What will our reaction be when we discover aliens?
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Hi, I'm Ira Flato, and you're listening to Science Friday. One of the most irresistible questions in stories about aliens, after they arrive, of course, is what will our reaction be when we learn of their existence? Will it be horror, bewilderment, relief, euphoria? It's a scenario we love to imagine again and again, as in Steven Spielberg's recent movie, Disclosure Day.
That truth will upend all established order across the entire world.
Really? Really? How would humanity react if we learned of intelligent aliens? Can you actually study that? Well, it turns out there's a whole group of people inside SETI, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, that is thinking about this, what the public response might be and how to prepare for it. We have the lab's co-directors here to talk about the research that's been done to answer these questions.
How does SETI's Discovery and Futures Lab study public reactions to finding intelligent life?
Let me introduce them to you. Dr. Lucienne Walkowicz. is an astronomer at SETI who's worked on NASA's Kepler mission and Hubble Space Telescope. Dr. Chelsea Haramiya is a senior research fellow at the University of Bonn in Germany and philosopher ethicist at SETI. And as I say, they're the co-directors of the organization's Discovery and Futures Lab. And just a heads up, we will be having a few minor spoilers for Disclosure Day. Welcome both of you to Science Friday. Pleasure to be here. Thank you, Ira. Nice to have you. You're both co-directors of this new lab at SETI. What exactly does this lab do and how do you ask the questions we were just talking about?
Sure. So the Discovery and Futures Lab is a research initiative. I think the tendency is to think that a question like, how will people respond to the discovery of alien life is merely a matter of opinion. But there are many opinions. And it's not just a matter of opinion, right? You can actually study that. So some of the questions that we might want to ask are, how will people react? And also, how should scientists actually convey what is happening during a discovery? You know, in media, we often see these sort of pivotal, like single moments of discovery. But in practice, we can all look at the ways that discoveries unfold in real time and understand that they're not a single moment, right? A discovery is something...
that we might get an initial inkling of or find something interesting, but then it has to be confirmed and tested and debated amongst experts and then communicated to people often as it is happening and often as information is complete. And in many ways... it is difficult to say when a discovery is actually over. When do you have all of the complete information? So some of the research that we can do, for example, is to look at the ways in which scientists are conveying what they are learning as these high-profile discoveries unfold, and then what are the best ways that people will understand the significance of those discoveries while also not, like, you don't want to foment a bunch of fear, for example.
But I think Chelsea has a completely different lens on this.
Well, I was going to bring it back to the Disclosure Day clip at the beginning here. And so in Disclosure Day, if you've seen it, they make it very much a moment, not just scientifically, but for the media, where there is literally a moment where everyone in the media is immediately and suddenly on board. And this is confirmed and it's true. And every reputable organization is out there telling everyone about it. And for people like us, that's very laughable, right? And I assume for your average audience member, you also recognize that as Hollywood and not particularly realistic.
Tell me why that's not realistic.
Well, I mean, if you watch the movie Beyond the Media, I think what we focus more on is the fact that the scientific confirmation is not likely to be a moment. It might be, but it's not likely that it will be just this moment where suddenly scientists know. It may take a long time to... get that first evidence of detection, but then be able to confirm it and to cross-confirm it with other scientists in different parts of the globe.
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