![-[SETI League]-](setileag.gif)
Like many people with an interest in science and science
fiction, I have always wondered if humans are alone in the universe. For
the past few decades, various attempts have been made to answer that question.
So far, there have been a few promising indications, but no definitive answers
that can be confirmed.
![-[SETI Institute]-](setiinst.gif)
While NASA's SETI program was terminated several years
ago due to budget cuts, several private organizations started their own SETI
programs.
In particular, The SETI League has begun Project Argus, in which a large number of people with small amateur radio telescopes will conduct an "all sky" search, and The SETI Institute conducts Project Phoenix, in which larger radio telescopes look at specific targets.
Looking is only half the job; it doesn't do any good to look if you can't figure out what you've seen. SETI@home is an experiment in Internet-coordinated dispersed data processing, in which specially developed software and raw radiotelescope data will be distributed to personal computer users for analysis. The project is currently scheduled to conduct technical testing in late 1997 and launch the experiment in mid-1998.
Count to ten, do some relaxation excersizes, and check out The Junk Science Home Page. Public health expert Steve Milloy applies the principles of risk analysis to some common environmental, biological, and medical claims, and finds many of them rather wanting.
For a more general overview of pseudoscience and its critics, take a look at The Skeptics Society home page.