Finding Large Extraterrestrial Civilizations with the WISE Telescope

[@KipIngram]

This is far and away the best SETI presentation that I've ever seen. Wright is clearly on top of his game, and this information is solid gold.

[@2Oldcoots]

Outstanding.....the best SETI lecturer and lecture by many orders of magnitude. Thank you Mr. Jason T. Wright and Penn State!

[@jjt1881]

Jason T. Wright is a magnificent speaker, specially during the Q&A section. He is very informed, intelligent and shows total dominion of the subject. It is pleasant to watch a physicist who knows exactly what he is talking about and can explain it in different ways.

[@Nightsd01]

He is pretty gifted. I really enjoyed this talk as well.

[@hollydavis06]

Jason is my favorite SETI speaker by far!

[@KipIngram]

This is really a very BRILLIANT presentation. Wow - I just LOVE seeing the most basic physics applied to such good effect like this.

[@waynecharlton954]

Jeff Marcy one off the best Astronomers when it comes to finding exoplanets nice introduction to Jason Wright of Penn state university I'm pleased Jeff Marcy was mentioned

[@Nightsd01]

This has to be one of the most fascinating talks I've ever seen. Jason Wright is the most intelligent speaker I've heard on the subject of extraterrestrial intelligence. Personally, I would suspect that advanced ET civilizations will have moved away from actual organic "bodies" to a digital form. I've always had the suspicion that one likely possible answer to Fermi's paradox is the idea that the the majority of aliens turn "inwards", and don't go outwards to colonize their Galaxy. Instead of colonizing new planets (which is nearly useless if you're an AI), they literally create their own digital universes. After all, they perceive the world through sensors, why not create their own?

[@Ryang403]

mate u have heard scientists say that don't pretend u came up wiv that theory haha

[@TechNed]

Over the last few years, I must have seen this at least 3 times because it has such an interesting title and I momentarily forget that I've seen it but it's always interesting to revisit!

[@Rayalot72]

This talk is very good. It's quite easy to think that Dyson spheres and the search for aliens are very unrealistic, almost fictional, and until recently this has lead me to be very incredulous of a lot of the material related to SETI. This gives a good outline of just how SETI manages to be scientific, and even outlines why it seems so fake (the philosophical problem of whether SETI is unscientific). I've come out with a much better understanding of how the science fiction can be translated into the physics and empirical observations that would allow us to know there are really aliens out there. It bridges the gap between the dubious and reality, no speculation or wishful thinking required.

[@ancalites]

I'm not sure I understand the last question. Can anyone explain?

[@TechNed]

Great talk. Well thought out.

[@FranckMarchis]

Live Science published an interesting article about this topic. "Incredible Technology: How to Search for Advanced Alien Civilizations" - See more at: www.livescience.com/42540-how-to-search-for-alien-civilizations.html?cmpid=514645_20140115_17056174#sthash.N7pfHc1I.dpuf

[@homersmith43]

The guy reading from a small piece of paper,I know that feeling.-)

[@daviddean707]

At 1.01:30 something comes along and scrubs that excess off the planet. Yes, like The Unreasoning Mask by Philip Jose Farmer (1981) which I read and found interesting, like this talk.

[@professormawillett4297]

We will never contact or communicate with an intelligent extraterrestrial life form within the lifetime of our species. The universe is just too big. For all intents and purposes, we are and always we be, forever alone.

[@橋本絵莉子]

Great Talk, SETI Institute Rocks! I got 2 Statements and I do not know why they are wrong, so I need help! 1st: An advanced alien civilization will not use artificial technologies, it will be based on biological technologies and use the starlight / chemical processes as energy source - can not be measured in MIR ? 2nd: An advanced alien civilization will recycle the energy they use, so they do not got any trace of energy indicator ? I think the new Ideas and indicators to search for alien life is very interesting, good hunting. Thanks and great work you do, keep on going.

