SETI@home

SETI@home

This is very cool! It's only tangentially related to skepticism, but it's close enough! "SETI@home is a grand experiment that will harness the spare power of hundreds of thousands of Internet-connected computers in the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI). With SETI@home, computer users from around the world will participate in a major scientific experiment. Each participant will have the slight but captivating possibility that his or her computer will detect the faint murmur of a civilization beyond Earth. ... The SETI@home program is a special kind of screensaver. Like other screensavers it starts up when you leave your computer unattended, and it shuts down as soon as you return to work. What it does in the interim is unique. While you are getting coffee, or having lunch or sleeping, your computer will be helping the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence by analyzing data specially captured by the world's largest radio telescope." In short, when the software becomes available next spring, they hope to have 100,000 people running the software on their PCs to analyze the radio signals they receive in an attempt to detects signs of intelligent life. Slick idea! Tired of fuzzy photos of UFOs that turn out to be Venus? This sounds much better!

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