to be effective, must be made of materials that're currently unavailable or unfeasible to use in large quantities; the solar sails must be extremely light (less mass, and thus less energy required to accelerate them) and strong (otherwise, the light waves/ionic waves will merely distort them). Otherwise, the acceleration gained from them will be less than effective.

  • Of course there won't be any aliens using cell phones in that frequency range. The ACC will have allocated the whole band to their radio astronomers. We need an astronomical null modem to swap the TX/RX freqs or we'll all just end up listening for each other.

  • Re:What a waste of bandwidth. (Score:3)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 19, 2000 @01:46AM (#993554)
    As the demand for wireless telecommunications for consumer use continues to boom, [...] A small number of astronomers will benefit from this move, at the expense of the rest of the world's population. Does this seem fair or reasonable?
    Your whining is disgusting. So astronomers will benefit "at the expense of the rest of the world's population", huh? Most of the rest of the world's population couldn't care about dastardly astronomers stealing bandwidth from wireless communication. Most of them care a lot more about what they're going to eat tomorrow. Why aren't you complaining about telecomm companies and their clients benefiting at the expense of the rest of the world's population? If the only issue at hand is "benefit to the most people", doesn't it seem more fair or reasonable that the small fraction of the world's population who would use wireless could live with good old-fashioned wired communications and take the money they'd have spent on wireless to do something that really would benefit the rest of the world's population?

    That being said: yes, I think it's fair and reasonable for astronomers to use bandwidth to learn about our universe, and then tell us about it. Knowledge doesn't just benefit those who are producing it; it benefits everyone who seeks it.

    Moreover, if the only thing people cared about was personal convenience, then there's no point in having civilization. Civilization is supposed to remove the necessity of having every single person spending their entire lives in survival, so that people can spend time doing non-essential things. Art, history, literature, music, philosophy, science. Those are the standards against which civilization is measured, not one's ability to hold a phone conversation or check e-mail outdoors. Good grief.

    Besides, I don't even see this as impacting wireless telecomm very much. The spectrum is still large, and there is still a great deal of room for technology to improve. Anyway, the telecomm companies are rich. Why don't they buy the bandwidth back from the radio astronomers, in exchange for setting up some radio telescopes on the far side of the Moon? I expect that a hundred billion trillion tons of rock would do a pretty good job of shielding stray radio emissions from the Earth.

  • We need an astronomical null modem

    Wow, that would be one hell of a cable. I'm sure you'd need some serious shielding on it too.
  • How is it you find yourself speaking against the "cult of science" by one of it's very products. Is this the height of hypocrisy, or merely bait for comments that will provide you with some amusement? The Big Bang may be a flawed theory, but it's followers possess much more evidence than a Christian could ever wield to prove his master.

    What of the background radiation in the Universe? Can you find equal fact that points to a god? What about the red shift of light, proven to mean that the Universe is expanding, by Doppler and Hubble?

    There is much more evidence of a world without God than there is of one with. It takes cowardice and spite for a religion to strike out against science, but it takes a great deal of refinement for one to embrace it. And that is where hard-core Christianity, such as that seen during the Burning Times, will die the horrible death it deserves.

    Furthermore, I find it incredibly sad for Christian fanatics to feign disgust at supposed government interference in their religion. Tell me, has the government prosecuted the Church for contributing to the delinquency of minors when they give alcohol to countless children every Sunday morning? Has the government banned performing one of your rituals, because of religous ignorance? And when have these beliefs, the beliefs you proclaim so arrogantly, been decent? After years of murder, theft, and corruption you have gained the majority. And with this, the fanatical have continued to ply a trade of immorality. Keep your fanatical and suppsedly decent Christian beliefs, for my beliefs were not won with the blood of the innocent.

