What about SETI?

 I was a part of SETI - Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence - since it's inception in 1999 until it shut down in 2020.   It was a group of astronomers that developed the SETI program in Berkley, California.   I remember trying to download data for analysis in 2020 and received information from SETI that packets of data were no longer available.  I have owned various computers during that time, but every computer I owned I hardly ever shut down because i was constantly running the program in the background, and I was curious as to whether anything unusual would occur and I wanted my computer to be the first to find it.  So, I kept my computers on just to run the SETI program.  According to the institute there were about 2.5 million of us offering CPU time to SETI.  The amount of memory used on any given computer was negligible at best.

But during that time and all those computers being used SETI found nothing unusual or out of the ordinary.  SETI now has enough computing power to replace all those home computers doing all their work.  But I found the SETI community fascinating and would watch the screen saver crunch the data my own computer was analyzing.  But I felt that volunteering my computer to SETI was worthwhile, even though I didn't understand all the colored graphs and what they were trying to accomplish.

I just found it fascinating that my computer was being used by SETI to analyze data in the search for intelligent life giving off radio signals from distant galaxies.  I miss their screen saver because in my free time I would watch the colored graph with the black background do its work on my computer.  I felt I was a part of something, and maybe something BIG, although I was never sure what I was a part of. Some might suggest it was a Spyware program, but I never received from my various anti-virus programs any warnings about SETI using my computer.  In fact SETI didn't have the memory to monitor the computers for other uses.  

So, I never once worried about the program running in the background.  SETI was a safe program one downloaded from the Institute.  Although granted these days one can't be sure about anything any longer.  Some say we have no privacy any longer so it wouldn't matter much now anyway.  

I miss SETI running on my computer now.  But SETI says in all that time with all those users, there is no new data to analyze until someone comes up with a better method to crunch the new data that would be coming in.  But SETI did all it could do and was capable of finding intelligent life giving off signals detectable by a computer program.  

Some might suggest that if SETI discovered anything the government or some government would not permit the information to be shared.  But as to whether we are alone in the universe is a question not even SETI can answer.  There are those who say we just might be the only ones.  But right now SETI is saying that they never found any unusual signals from the known universe.  

I'm not too worried about it one way or another.  There are just too many things that have no explanation.  So, I'll relax with my Peterson System pipe,with some Peterson Early Morning Pipe, watch the boats go by, and not give it much more thought on this Fourth of July morning.  A happy Fourth of July to each of you.  Thank you for your time and Peace.

Dave