Blog

Asking questions

Jan 5 2021 - 8:48pm

By William Alba 

William Alba is Associate Teaching Professor in Chemistry and Assistant Dean for Diversity in the Mellon College of Science at Carnegie Mellon University, where he directs two academic programs. He serves on the Advisory Council of METI International, the Advisory Board of Arch Mission Foundation, and the Board of Directors of the Society for Social and Conceptual Issues in Astrobiology.

Earlier this year, astronomers with the Breakthrough Listen project detected a narrow-band radio signal (BLC1) from the direction of Proxima Centauri. Scientists continue to verify and analyze data to determine whether BLC1 might be an intentional message from an extraterrestrial civilization.

Starfleet Captain Sends Out Hail as New Board Member of METI—Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence

Nov 17 2020 - 10:58pm

 

METI, the scientific organization devoted to Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence, is excited to announce that actor Anson Mount has joined its Board of Directors. Mount stars as Captain Christopher Pike of the USS Enterprise in the upcoming CBS All Access television series Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.

In Space, No One Can Hear You Compartmentalize

Sep 8 2020 - 9:52pm

Author: Douglas Vakoch

Douglas Vakoch is the President of METI International 

Teaser: Rage, father-son conflict, and a distant husband launch Ad Astra, a science fiction action film.

The further we travel into outer space, the more we realize our most important connections are down here on Earth. That’s the message of Ad Astra, a science fiction action movie that doubles as a psychological study of deep space exploration and complex intimate relationships.

SPOILERS FOLLOW.

Space, Life, Science and Stories – our recurring interest in the possibility of cosmic visitors.

May 20 2020 - 6:08pm

Carl L. DeVito.

Carl L. DeVito is a member of the Emeritus faculty of the Department of Mathematics at the University of Arizona. Here he discusses his new book “Space, Life, Science and Stories: Our Recurring Interest in the Possibility of Cosmic Visitors”.

Some time ago an unusual book sold over 70 million copies and was translated to 28 languages. It claimed that aliens had come here and greatly influenced the development of humanity. This was just one of a number of surges of public interest in the possibility of our having cosmic visitors. Unfortunately, the scientific community rarely addresses the stories behind these surges and, when pressed, some among them respond with ridicule.

Multi-Messenger Astronomy and METI

Jan 15 2020 - 12:51am

By Morris Jones

Morris Jones, PhD, is an Australia-based journalist and has acted as an advisor on scientific matters to the media. He can be reached at morrisjones@hotmail.com.

Multi-messenger astronomy is a hot ticket in science right now. Basically, it means observing the same astronomical target (or event) with different types of instruments. Some phenomena can produce flashes of light (visible with optical telescopes), radio bursts (collected by radio telescopes), and particle emissions (which show up in neutrino detectors and other instruments). Combining simultaneous observations from two or more instruments with different capabilities can help to reveal the true nature of strange things in the universe. 

Language and METI

Dec 11 2019 - 5:21pm

By Laura Welcher.

Laura Welcher is the director of Operations and the Long Now Library at the Long Now Foundation.  She is also a member of the board of METI International.

More than Footprints: Space Archaeology and Heritage

Nov 15 2019 - 3:27pm

Beth Laura O’Leary, New Mexico State University

Beth Laura O’Leary is a retired professor of Anthropology from New Mexico State University

 

Happy Halloween, Fermi Paradox  Style

Oct 28 2019 - 7:38pm

Of all the kinds of unlikely scary  stories humans have told each other about what might be 'out there', to me,  this is the   scariest.  Our thanks to Rebecca Orchard for the grim details:

Rebecca Orchard is a fiction writer in the PhD program at Florida State University, and her work about the Voyager Golden Record has been profiled in the Guardian, BBC World Service Newshour, and Atlas Obscura. 

www.rebeccaorchard.org

An Honest Appraisal of the Fermi Paradox

Oct 15 2019 - 2:44pm

 

This is the second in our Fermi Paradox series. This one brought by us by Kelly Smith, Chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Clemson University. Kelly is also the current president of SSOCIA: The Society for Social and Conceptual Implications of Astrobiology - https://ssocia.com/ - and serves on the advisory board of METI International.

 

On the Meaning of the Fermi Paradox

Sep 17 2019 - 5:31pm

On the Meaning of the Fermi Paradox

Carl L. DeVito

The many extra-solar planets the astronomers have found lends greater poignancy to Enrico Fermi’s famous question: “Where is everyone?”

My paper dealing with this question appeared in a special issue of Futures.

The paper begins with a thought experiment. Suppose that the universe had been scanned continuously, and at many frequencies, for intelligent signals. Suppose the scan had been programed to note any signal detected but then to simply continue the search. We would expect the rate at which societies would be found to depend, in some unknown way, on the number of societies and the rate at which such societies arise. Had this scan begun when the first society arose and continued to the present the number of societies detected would be expressible as a definite integral.