  • It isn't all about LGM (Score:4)

    by HiyaPower ( 131263 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @02:16AM (#993557)
    One of the prime uses for radio astronomy is earth weather. Water vapor has a spectrl line at 22.235 GHz and 117 GHz (and up). Oxygen has a complex of lines around 50 GHz. By picking your frequencies carefully and being clever with your processing, you can tell the vertical temperature distribution of the atmosphere as well as water content. Also, the microwave emission quality of the ocean varies with wind speed. Again you can tell something about it. Snow pack depth is also something that you can monitor in the spectral region. Since most of the earth is covered by water, and infra-red does not penetrate cloud tops well, remote sensing by microwaves has help immensely with the ability to forcast weather in the past 20 years. All we need is for some commercial interests to blow the spectrum out of the water in order to broadcast a bazzilion channels of the latest WWF tag team.

  • Re:What a waste of bandwidth. (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    What do you mean, "fruitless research"? Without being able to observe at these wavelengths, radio astronomers can't see anything! Say permanent goodbye to any future hope of learning things about our universe. Radio astronomy plays a key role.

    And yes, this is a win for science. Otherwise it's just one step down the slippery slope of killing all fundamental research for lack of "practicality". "Hey, why continue to fund X? We should shut them down just like the radio astronomers, they haven't designed us a better toothbrush lately."

  • No, they didn't get 200 GHz (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    From the article (emphasis mine):
    WRC 2000 has protected for science all the frequencies between 71 and 275 gigahertz
    that radio astronomers currently use. They have added more than 90 GHz of spectrum to the 44 GHz already set aside for their use in this frequency range.
    In other words, they have 134 GHz now, not 200.
  • OK, this is a flame, if you don't like flames, don't read it.

    If it hadn't been for basic research in astronomy, you wouldn't have had a computer to write on. What you are saying is like shutting yourself into a building and think that you are able to do come up with bright ideas without any input from outside. History has shown over and over again, that astronomy is the branch of science that causes the most fundamental changes in our world view.

  • This article is bogus (Score:3)

    by hpa ( 7948 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @02:19AM (#993561) Homepage
    This Slashdot article is completely bogus. The quoted article says:

    WRC 2000 has protected for science all the frequencies between 71 and 275 gigahertz
    that radio astronomers currently use.

    Translation: the radio astronomy allocations in the 71-275 GHz band was not diminished. This is a far cry from claiming that over 200 GHz of EHF spectrum (of which there is 270 GHz in total) would be allocated solely to radio astronomy.

  • Dunno. I can't think of hearing it w/ the future part tacked on from anyone else so maybe it came from my head or maybe I'm just tired and can't remember. Do you think I can patent it? LOL

  • a win? (Score:1)

    by kat5 ( 202129 )
    ok... some of you obviously feel that this is not a win for science but yet one for astronomy... well.. I can agree and disagree with you on that statement, first, what about projects such as SETI? this project is truely an "open" source project which is funded by public corporations... also.. yeah it may be a "waste" of bandwidth but think about all the copper that's out there that limits bandwidth.... c'mon.. what about the use of fiber optics? what about dsl/cable? if all you're gonna bitch about is the "coming of the wireless age", then move your soap box over and take a back seat... there are still problems with wireless communications (namely transmission distance/interference) that have to be worked out.... not to mention what about all the nice low level frequencies?? bigger, better, faster?? nope.. try smarter, smaller, shared communications

  • Wrong, Wrong, Wrong (Score:5)

    by Detritus ( 11846 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @01:57AM (#993564) Homepage
    Read the article:

    WRC 2000 has protected for science all the frequencies between 71 and 275 gigahertz that radio astronomers currently use. They have added more than 90 GHz of spectrum to the 44 GHz already set aside for their use in this frequency range.

    Radio astronomers have been given some new allocations, but not the entire 71-275 GHz frequency range. Allocating all of that range to radio astronomy would be a disaster for research, experimentation and other users of the RF spectrum.

  • Ummmm It does propogate as light. The only way to get past a tree, building, or horizon is to bounce the RF off of other trees, buildings, or ionosphere. It is like trying to communicate with someone around a corner with a flashlight. You cannot flash them a signal directly, but if you shine your flashlight on the corner, the light will bounce off and be seen by the other person. Bad example, but it fits. It is only when you get to really high frequencies that you go through instead of around. That is why these 900Mhz portable phones are soo much better than those they had out a few years ago.

