Doug Vakoch

Testing, testing.

How are we doing?

Are we recording now?

I grew up as a kid on a farm out in a remote part of northern Minnesota.

And so especially on winter nights, you know, I would go outside and I would look up there.

And it's just beautiful.

It's breathtaking.

But it also got me thinking, huh, you know, I wonder if there are any kids out there on other planets who are looking up there and thinking the same sort of thing.

What if you're talking about an exoplanet that has this murky cover where short-distance vision really isn't helpful?

Then you have to use a sense of sound or a sense of touch or a sense of smell.

So we look at other species here on Earth and say, you know, how do they encounter the world?

And what if there were an alien who used that as their primary way of engaging with their environment and with one another?

Yeah, the origin story was, sure, I'd been making the case.

The talks I was giving as a grad student were, and we should be transmitting too and not just listening.

And so I made that case over the years.

The argument is everyone is sitting around waiting for someone else to take the initiative.

And if everyone is simply doing what we are doing, simply sitting here and listening and not transmitting, it's going to be a really quiet universe.

I was able to make my case and I lost.

And one of the big reasons was that people were scared.

That came up when Stephen Hawking was promoting a new science documentary.