Duncan Forgan on using the Square Kilometer Array (SKA) to eavesdrop on ET (free bonus audio content)

Release Date: 16 November 2014

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I interviewed Duncan Forgan in June of 2013 on multiple topics. I used part of this interview on asteroid mining in Season 1, Episode 8, and another part on the Fermi Paradox in Season 1, Episode 9. However, this relatively brief segment concerning SETI with the Square Kilometer Array remained without a home, and so we are releasing it as free bonus audio content. This won't appear on the RSS feed, but you can download it, or listen to it with the player above.

The discussion to this 2010 paper by Duncan Forgan and RC Nichol:

A Failure of Serendipity: the Square Kilometre Array will struggle to eavesdrop on Human-like ETI

Episode 17 - The Long Delays

Release Date: 29 October 2014

Alan Penny

Is SETA really just local SETI? It makes sense to me, and to Alan Penny, coordinator of the UK SETI Research Network. We talk to Dr. Penny about the future of SETI. Then, we talk to another Scottish astronomer Duncan Lunan about the scientific mystery of the Long Delay Echoes. Are the LDEs from a Bracewell Probe?

Music by DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson, Erika Lloyd and George Hrab

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Detailed Show Notes




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Episode 13 - The Great Voids

Release Date: 18 May 2014

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This is our third episode to directly address the Fermi Paradox. Given some reasonable assumptions, the

Earth should have been colonized by a superior technological civilization. We see no evidence of this. Why is that?

No one knows, but the Fermi Paradox serves as a wonderful mental lens to probe our assumptions and ask deeper questions about how well we really understand our universe and its tendency to give rise to long-lived, technologically sophisticated societies with both the ability and drive to colonize their galactic neighborhood.

We talk to Dr. Daniel Cartin about his recent follow up to Geoffrey Landis' percolation framework for understanding the Fermi Paradox, using the well known census of stars in the local solar neighborhood:

Quantifying the Fermi Paradox in the Local Solar Neighborhood

We also talk about the life span of technological civilizations, and I speculate how accidental contact could be important to understanding how this life span could increase over time.

See the Detailed Show Notes

Season 2, Episode 2 of the Wow! Signal by Paul Carr is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Episode 9 - Listening to the Silence

Released: 27 July 2013

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The Fermi Paradox, Part 2, with Universe Today's Fraser Cain and University of Edinburgh's Duncan Forgan.  Why, as far as we can tell, has the Earth not been colonized by superior alien civilizations?This question is called the Fermi Paradox, and it is a surprisingly difficult question to answer. We discuss just how strong the Fermi Paradox is, and the kind of research program it will take to resolve it.

The Wow! Signal Podcast podcasting seal of approval goes to: Penn's Sunday School.



Links:

Fraser Cain

Episode 2 - the Fermi Paradox with Geoffrey Landis

Universe Today

Duncan Forgan

Duncan Forgan et. al. , The Effect of Probe Dynamics on Galactic Exploration Timescales

Self Replicating Probes Could Already Be Here

The Kardashev Scale
Haldane's Law
Clarke's Third Law
The Fermi Paradox, Part 1 (blog entry)

The NASA Kepler Mission
Terrestrial Planet Finder

The Episode 9 Script

Penn's Sunday School

Duncan Forgan

The Music

Ahleuchatistas

DJ Spooky

Jason Robinson

John Baez and Mark Egan's Telesto
Cuneiform Records 

Episode 8 - Cosmik Debris

Release Date: 25 June 2013

Duncan Forgan

The topic for Episode 8 is asteroid mining - the prospects for asteroid mining by humans in our solar system and for detecting its traces should an ET civilization be doing it in a nearby planetary system.  I spoke to scientist Duncan Forgan, entrepreneur Isaac Stott, and Ben Wright McGee, who wears a lot of hats.

Of course, the title refers to a Frank Zappa song about a New Age charlatan, but as you will hear, I don't think asteroid mining is a con.  It's just that asteroids are - debris.

The fifth Wow! Signal Podcast podcasting seal of approval is awarded to: Sid Smith's Podcast from the Yellow Room.

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Isaac Stott

The Episode 8 script

Guests:

Dr. Duncan Forgan is a researcher at the University of Edinburgh.  His research interests include planetary system formation and theoretical SETI.

• Duncan Forgan and Martin Elvis, "Extrasolar Asteroid Mining as Forensic Evidence of Extraterrestrial Intelligence"

Isaac Stott is CEO of Stott Space, a company that aims to be the first to mine an asteroid.

• Stott's architecture for robotic asteroid mining

Ben Wright McGee is a scientist, writer and space entrepreneur

Ben Wright McGee

• Calling the Space Privateers.

Other Links

Planetary Resources
Deep Space Industries
Near Earth Object (NEO) Catalog
The Wow! Signal Podcast on iTunes

The Music

Ahleuchatistas
Jason Robinson
Mike Griffin
DJ Spooky






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