Learning with SETI
Résumé
Within 20 years SETI has changed the citizen involvement in scientific research.
The SETI@HOME BOINC project has 1,679,158 users today. Most of them are passive. They just share their computer. A few users created statistic tools. Other manage websites and forums with technical or scientific exchanges. The SETI League launched the Argus project the 21th of April 1996. Hundreds of amateurs around the world have downloaded a technical manual to build a station. Earthlings everywhere became active participants in projects such as Planet Hunters or SETI Lives. With SETI@IBMCloud or SETI Code Challenge, the SETI Institute asks the users to write the code.
Amateur and professional SETI enthusiasts spend time explaining what is a scientific method and why we need it to search for extraterrestrial intelligence. The are we alone question is a motivation for people to learn languages, computing, radio-astronomy, mathematics, biology, chemistry or astrophysics. More than 6,000 entries from 146 countries were received in the 2016 Breakthrough Junior Challenge. In a 2009 TED talk Jill Tarted said If SETI does nothing but change the perspective of humans on this planet, then it will be one of the most profound endeavours in history.
Each citizen participating in a SETI Project learns how to work with scientists. His scientific and technical knowledge improves according to his involvement. Even if we are alone in the universe, SETI is a non-zero-sum game.