[@橋本絵莉子]

***** Thanks , I will learn more about thermodynamic. So huge civilizations will be seen in the MIR, even when they are only based on biology, they will emit heat in that region and to recycle all the energy like heat is not possible, or even the recycle process will be seen, because of the thermodynamic laws(?) So that says we will find them, as long as they are there and they did grow huge enough and exclude that the MIR is nothing based cosmical in that region we only need time and a bit luck, that sounds great.

[@Aluminata]

Andromeda would not see our heat signature bcs they, as we, are seeing what existed 2, 500,000 years ago.

[@misterroberts4240]

correct

[@brucehayman4206]

I agree. Great speaker.

[@keithcallen2844]

Great speakers don't habitually smack their lips. Fascinating topic, good info, but tedious to listen to.

[@1WaySafe]

I wonder when we will feel satisfied that science has done a "Good enough" job and decide to develop a way to recognize it may be possible that we have been looking in the wrong direction. Could it be that consciousness has completely different parameters that are recognizable by "Intelligent Beings" And are detectable by an intelligent conscious being?

[@allurbase]

It took ~4 billon years to get from bacteria to humans on earth, maybe the galaxy is full of bacteria and dinosaurs but no humanoids yet :P

[@rstevewarmorycom]

Given changes in physics in 400 years of OUR history, chances are aliens don't even USE "energy", how primitive!!

[@kejoyroberts3296]

+rstevewarmorycom Why should we expect aliens to think as we do and to seek out other aliens? They may be completely different and 'alien' in their thinking.

[@rstevewarmorycom]

Kejoy Roberts Agreed. But among all aliens some likely have our similar desire to contact.

[@TheCyricson]

Some people...guys, do you understand the amount of technology we discovered since 1900? Imagine a civilization who has 10.000 years of continuous technology advances. The things they will be able to do would simply be "magical" or "impossible" when viewed by us. So plz think on that when you say they ll be limited by the speed of light. And then imagine a civilization of 100.000 years of technology. Actually its impossible to imagine. We will probably say that it is God with his angels coming to our universe.

[@HardRockMiner]

Aliens listening for radio waves is about the same us looking for 8 track communication from the stars.

[@rascal3770]

Why do you assume they would be more addvanced than we are?

[@brucemyall945]

The file is corrupt for streaming considering the state of technology we now have ?

[@davidinfante6348]

They make their own Fusion then I'll need Stars

[@Eo_Tunun]

~ 32:00 : Mentioning "G-Hat" probably had some NSA chaps listening up. ^^

[@SyriusStarMultimedia]

Assuming that any alien civilization is utilizing energy in such a way that they would generate heat and be detectable. This idea is not provable, it is not true or false. What if they have no need of energy?

[@MrFlaviojosefus]

Wow! Magnificent speech. Superb!!!!

[@TheisticThinker]

Great talk! But in the response to the last question, he's wrong. He's basically making Brandon Carter's evolutionary argument. If the evolution of intelligence is unlikely during the duration of hability, then we'd expect to live close to the end of habitability since there evolution have the most time to work on. Carter specifically showed that the number of 'hard steps' in the evolution of a scientific civilization is related to the time left the biosphere can thrive on the planet. In our case, the number of steps is likely ~ 4 - 5 given a further duration of ~ 1 Gyrs.

[@davidinfante6348]

Type 0 are the only one using radio waves !!!

[@reichplatz]

The one with pictures and plots closeups

[@kurohikes5857]

If aliens have faster than light travel, they will not be using radio communications.

[@afonsosantos8364]

The rare LIKE hypothesis: most intelligent viewers are hiding their likes in fear of being eaten alive by the more advanced posters out there ...

[@jaymendoza7075]

wouldn't an advanced civilization be able to recycle energy waste?- then they would be practically invisible really

[@TechNed]

I think the point is that if they tried that, they would simply heat up until self-destruction. What I wondered was why (and I'll bet Physicists can explain why not) can't the near-infrared energy be recycled down to even longer wavelengths but the speaker answered a similar question suggesting that it takes more energy to do that (than can be collected in the first place) - I wasn't clear on whether he meant it takes more energy to direct the beam away (the original questioners point) or simply to do the down-conversion.

