MAGAZINE OF THE SOCIE TY FOR SCIENCE & THE PUBLIC MAGAZINE OF THE SOCIETY FOR SCIENCE & THE PUBLIC
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An intelligent ET would
probably just stay home
Apart from jokes about how hard it is to
find intelligent life on Earth, let alone in
the rest of the galaxy, the possible existence of extraterrestrial beings — and
the lack of contact with them — poses a
perplexing issue.
Because the galaxy is several bil-
lion years older than the Earth, planets
around distant stars have had plenty of time to produce civi-
lizations that would by now possess technology millions of
years beyond current human capability. Presumably those
advanced aliens would have built vessels permitting easy
interstellar travel and so should be conducting regular tours
to their favorite Earthly vacation spots. But as the famously
sagacious physicist Enrico Fermi long ago observed, alien life
is conspicuous in its absence. “Where is everybody?” Fermi
asked. Ever since, experts and amateurs alike have sought
reasons why the best response to Fermi’s question is some-
thing other than simply concluding that no aliens exist.
Of course, proving alien life’s existence would not require
an actual visit from Klaatu and Gort or those Witch Mountain kids. A text message or even a Morse Code telegram
would be evidence enough. But as Elizabeth Quill points out
on Page 22, human strategies for finding such a signal have
probably been attuned to the wrong medium: the electromagnetic waves, basically radio, that represent a transient
phase in Earth’s communication technology. Seeking signs
of ET by listening to radio waves is like trying to watch ESPN
on a TV with rabbit ears.
So searchers for extraterrestrial intelligence are now
attempting to imagine other ways that more advanced societies might advertise their presence. It may be, though, that
they are not advertising at all and would prefer to conceal
their existence from other civilizations. Because if anybody
has developed high-speed interstellar spacecraft technology,
the galaxy is a very dangerous place.
Imagine a ship only the mass of the space shuttle — at
a mere 20 percent of the speed of light, its kinetic energy
would exceed that of 15,000 hydrogen bombs. You wouldn’t
want to invite a visitor to aim such a ship in your direction.
In fact, realizing the potential weaponry power of an interstellar spacecraft might be just enough to persuade a really
intelligent civilization not to build one. And so the answer
to Fermi’s question might be that everybody decided to stay
safe at home. —Tom Siegfried, Editor in Chief
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