My first Magazine Sky & Telescope - 01.2019 | Page 16

COSMIC RELIEF by David Grinspoon
After a long hiatus, the space agency gets back into the SETI game.
IN JULY I WROTE ABOUT innovative
approaches for the Search for Extrater-
restrial Intelligence (S&T: July 2018, p.
12). In that column I lamented the fact
that NASA support for this fi eld dried
up in the 1990s and had not returned,
even though astrobiology has since
fl ourished. Many of us felt that the
bureaucratically maintained distinction
between astrobiology and SETI did not
make intellectual sense, and we longed
for SETI to be let in from the cold.
Sometimes wishes come true.
As that column went to press I
received an email asking if I would
help organize a workshop on “techno-
signatures.” The sponsor? NASA. That
got my attention. The purpose was to
explore how to best use NASA resources
in a renewed search for extraterrestrial
intelligence. Apparently, Congress’s
new federal budget mandated that
NASA spend $10 million “to search for
technosignatures, such as radio trans-
missions, in order to meet the NASA
objective to search for life’s origin,
evolution, distribution, and future in
the universe.” Wow!
The workshop, which took place in
September, was highly stimulating, and
given the renewed government inter-
est in SETI, the mood was bright and
optimistic. Along with evaluation of
historical and current searches, there
was an openness to new ideas born
of a kind of humility. We can’t really
second-guess the properties or motiva-
tions of technological aliens, so we
have to cast a wide net. In addition to
“traditional” SETI searches for radio
signals or laser pulses, we must be alert
to more passive signs of technological
u With the number of known exoplanets
exploding (here, an artist’s concept of an Earth-
size planet in a binary star system), NASA’s
renewed interest in the hunt for signs of intel-
ligent life elsewhere is exciting.
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JA N UA RY 2 019 • SK Y & TELESCOPE
entities that might not be trying to get
in touch with anyone. These include
possible artifacts beyond or within
our own solar system, or planetary
atmospheres altered or engineered by
industrial activities.
Attendees made an effort to stick
to the prosaic questions: What observ-
ing programs can we ramp up in the
next few years using NASA’s current or
expected assets and instruments? How
can NASA best collaborate with private
partners such as the SETI Institute and
Breakthrough Listen?
But with SETI it’s hard to avoid deep
philosophical musings. Some talks at
the workshop delved into abstract but
necessary puzzles about the properties
and behavior of distant, advanced civi-
lizations — even about what we mean
by “advanced” and “civilization.” SETI
has always combined solid engineer-
ing, daring speculation, and profound
questioning.
This admixture didn’t always sit well
with some. At the fi rst international
■ Astrobiologist DAVID GRINSPOON
spent the fall of 2018 at the Institute for
Cross-Disciplinary Engagement at Dart-
mouth, studying the nature of planetary-
scale intelligence.
NASA Sends a Signal
SETI conference in Byurakan, Soviet
Armenia in 1971, organizers Carl Sagan
and Iosif Shklovsky welcomed histori-
ans, philosophers, linguists, and social
scientists along with the scientists. At
the time, one young Soviet astrophysi-
cist asked that the humanities be left
out, stating he didn’t want to listen to
“windbags.” A leading American physi-
cist exclaimed, “To hell with philoso-
phy! I came here to learn about observa-
tions and instruments . . .”
This historical tension seemed absent
from September’s workshop. Although
our prime directive was to guide NASA
in the use of its assets to search for
technosignatures, there was respect-
ful discussion of the more esoteric and
humanistic questions that are naturally
evoked, and a recognition that a mature
SETI program going forward will involve
more than just telescopes and computer
models. Out of this will come new calls
for proposals to NASA, and then a new
era of federally funded SETI research.
May it be long and fruitful.