[@zebonautsmith1541]

No self respecting Alien travels through normal space. The travel times are beyond outrageous. They use wormholes; and quantum teleportation; they'd be here if they could; but we haven't yet built the receiving ports for the wormholes or the teleporters. We are far too primitive. Thats what the radio message they we will soon find; will instruct us how to make. Sagan had it spot on, in his premise for the book Contact.

[@yoandrew4886]

Isn't the galaxy expanding faster than we can communicate.

[@TheXitone]

no

[@gregnicenh]

Not across "shorter" distances... yet. Eventually it will be, just as the light from other stars will fail to reach us.

[@galaxia4709]

+adhamh, lol

[@rodgerlucio5523]

if we make movies like starwars star trek ,robots than that is the way our future will go.. becouse what we really think inside is what will probably happen. our inteligence has been passed throught the universe . so anything is posible in such a vast universe .. everything this guy said is just what he thinks with the information he has in this little planet in this huge universe in this second that just went buy with the technology we now have that will be like cave men stuff and round and round we go. good luck

[@TheXitone]

righto guy

[@theobserver9131]

Smacking at the end of every sentence.... can't take it!

[@propellerhead9197]

I fart after each sentence...

[@Dan.50]

Life existing on earth is a statistical impossibility in itself, much less developing anywhere else. We are it.

[@misterroberts4240]

"Life existing on earth is a statistical impossibility", yet here we are

[@RikkiSpanish]

And you don't believe that life could have beat those incredible mathematical odds somewhere else in the galaxy? There are millions of humans who had to defy terrible odds in order to be born here on Earth, make it to their first birthday, etc. There are countless other living things on Earth defying odds to survive and thrive. That can't happen anywhere else in our galaxy? What about the universe? Have you ever looked at one of those Hubble photos with galaxies littering the shot from edge to edge? That's a whole lot of stars in just one galaxy. A shot of a galaxy cluster contains more stars than I can fathom. Do you sincerely believe, without a doubt, all of those stars are heating nothing but dead worlds? That's a lot of wasted space. This generation may not find evidence of extraterrestrial civilizations in our lifetime. The next generation might not either. That doesn't mean it can't ever happen. Even in science fiction, it can take a long time. Take the movie/series Alien, for example. Humans had been terraforming other worlds for a long time without coming in contact with any sentient species(the Engineers/Space Jockies, not the xenomorph). The humans have found alien life, but nothing sentient for a long time. And quite frankly, life would have been better for humanity had they never gone to the Zeta Reticuli system.

[@Futureplanet]

A ship that takes 100,000 years to get a star, and what are the odds it would, 1 get there. 2. find a planet that has the atmosphere, gravity, temperature, etc. to support the colonists? We are not launching any 100,000 year ship. Can't imagine any civilization would do that.

[@Godscountry2732]

+Futureplanet Most civilizations likely destroy themselves before ever reaching out to other worlds,that may in fact be why we haven't seen any activity as of yet.But I'm betting a few,survive and do make it off their planet.Long before we ever construct a starship,we will have detected many worlds where we could survive.With the James Webb telescopes launch in 2018 and those that follow it,we will at some point in time,detect life,including intelligent life[if it exists] within the Milky Way.Using spectrum analysis etc we can detect the presence of life.We know what planet Earth looks like from space, so we should be able to detect life on other worlds.That is if they're not hiding they're presence.The only way I see two civilizations meeting is by accident[A starship encounters us,they fly past Earth,etc,I doubt any civilization would chance a meeting and the distances between worlds likely will rule out it ever happening,at least for hundreds of thousands of years.

[@Futureplanet]

inagod Yes, I'm very excited about James Webb.

