Life beyond Earth

Who benefits from scare stories about aliens, and are we alone in the Universe?

Since ancient times, humans have gazed at the night sky filled with countless stars, pondering whether there is someone out there in the darkness, a kindred spirit or at least a being capable of asking the same question. Despite the fact that the space age has lasted for several decades, solid evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence has yet to be found. Nevertheless, this does not prevent many earthlings — from banal fraudsters to science fiction writers — from profiting from humanity’s dream of finding aliens, while some particularly cunning representatives of Homo sapiens even exploit it for political interests.

Truth is out there

There is no other country in the world where the theme of extraterrestrials has penetrated society as deeply as in the USA. Many of the clichés about aliens, such as ‘flying saucers’, ‘little green men’, and ‘secret government and alien conspiracies’, originated there, along with hundreds of clever and not-so-clever books and films about contacts and invasions. According to a survey conducted by JL Partners, 40 percent of Americans believe that aliens have definitely visited Earth in the last 50 years, while over 70 percent are convinced that the authorities are hiding information about extraterrestrial objects from the public. 
Such a high percentage of believers in the existence of aliens and secret connections between them and the ruling elite is not coincidental. The authorities themselves stimulate the interest of ordinary Americans. Many agencies, including the US Department of Defence, national intelligence, and NASA, have special divisions dedicated to studying anomalies.

The extensive research into something that does not even fit within the framework of modern science and provokes unhealthy excitement suggests that the rapid development of the UFO topic has its beneficiaries. And that is the US government. 

On the one hand, the authorities — through their vigorous activities in the search for ‘little green men’ — distract the public from truly important issues. On the other hand, the commotion surrounding aliens keeps Americans on their toes: after all, there are not only earthly enemies but also extraterrestrial invaders. Everyone remembers the hysteria that erupted in January–February 2023 due to the situation with the Chinese research balloon that accidentally entered US airspace.

Endless search  

While ufology is not a science, lacking a clear object and subject of research, the current search for life beyond Earth firmly stands on scientific grounds and employs the most advanced technical methods. 

The history of the search for extraterrestrial civilisations began in 1959 with the publication by physicists Giuseppe Cocconi and Philip Morrison of an article proposing to use the potential of microwaves for interstellar communications. A year later, astronomers from the Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia, led by Frank Drake, launched the Ozma project, which used a 26-metre radio telescope tuned to a wavelength of 21 centimetres to study two stars — Tau Ceti and Epsilon Eridani. The scientists attempted to detect signals that might originate from an advanced civilisation. 
Ozma did not yield the desired results, yet it initiated a whole series of projects united under the acronym SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence). For a time, NASA took on its co-ordination and funding; however, the enthusiasm of federal agencies did not last long. As a result, specialised non-profit organisations began to emerge. The most well-known of these is the SETI Institute, established in 1984, which employs radio, space, and optical telescopes and participates in interplanetary missions.
With the advent of personal computers and the spread of the Internet, interested individuals have also been able to join the search for extraterrestrials. In 1994, the SETI League was formed, comprising both professional astronomers and enthusiastic amateurs who possess the necessary equipment and computers to decode signals.

Equation with many unknowns  

The search for extraterrestrial intelligence is closely linked to solving the Fermi Paradox, proposed by renowned physicist Enrico Fermi in the mid-20th century. The essence of the paradox is that humanity has scientifically grounded reasons to believe that extraterrestrial civilisations should exist; however, we have no confirmation of this. Over the decades, numerous solutions to this paradox have been suggested, but which one is correct remains unknown.  

One intriguing hypothesis is the zoo hypothesis, initially proposed by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky and further developed by radio astronomer John Ball, which suggests that aliens are simply waiting for us to reach a certain level of technological development before making contact.  

In 1960, one of the founders of SETI, Frank Drake, proposed a formula that — provided we know most of its components — could help determine whether we will encounter aliens, for instance, in the vastness of the Milky Way. Unfortunately, solving the equation is only possible with significant advancements in the exploration of deep space, and for now, we can only engage in theoretical calculations. Drake estimated that if we take the average values of all parameters, there could be as many as 10 extraterrestrial civilisations in our galaxy.

Dark forest full of strangers

In 1974, a message containing basic information about human beings, humankind, and the Solar System was sent towards the Hercules constellation using the Arecibo radio telescope. The recorded messages were carried into the depths of space by the Voyager and Pioneer probes. The chance of receiving a response is extremely low; however, this method of announcing our existence to the possibly inhabited Universe has its critics.  
They argue that humanity’s excessive activity in searching for extraterrestrials could lead to a more advanced civilisation exhibiting aggression towards earthlings for various reasons. 
The great physicist, Stephen Hawking, believed that visitors from space could turn out to be ‘rapacious marauders roaming the cosmos’, citing the fateful encounter between Native Americans and conquistadors as an example. The legendary science fiction writer, Arthur C. Clarke, thought that both solitude in the Universe and the presence of neighbours are equally terrifying. The former would mean the destruction of humanity’s notions of higher beings, while the latter poses the threat that extraterrestrial intelligence might be a hunter waiting for the right moment to strike. 
Humanity does not know whether it is unique or merely one of the many children of the Universe. Fantasy books and films feature thousands of images of alien brothers in intellect or monstrous invaders; however, reality may be entirely different — one only needs to recall how writers of the mid-20th century envisioned the future and how it actually turned out. Our civilisation must be prepared for this reality: to both defend itself and co-operate.

According to the Earth Similarity Index (ESI), the most suitable planets for life outside the Solar System (where a value of ‘1’ represents Earth) are:

1. Teegarden b ESI — 0.95. Distance from Sun — 12 light years
2.  TOI-700 d ESI — 0.93. Distance from Sun — 101 light years
3.  Kepler-1649c ESI — 0.92. Distance from Sun — 301 light years
4.  TRAPPIST-1d ESI — 0.91. Distance from Sun — 41 light years
5.  Proxima Centauri b  ESI — 0.87. Distance from Sun — 4.2 light years

FACT

On October 30th, 1938, nearly a million people in the eastern United States fell into a panic as a result of a radio broadcast of the play The War of the Worlds based on the novel by H. G. Wells. The production that was styled as an evening radio programme led to mass evacuations from cities, traffic jams, and overloaded telephone lines. Eleven years later, a similar production in Ecuador ended in a studio riot and the deaths of six people. 

By Anton Popov