[ SETI@home...crackpot theory number x]

Robert Owen (rowen@technologist.com)
Fri, 08 Oct 1999 18:47:32 -0400

steve wishnevsky wrote:

> From: steve wishnevsky <wishnevs@bellsouth.net>
>
> Jens Luedicke wrote:

>
> > From: Jens Luedicke <webmaster@irs-net.com>
> >
> > Report:
> >
> > A co-worker of mine has SETI@home running on his computer. This is
> > software, distributed by SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial
> > Intelligence), that will run on PCs as a screen saver and analyze
> > chunks of data from a radio telescope looking for non-naturally
> > occurring signals from outer space.
>
> excuse me if this type of message is not allowed, but here goes.
> .... i suppose that this SETI search is the first major use of the
> internet/pcs to create a massively parallel computational system
> for a specific task. It strikes me that this is a mock up of the way
> a human brain works... or so they tell me. Could it be possible ,
> either by design or accident, to create a true Artificial Intelligence
> entity using a similar network?...Is it possible to use a fraction of
> the internet and it's netizens to solve similar huge problems? I can
> only think of weather related problems as being big enough to bother
> with.. Is it possible that there will eventually be created a global
> consensus, an internet consciousness ? I have no rigorous back-
> ground at all, but what do you think?
>
> Thank you, Steve w.



Robert M. Owen
Director
The Orion Institute
57 W. Morgan Street
Brevard, NC 28712-3659 USA