[@eliotgillum]

+Futureplanet you're right that those possibilities exist. of course it's hard for us, as a non-colonizing civilization (but hopefully in the future!), to estimate the risk of space travel. I think the smallest risk is technological, and the larger is the multigenerational society--why would the 1000th generation want to get off their perfectly good spaceship? your second concern, I think, it much easier to solve before launch with more advanced telescopes (we're just starting to image and measure atmospheric spectra) and the ability to change course enroute or simply pass on to another system. if you can survive 100,000 years, skip or drop off a few die hard settlers, and head for the next good looking star.

[@Futureplanet]

eliotgillum Anyway, I hope and trust that there will be many technologies that should take us or aliens interstellar in much less time than 100,000 years.

[@Nightsd01]

Civilization? What about an AI? Creatures with bodies that age and die are pretty bad for space travel. But I'm betting that most advanced alien civilizations move past their physical forms pretty quickly. After all, in 10 years when we have computers powerful enough to simulate every single neuron (brain cell) in your head, why would you stick around in your physical body? If we ever do find aliens, I'd wager they would be AI. After all, an AI doesn't need a climate controlled space ship with air locks and artificial gravity. A computer doesn't mind being in sleep mode for 100,000 years. I'd go one step further, and estimate that within 150 years very few people will still be in their physical forms. Most people will have their minds uploaded to computers. Then the real fun begins (rapid exponential self-improvement, etc)

[@brucemyall945]

It's as if I am watching from mars

[@coolxjl]

Before anything, we should be asking that with the technology available to us what kind of civilisation can we realistically expect to detect? It's most unlikely that we'll be able dectect any civilisations who are super advanced, unless they want to be detected. Its all good and well putting up some physical laws, as we understand it, but why would advanced civilisations be using, to them, something so primitive? Us detecting super advanced civilisations is a bit like cavemen trying to figure out how a smartphone is made. Of course the cavemen might get lucky, they may bangs the smartphone few times and accidently turn it on and then think its some sort of magic light producing shininy flat stone, just the same way that we might get a "vague traces" of these advanced civilisation, yet we'll only be too quick to dismiss it usung our primitive understanding of things.

[@almirahmedic4399]

We are all aliens and bilion species on earth but inteligent life is rare and without Tesla we have been in stone age

[@EV50400]

He sounds pretty confident in the video. Too bad it didn't know then, what the scientists who published their findings this past April discovered, which is that after monitoring 100,00 nearby galaxies for heat waste/infrared activity, no signs of T3 civilizations were found.

[@Godscountry2732]

+Eric Moore With the James Webb telescope [2018 launch] and the others that follow it, if life exists,including intelligent,we will at sometime detect the presence of it on the surface of a distant world.Spectrum analysis,etc should tell us the story.When,?its could take 25 years or 10,000 I doubt were it,the numbers are just too big to rule out a single intelligent life form.While the number of intelligent life forms that make and use technology may be fewer,it could still be in the millions.

[@Nightsd01]

Jason Wright is an optimist. Like me, he would probably bet that they're there, we just haven't been smart enough to detect them.

[@noseonscent1935]

Ever heard of current video tech? Blimey.

[@jameswest4700]

I think its odd we havent heard from one civilization. Maybe the great filter is closer than we think.

[@cjaccardi]

did you even watch the video ?

[@jameswest4700]

Not all of it I was busy that day.

[@DokktorDeth]

NOT the most auspicious of starts ...

[@jameswest4700]

in front of us i mean

[@bes1batch1976]

Thousands of books were written by highly credible people about aliens and seti is still searching seti is like a blind searcher looking afar yer the answer is right before their fucking eyess seti is discoonennected from reality

[@KipIngram]

What is wrong with this video? It looks so odd.

[@richardherscher8487]

These seti hustlers are scamming everyone.

[@bazzadebear8012]

Technical amateurs.... Stopped watching.

[@richardherscher8487]

Seti scammers, better chance of