http://www.science20.com/brinstorming/meti_should_we_be_shouting_cosmos-114283

If I saw a half-naked meth addict on the bus with seven of his own guns pointed at his own head, covered from head-to-toe in machine parasites, and clearly almost hopelessly insane, and if this man was signalling for ‘other intelligences’ to join him, I would not only pass him by, I would -hide my signals- so that he would -never discover me-.

In fact, the better half of me does precisely this with human culture.

Dr. Brin has other concerns, and although I share some of them, my primary concern is that we attempt to develop something vaguely akin to actual intelligence before we go attempting to signal to other species that we have some.

I began to examine these arguments in the wake of my own direct contact with nonhuman intelligence in 2002. If anything, the situation has worsened dramatically since then.