Kardashev
catdynamics | September 18, 2013The google+ hangout on SETI searches for KII and KIII aliens using WISE is archived on Youtube:
Enjoy
catdynamics | September 17, 2013A google hangout this afternoon:
"Today, September 18, 2:00 PM
SETI Institute researchers Jill Tarter and Franck Marchis (host & moderator) will hangout with Jason Wright, professor of astronomy at Penn State, Matt Povich, professor of astronomy at Cal Poly Pomona and Freeman Dyson, theoretical physicist and mathematician at the Institute for Advance Study.
These scientists will discuss the potential for the WISE telescope to detect extraterrestrial super-civilizations that acquired a large energy supply by building a mega-structure to harvest the energy of their star("Dyson Sphere") or…
catdynamics | February 5, 2013Ok - I'm crowdsourcing the internet, because the google has failed:
there are two science fiction short stories that I need titles and authors for, source in anthology or collection would be better still.
1) humans in slower-than-light spaceship set out to colonize planet identified around nearby star. When they finally get there, they find the planet already colonized by humans, who had left after them but on a faster (ftl?) spaceship and arrived before them
2) humans expand around galaxy and find no intelligent life - finally contact is made, arrangements are set up to treat with aliens,…
catdynamics | December 5, 2012On the purity of science careers; the waste of civilization and other assorted snippets... and a happy Feast of St Nikolaus
The Rise of the Science Politician - Matt B. continues provocative Conversations.
There is an interesting thread on this on The Astronomers fb.
On The Inevitability of Kardashev Civilizations - the Astro Wright continues to lay the ground work for some fun speculation
Waste Heat: Parametrizing Alien Civilizations - the Astro Wright series continues with a reformulation of the Drake Equation appropriate to K3 civs.
What Do We Want Graduate School To Be? - astrobites…
catdynamics | October 13, 2012Continued slow liveblog of the New Frontiers in Astronomy and Cosmology Conference at the Franklin Institute.
Lunch is almost over and we are headed into the final session of research presentations, clearly saving the best for last...
I am also reminded why we have these meetings, in person, the chats during break and back and forth in sessions provides very dense information transmission and tight feedback loops on news.
Big Question IV - Are we Alone in the universe?
Or, are there other life and intelligence beyond the solar system?
1) Jonathan Lunine from Cornell on "The search for life…
catdynamics | October 5, 2012In which we win an award from the New Frontiers in Astronomy Program.
The New Frontiers in Astronomy and Cosmology program announced its research grant award winners yesterday.
The last, but not least of the Big Questions solicited in the Call for Proposals, was:
Are we alone in the universe? Or, are there other life and intelligence beyond the solar system?
There were four awards in this "Astrobiology and SETI" category, focusing on different approaches in the search for life elsewhere in the Universe.
We got one:
"Constraining the Abundance of Kardashev Type II and III Civilizations From…