  • Nice comeback; it must feel much better to claim to be trolling than to admit that you're too stupid to know the difference between astrology and astronomy. :
  • As Calvin in "Calvin and Hobbes" once said,

    The best sign that there is intelligent life out there is that none of it has come to contact us

    -
    Ekapshi
  • No, see, it's wireless. You'd just have a giant repeater halfway between the civilizations.
  • This is all about money, not science. Sure, the radio astronomers would like to have all the high-end frequencies, and probably will for a number of years, but the band they got in this deal is low enough that it could easily be commercially usable in several years.

    At that point, it'll be worth countless billions, and you can bet they'll be trying to shake down the ".rad's" in excahnge for "giving up" their RF turf. This is *very* bad for the future of always-on, always available high-speed wireless networking and it's a horrible deal for everyone but the astronomers. It's not a problem now because those frequencies are not yet commercially viable - but they *will* be.

    (I used Motorola's 18 GHz LAN back in the early 90's. Other than sub-optimal wall penetration, these high frequencies work well - and more importantly, there's a *TON* of bandwidth up there, and as Shannon taught us, you can trade bandwidth for power.)

  • I feel really angry about this. Bandwidth is an already scarce resource, and for them to waste a full 200GHz for this sort of research seems criminal. As the demand for wireless telecommunications for consumer use continues to boom, it seems crazy that they are devoting such a large slice of the spectrum to what will probably be fruitless research. A small number of astronomers will benefit from this move, at the expense of the rest of the world's population. Does this seem fair or reasonable?

    The BBC article says "It is a win for science". This is a very naive attitude. It is a win for astronomy, nothing more. Surely science would benefit more if governments were to fund their scientists properly - astronomy is just a very small branch of science, and is a branch of science which does little to address the world's problems. This is just a token attempt by the governments of the world to try to show their commitment to science.

    I beg to differ. First, you can't know beforehand whether there is something useful or interesting to be found or not, because you can't know about things that are yet far off in science. Who would have known about semiconductors 150 years ago? Probably quite a few researches that eventually led to them were doomed as useless, simply because the results couldn't be anticipated until much, much later.

    Second, I think that this forces the wireless telecommunications industy to seek new methods, therefore opening some new inventions that wouldn't have probably discovered as soon if everything had gone easily for them.

  • Hmmm, my main concern is that their government has also alocated the same frequencies for listening and we're both sitting there listening to the same "station" but no one's broadcasting. Figures... :)
  • Actually, I hate to nitpick, but most "fauna" also use what you call "saturation" strategies, although this only lends creedence to your argument of using many different methods to find life "out there". Think of all the insects, snails, worms, fish, sponges, jellyfish, amphibians, coral, crustaceans (shrimp, krill), and even mammals such as certain rodents that exibit a somewhat to extreme r-selected population dynamic, while only a small percent of any life uses a definite K-selected population dynamic. We humans are the extreme of K - selected, dumping massive pre and post natal care and resources into each offspring, which I guess you've described as "specific". (R-selected is so named because final pop size has to do with both rate of new birth and rate of mortality of any given season, while K selected has to do with the overall long-term carrying capacity of environment.)

    A better analogy if you want to use the terms saturated and specific (as specific means more as to whether the species in question is quite generalist in food consumption and ecological niche, or specialist) would be the difference in reproductive strategies among K-selected males and females. Females want to focus their substantial rescource commitment in a very specific, choosy manner, while guys generally want to just get it all out there, as much as possible, as many ways as possible, although both are proactive, I guess. A guy who mates with an undesireable mate has often little to lose in the bargain, as he can mate with many other girls even that same day, but the female in the same situation must spend considerable resources raising a "sub-standard" offspring.

    ooky
    I want one big nuclear bomb and two, no, THREE little ones. For setting examples. -Keith
    No nukes! - me
  • The price of RF is as much government rent-seeking as corporate rent-seeking. Governments, especially in Europe, have been collecting billions of euros or dollars in return for access to spectrum which would otherwise be publicly available. That's especially ludicrous with spread-spectrum technology like CDMA, where multiple users can share the same spectrum space. RF space in the broadcast bands is more monopolistic - radio regulations in the US were particularly promulgated to reduce competition for stations and prevent little guys from getting involved, but corporations were able to do that because it increases the government's power and influence, so the government's happy to sell that service.
  • I understand that astronomers need their space. I won't argue that. But how much space does communication need? In other words, what is the physical limit for how much information can be crammed into a particular frequency?
  • You are quite correct. The male of our species does spread his seed to the wind just like the dandelion. I was thinking more in terms of the female's role in reproduction, though. Even still, my metaphor was flawed.
  • I think you misparsed: "all the frequencies between 71 and 275 that radio astronomers currently use" != "all the frequencies between 71 and 275".

