Science can proceed only if the scientist adopts an essentially theological worldview. ..even the most atheistic scientist accepts as an act of faith the existence of a law-like order in nature that is at least in part comprehensible to us.

Paul Davies

Categorized in : Order Law Scientist

The problem here is that a civilization that is 1,000 light years away doesn't know we exist. They don't know that we have radio telescopes here on Earth because they see Earth as it was 1,000 years ago. Nothing can travel faster than light, so however good their instruments they can't see in affect the future. So there is no particular reason they should be sending us messages at this time.

light civilization years

It's only fashion that has said the pendulum has swung from extreme skepticism about extraterrestrial life to extreme credulity. The truth is somewhere in between.

truth-is fashion said

"Are we alone in the universe?" This is a question which goes back to the dawn of history, but for most of human history it has been in the province of religion and philosophy. Fifty or something years ago, however, it became part of science.

dawn philosophy years

In the 1990s I began to study the prospects that life could spread from Mars to Earth or maybe Earth to Mars and that maybe life began on Mars and came to Earth, and that idea seemed to have a lot of traction and is now accepted as very plausible.

mars earth ideas

I suppose my interest in looking for life elsewhere in the universe really dates back to my teens. What teenager doesn't look up at the sky at night and think am I alone in the universe? Well most people get over it, but I never did and though I made a career more in physics and cosmology than astrobiology I've always had a soft spot for the subject of life because it does seem so mysterious.

teenager night thinking

How likely is it that alien probe would be on one of these co-orbitals, obviously extremely unlikely, but if it costs very little to go take a look, why not? Even if we dont find E.T., we might find something of interest.

science

A universe that came from nothing in the big bang will disappear into nothing at the big crunch. Its glorious few zillion years of existence not even a memory.

nothing will memory universe