text: Others have pointed out that it's not a waste of government money, but is it a waste of other folks' money?  I will say probably not.\n\nFirst of all, if we do detect intelligent signals that we wouldn't otherwise have detected, I don't suppose anyone could call it a waste of money, even if very large sums had been spent.\n\nBut even if we continue to not find anything, the project will not have been completely useless.  We'll still have learned a lot about our universe!  Namely, that there aren't any radio signal emitting civilizations within our ability to detect them.  That will, as is often the case in science, raise new questions.  Mainly, why don't we detect any other civilizations?  This is the Fermi Paradox.  See the attached article for information, I think it'll interest you.\n\nOf course, if the money and resources (radio telescope time, etc) spent on SETI could have gotten us more information about the universe if invested in other ways, then, yes, SETI would end up not having been worth it.  But it's difficult to say that unless we already know what we'll find (or fail to find).  And I'm not equipped to evaluate what use of science resources is best.  In the meantime, I'll enjoy what SETI has already told us about the universe and will eagerly await more data, whether that confirms that we are still alone in the known universe or whether we have company.