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SETI - CONTACT Concludes

OPENING QUESTIONS: Astronomers have to pay for telescope time-- usually funded through grants from research organizations, the government or universities. Our hero lost funding for her time on the Aracibo Radio Telescope. Why is that?

By the way, HERE is the Aracibo Radio Telescope today (*yikes*)

If you didn't see the movie I have copies of the Wikipedia summary for you (It's *really* important that you have a good idea of what the film covered)

OBJECTIVE:   I will be able to relate one way that we are searching for extraterrestrial intelligence after today's class.

WORD FOR TODAY:

  • SETI

WORK O' THE DAY: 

OBSERVATION TONIGHT?

Before we get into SETI sorts of things in more detail, let's examine a few aspects of the film first:

For this first exercise let's have the people designated by the color ORANGE lead the conversation-- (which we'll get to in a moment)! That means ONLY the people designated by the color ORANGE can talk unless of course, the ORANGE person asks them to! If there is ORANGE person in the group then the person designated by the color RED will take on project manager duties.

Oh and if there are only 1 or two people in a group, please redistribute yourself into another table group but please, no more than 4 in a group!

Imagine you are either the person chosen to go on the MACHINE (like Jody Foster's character) or a person very much in love with that character.

Please take a moment (or two!) to write down a particularly compelling argument for why that character should stay or why they should go. If you don't have someone willing to take each character's side, the the ORANGE person will assign that role to someone in your group.

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the ORANGE will now lead a conversation where your team will determine the strongest argument for each side)

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The ORANGE person will then stand and read the strongest argument from each team.

One of the ORANGE persons will then lead the entire class in a discussion of which of those strongest argument for going and for not going rises to the top for the whole class. Please somehow indicate that so that I can see that when I come in tomorrow!

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Now let's turn to the various themes that were present in that movie. Please make a list of those yourself.

When you're done with your list, please rank those themes from 1 - <however many you have> in terms of how well they appeal to you.

Now please make a list of the scientific aspects or themes and rank those accordingly (you'll turn this in at the end of the period so please keep that in mind)

It's kind of sad commentary (I believe), that the Aracibo Observatory itself was allowed to fall (literally into decay). The federal government refused to fund the cost for repairs and it eventually collapsed. Do a wee bit of research and determine how much:

  • It would take to have fixed up the huge radio dish so that it would still be in use today
  • It will take to clean up the mess after it collapsed
  • It would take to replace that dish

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Jodi foster's character repeatedly states that the discovery of an extra-terrestrial intelligence would be the single greatest scientific discovery in history.

Please write a paragraph or two clearly stating whether you agree with that point of view or not, and provide clear and convincing evidence to support that claim.

I'll see you tonight at our observation!