    And it's fairly clear the moderators didn't bother to look any more closely... *sigh*
  • I was watching Contact last night and it made me wonder what the point of looking for ET is. Why bother scanning the skys all the time, there is too much to look at and not enough processing power to cover everything properly.
    Even when not looking for ET, so what ? I mean some guy finds a planet that is so far away we will never go though. Does it really make a difference to us ? I don't think so and the amount spent on this sort of research is (if you'll excuse the pun) astronomical.
  • I agree...I dont think that the time spent in this area is as valuable as it is held to be

  • I expect that a hundred billion trillion tons of rock would do a pretty good job of shielding stray radio emissions from the Earth.
    Now come on, we all know that the moon has a mass of 81.02 billion billion tons. For the magnitudinally challenged, that's 81.02 quintillion tons.

  • Evolution of Life (Score:4)

    by Digitalia ( 127982 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @01:06AM (#993580) Homepage
    Through the years, nature has developed two means of propagation: saturation and specification. While most fauna are specific in their intent, flora opt for the easier of the two. A dandelion does not release one seed into a SSW vector. It's species would have gone extinct long ago if it had. Instead, it releases a gross of seeds into the wind. Perhaps we need to do the same. Concentrating on radio alone will get us no where. We will go extinct before we meet an alien species. I am a proponent of sending out beacons. Launch a thousand small craft with a solar sails towards the most promising targets. On board is a cache of data on humanity, and a radio transmitter.

    Continue to scan the skies with our antennas, but in a universe of so many stars, and so many planets, a proactive solution is the only one that will work.
  • Not at all, I see no real evidence for there being a "god". I am amazed by the number of people who are so desperate to find out "why we are here" and "where we came from". To this I ask - "If we had definite proof one way or the other about the creation of the universe, would your life be different ?". Of course it wouldn't be. To be honest I don't care, the fact is the human race exists and we may as well enjoy ourselves instead of spending our time trying to find the answer to a question we don't even really understand.

  • One way glass? (Score:4)

    by MikeFM ( 12491 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @12:53AM (#993582) Homepage Journal
    Hrm.. if we have that whole range of easy to see signals blocked off so we can see any lil green men sending in that range I guess we're not sending anything out at that range. What if the lil green men decided that this was an optimal range to watch also so they aren't sending anything out either. We're each sitting behind a one-way mirror trying to see the other but evidently only seeing the blank reflection of our own window. :)
  • Such as ?
    Even if we found an alien race that said they had created us, my first question would be - "Well who created you ?"
    No matter what we found it would be impossible to truely discredit religion, no matter what your beliefs are.
    I'm not religous, but I don't think that space exploration will ever convince any religion that it is wrong.
    Nobody likes to be wrong, least of all religous people.

  • Re:Contact (Score:3)

    by Nexx ( 75873 ) on Monday June 19, 2000 @01:08AM (#993584)

    I wonder what the point of looking for ET is

    Radioastronomy isn't *just* about looking for ET; it's also about looking at the fundamantal structure of matter itself. There are many phenomenons in space (like the supernova) that're either difficult or simply impossible, with today's technology, to recreate. Studying these will give us valuable "basic science" that may, one day, become usable technology.

  • Now, that would be kind of funny :-)
  • Realisticly though, the only space we are going to explore is in our own solar system so we should concentrate our efforts here.
    Yes, I'd like to see a man on Mars and I'd like to go to the moon, but isn't radio astronomy unnecessary for this "short" distance ?

