Ohio u. researcher sets the record straight on "project seti".

Sun 26 Apr 92  2:05
By: Don Allen
To: All
Re: Q & A on "Project" Seti

** Forwarded from Usenet **


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Article 13259 of sci.astro:
From: Bob_Dixon@osu.edu
Newsgroups: sci.astro
Subject: Re: What is the Current Status of Project SETI?
Message-ID: 
Date: 21 Apr 92 15:21:57 GMT
Sender: Bob Dixon 
Reply-To: Bob_Dixon@osu.edu
Organization: The Ohio State University
Lines: 26


In response to Jon Noring's questions of Apr 17:


There is no such thing as Project SETI. SETI is just an acronym that stands
for a particular field of research, like brain surgery. There are many
Projects around the earth, run by many different people and organizations,
that are engaged in the field of SETI.


The longest-running SETI program on Earth is the one at here at Ohio State.
Another very important one is at Harvard. The only other continuous program
is one started recently in Argentina.


NASA plans to start their own program next October, using various radio
telescopes around the world (primarily NASA-owned).


The SETI detection protocol discussed earlier on this newsgroup formalizes
the distribution of any discoveries, making it unlikely that they could
be classified. But even without that, classification does not seem to be a
real threat. No government has ever mentioned such a possibility. Nobody
in a position to classify anything knows what is going on day-by-day at
any observatory. Surely the scientists involved will notify one another
at the various observatories before making any announcement. By then it will
be too late for classification to make any difference.




                                               Bob Dixon
                                               Director, OSU SETI Program




** End of Article **


Don

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