I have been involved with [EMAIL PROTECTED] for the past 4.449 years (talk about anal retentive) and have completed almost 9,300 work units for the project. I am at the 99.668th %-ile among the 4,729,551 people in the world who are currently involved in the effort to locate the little green guys.
I was reading an article about BOINC ( http://www.planetary.org/html/UPDATES/seti/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/Update_092503.html ), a system that "will make it possible for researchers in areas as diverse as molecular biology, climatology, and astrophysics to tap into the enormous but under-utilized calculating power of personal computers world-wide." It was developed by [EMAIL PROTECTED] project director David Anderson and his crew at Berkeley, and is currently in Beta testing. It will not be long before it is available to use in research by others. I am wondering if there are any ideas floating around out there in TIPSterville for psychological research that could benefit from the combined power of thousands of computers in a distributed computing network, as [EMAIL PROTECTED] has done. We might not get 4.7 million computer owners involved (unless the research has something to do with sex), but I suspect that thousands of psychologists might be willing to participate. That would be a lot of computing power! Is there anything in the field of psychology that needs that kind of computing power? If not now, maybe the combined brain power of all of the citizens of TIPSterville can come up with something that needs that sort of analysis some time in the future. Relevance to teaching? Many years ago, in introducing Freud's psychoanalytic theory, I began pointing out to my students that he had earned a place in the history of psychology if for no other reason than that he had developed the biggest, broadest, most complex personality theory in the field. And, that nobody has been dumb enough to try to match his effort in the last 100 years. (Hey, on a good day, I could keep them over 15 minutes past the end of the class -- with the setup alone.) I pointed out that all the other personologists since Freud had been smart enough to be satisfied with the development of "mini" theories, which focus on much narrower features personality. I posited that the development of a truly "grand theory of personality" would have to await the development of computers beyond the scope of what we could imagine a few years ago. That no single human brain could handle all the variables that would have to be considered at the same time in order utilize that theory. (I always pointed out that I could appreciate just how thankful they were that my "grand theory" had not yet been developed, and therefore would not be on the next exam.) Could BOINC be in our future? (Maybe a BOINC table at NITOP? I am still hoping to go.) -- ----------==========>>>>>>>>>> ��� <<<<<<<<<<==========---------- Sometimes you just have to try something, and see what happens. John W. Nichols, M.A. Assistant Professor of Psychology Tulsa Community College 909 S. Boston Ave., Tulsa, OK 74119 (918) 595-7134 Home: http://www.tulsa.oklahoma.net/~jnichols MegaPsych: http://www.tulsa.oklahoma.net/~jnichols/megapsych.html --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