  • The BBC article The BBC article says "It is a win for science". This is a very naive attitude. It is a win for
    astronomy, nothing more. Surely science would benefit more if governments were to fund their scientists properly - astronomy is just a very small branch of science, and is a branch of science which does little to address the world's problems. This is just a token attempt by the governments of the world to try to show their commitment to science.

    Interesting. In supporting your views, allocating the spectrum range cost these governments virtually nothing, whereas fuding for building an atom-smasher would cost on the order of millions, at the very least. The first is a very inexpensive show of support, the other can potentially run afoul with the constituents.

    However, if this action sets a precedent for funding other realms of research, then it was good for science, nost just for radioastronomy. Our Mileage will vary, of course.

  • I think it would only generate new forms of religion. Think about it. We discover a race that is technical superiour to ours by far (how could we else get their signals ?)
    What would joe "believer" do ? Perhaps his "god" has arived ?

    There are quite may sci-fi flicks out there that deal with this topic ....
    Samba Information HQ
  • Those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it, those who ignore the future are just doomed. Sure it may seem like a total waste of time and money to watch and explore space but most discoveries are made when you are least expecting them. If you aren't paying attention then it might blow past you and you'll never realize what you missed. There will come a point when this planet will be destroyed, either by our own foolishness or by some outside force. If we haven't colonized space by then then poof the human race is gone. Remember all those asteroid movies a couple years ago? :) Don't put all your eggs in one basket, sure another basket might cost more but it provides you extra protection. Just imagine life as needing RAID protection. :)
  • "Hopefully all those little green men out there use cellphones in that frequency range."

    Unless they are like us of course, and they have kept those frequencies clear for radio astronomy.

    Perhaps we're all listening on the same channels, and nobody's transmitting !!!

  • Not the point (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The astronomers aren't reserving this range for SETI searches! They're reserving it because it's the range that a lot of natural astrophysical phenomena radiate within.

  • Good News (Score:3)

    by KjetilK ( 186133 ) <kjetil AT kjernsmo DOT net> on Monday June 19, 2000 @01:30AM (#993592) Homepage Journal
    This is extremely good news for science! Electromagnetic pollution is the most serious threat to astronomy today, both in the optical and at other wavelenghts. Then, there is all the garbage out there. For more information about this issue, please visit International Dark-Sky Association [darksky.org].

    Now, it is not protected primarily for SETI. Submm is an extremely important branch of astronomy, and gaining. The page of the largest submm telescope [hawaii.edu] in the world the JCMT is a good place to start if you want to find out more about submm astronomy.

    As for SETI funding, there are not huge amounts of resources going into it. There are small amounts of resources. IMHO, that is the way it should be, but piggyback projects should be conducted. Computing is best done through distributed projects, like the SETI@Home [berkeley.edu] project. I have stopped running the client, though, I think they're not managing the project right.

  • There are many phenomenons in space (like the supernova) that're either difficult or simply impossible, with today's technology, to recreate

    Good, the idea of some guy in a lab recreating a supernova is not my idea of fun, what they do at CERN [www.cern.ch] is good enough.
  • Of course, some of the stuff they do in CERN is to understand what goes on within a supernova. What "looking up" also allows us to do is to see the state of the Universe as it was eons ago.
  • Of course, the down side of this is that we may become extinct if we meet an alien species....

    regards,
    treefrog
  • And this frightens me more than anything else. Embracing the technologically superior caused the destruction of the South American cultures. When those of white skin came in on wings of white, they were mistaken for Gods. Instead, they were Spanish humans who proceded to murder and steal in the name of Christianity. I am anxious to see that our search was not for naught, but I would be wary of any Alien life.

  • Those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it, those who ignore the future are just doomed.

    Wow! I need that sentence in my quotes file, did you come up with it yourself, or did somebody else say it...? Who should I site...?

  • Re:What a waste of bandwidth. (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Bandwidth is an already scarce resource,

    Is it? I believe the 500-1000 GHz frequency range is still free. So is most of the the 10-10000THz range. and then there's all the 10 Hz and lower frequencies.
  • The most effective solar sail we could produce would be one made with a carbon composite. It would be very tough, yet not very dense at all. NASA intends to test one in a few years.

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