SETI Astronomer Jill Tarter Steps Down from Alien Hunt

Tarter is shifting into a full-time fund-raising role for the SETI Institute, which had to shut down a set of alien-hunting radio telescopes for more than seven months last year due to budget shortfalls


TechMediaNetwork













Share on Tumblr

Copyright 2012 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


TechMediaNetwork

3 Comments

Add Comment
View
  1. 1. jgrosay 07:15 PM 5/24/12

    Search for extraterrestrial inteligent life looks to me as one of the most purposeless tasks you may invent. If alien civilisations are in a let us say, stone age phase, we won't notice them, if they've reached a level of development above us, our technology will never have the ability to detect or even guess theirs, and even more, imagine that in our world or in another, a new Attila is born, but having the technology for expanding to stars: anybody with the lesser amount of prudency in the outer space will make everything possible to stay hidden. This kind of activities are good in that they give many people an occasion to entertain the hours, to have a hope of an Arcadia or Utopia existing somewhere in the universe, and for giving opportunities and money to the people working in this search. Sincerely, I'll never put a single cent in anything like this.

    Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
  2. 2. shazam 11:07 AM 5/25/12

    Yes, let's hide our heads in the sand and hope ET doesn't see our asses sticking up.

    Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
  3. 3. Quinn the Eskimo 11:54 PM 5/27/12

    The search may be good. May be not. But, in this article, she quits a productive job to raise GRANT MONEY.

    Maybe the project has no purpose, other than employing misplaced astrophysicists. How many do we really need?

    Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
Leave this field empty

Add a Comment

You must sign in or register as a ScientificAmerican.com member to submit a comment.
Click one of the buttons below to register using an existing Social Account.

More from Scientific American

See what we're tweeting about

Scientific American Editors

More »

Free Newsletters


Get the best from Scientific American in your inbox

Solve Innovation Challenges

Powered By: Innocentive

  SA Digital
  SA Digital

Science Jobs of the Week

Email this Article

SETI Astronomer Jill Tarter Steps Down from Alien Hunt

X
Scientific American Magazine

Subscribe Today

Save 66% off the cover price and get a free gift!

Learn More >>

X

Please Log In

Forgot: Password

X

Account Linking

Welcome, . Do you have an existing ScientificAmerican.com account?

Yes, please link my existing account with for quick, secure access.



Forgot Password?

No, I would like to create a new account with my profile information.

Create Account
X

Report Abuse

Are you sure?

X

Institutional Access

It has been identified that the institution you are trying to access this article from has institutional site license access to Scientific American on nature.com. To access this article in its entirety through site license access, click below.

Site license access
X

Error

X

Share this Article

X