British academic researchers and leaders want to restart the
British SETI (the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) program in
hopes of finding signs of intelligent life in the universe. They argue that
there really isn’t a program that truly looks for alien life in a coordinated
and pragmatic way. It is argued that with just a half a percent of the UK astronomical
budget it is possible to create a program that is competitive with the
private-funded American SETI program (Extremetech, 2013).
According to Dr. John Elliot of the SETI Research UK website
the primary purpose of the program is to decipher space messages for
intelligent structure. The programs include detecting a signal signature of ET
technology, the impact of such a signals on humanity, protocols for ET
communication. The program focuses on trying to connect with and send signals
to possible extra terrestrial life.
The program also known as UKSRN was announced recently at
the Royal Astronomical Society’s National Astronomy Meeting in St. Andrews,
Scotland (NBC, 2013). At present the leading program is the U.S. based California
SETI Institute that has a
much larger budget than the $250,000 initial proposal by the UK SETI program
and the $1.5 million annual budget the group hopes to raise.
The problem with such research is that it has few benchmarks
for failure and one initial benchmark for success (i.e. finding extraterrestrial
life). The participants have announced that they are hoping to partner with a
number of satellites as well as focus on the development of better language
analytical models. Their work will
include the search for intelligible language as well as finding large
artificial structures based upon previous astronomical research.
At a time when research budgets are under pressure such
programs often take a back burner and must fight for limited government and philanthropic
funds that appear to have more practical outcomes. It does make one wonder if
the group broadened their scope to include the development of new communication
languages or the enhancement of space communication whether or not they would
have better funding opportunities.
It can be beneficial to include corporate funds in
the funding mix due to the potential broad and ambiguous benefits of such programs. If the
researchers focus on finding patterns within noises and sounds from space it
may be possible to also use that information to develop new communication
languages or methods. A slightly broader scope may draw additional stakeholders
with investment money if they can capitalize on such research for future
products. Finding patterns and developing patterns is not that different but there are multiple opportunities for partnerships.
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