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TINY STEPS. “As a result of the feedback NASA received from that workshop, most of the SETI-exclusionary language was removed in the amended 2018 ROSES document, and “technosignatures” was explicitly solicited in the amended version of the ROSES 2018 XRP and Exobiology calls in early 2019.” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

DANCING IN THE CORNER. “At the workshop NASA Deputy Associate Administrator for Research Michael New expressed his personal view that within NASA the term “SETI” is heavily associated with HRMS and radio programs, while the term “technosignatures” is “freighted with less history” and “doesn’t provoke as many antibodies” at NASA.” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

TECHNOSIGNATURES. “The rebranding seems to have helped. In 2018 Congress considered requiring NASA to include searches for technosignatures (by that name) within its science portfolio as part of the House version of the NASA appropriations bill. In anticipation of this language (which did not ultimately become law) NASA hosted the “NASA Technosignatures Workshop” in September 2018 to learn about the searches for technosignatures and how it could support them, because it had little internal expertise on the topic.” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

REBRANDING SETI. “The community has long perceived that part of the difficulty is persistent confusion within and beyond NASA about whether “SETI” refers to a specific radio signal search rationale and technique, the SETI Institute itself, or to the broader effort to identify technological life in the universe. This led Tarter (2007) to coin the term “technosignatures” by analogy with biosignatures to refer to any sign of technological life, including communicative transmissions and other technologies.” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

CALLS FOR CHANGE. “It is time for NASA to move on from its 1990’s aversion to SETI and nurture a new generation of astrobiologists that will lead the search for technosignatures into the future.” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

PRODDING THE BEAR. “It is thus unlikely NASA will significantly fund searches for technosignatures without ​explicit​ instruction to do so from the Astro2020 Decadal survey.” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

DAMNED BY FAINT PRAISE. “Perversely, such vaguely positive but non-specific language past in Decadal surveys has been deployed by NASA as a reason ​not​ to fund SETI.​“ https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

DEAF EARS. “Tarter et al. (2018) catalogs many past recommendations from National Academies reports, NASA strategy documents, and prior Decadal surveys that endorse NASA’s embrace of SETI or the search for technosignatures, including the 1998, 2003, and 2008 Astrobiology Roadmaps, and the 2015 Astrobiology Strategy document.” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

EXPANDING BEYOND HOBBYISTS. “The resulting workshop report stated: “...getting good answers to the questions posed by the workshop is not a matter of asking the appropriate experts to synthesize information that already exists, it will require training and supporting scientists to do the work necessary to generate that information in the first place. ​—Technosignatures Workshop Participants (2018).” https://lnkd.in/djnMhU6 View in LinkedIn

CLOCK ENTRAINMENT. “Circadian clocks, which underlie the daily rhythms in virtually all organisms, are entrained by diurnal changes in light, temperature, nutrients, and even sound.” https://lnkd.in/dYTpyue View in LinkedIn