David Delgado Shorter, University of California, Los Angeles; Kim TallBear, University of Alberta, and William Lempert, Bowdoin College

We’re only halfway through 2023, and it feels already like the year of alien contact.

In February, President Joe Biden gave orders to shoot down three unidentified aerial phenomena – NASA’s title for UFOs. Then, the alleged leaked footage from a Navy pilot of a UFO, and then news of a whistleblower’s report on a possible U.S. government cover-up about UFO research. Most recently, an independent analysis published in June suggests that UFOs might have been collected by a clandestine agency of the U.S. government.

If any actual evidence of extraterrestrial life emerges, whether from whistleblower testimony or an admission of a cover-up, humans would face a historic paradigm shift.

As members of an Indigenous studies working group who were asked to lend our disciplinary expertise to a workshop affiliated with the Berkeley SETI Research Center, we have studied centuries of culture contacts and their outcomes from around the globe. Our collaborative preparations for the workshop drew from transdisciplinary research in Australia, New Zealand, Africa and across the Americas.

In its final form, our group statement illustrated the need for diverse perspectives on the ethics of listening for alien life and a broadening of what defines “intelligence” and “life.” Based on our findings, we consider first contact less as an event and more as a long process that has already begun.

Who’s in charge of first contact

The question of who is “in charge” of preparing for contact with alien life immediately comes to mind. The communities – and their interpretive lenses – most likely to engage in any contact scenario would be military, corporate and scientific.

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By giving Americans the legal right to profit from space tourism and planetary resource extraction, the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act of 2015 could mean that corporations will be the first to find signs of extraterrestrial societies. Otherwise, while detecting unidentified aerial phenomena is usually a military matter, and NASA takes the lead on sending messages from Earth, most activities around extraterrestrial communications and evidence fall to a program called SETI, or the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.

SETI is a collection of scientists with a variety of research endeavors, including Breakthrough Listen, which listens for “technosignatures,” or markers, like pollutants, of a designed technology.

SETI investigators are virtually always STEM – science, technology, engineering and math – scholars. Few in the social science and humanities fields have been afforded opportunities to contribute to concepts of and preparations for contact.

In a promising act of disciplinary inclusion, the Berkeley SETI Research Center in 2018 invited working groups – including our Indigenous studies working group – from outside STEM fields to craft perspective papers for SETI scientists to consider.

Ethics of listening

Neither Breakthough Listen nor SETI’s site features a current statement of ethics beyond a commitment to transparency. Our working group was not the first to raise this issue. And while the SETI Institute and certain research centers have included ethics in their event programming, it seems relevant to ask who NASA and SETI answer to, and what ethical guidelines they’re following for a potential first contact scenario.

SETI’s Post-Detection Hub – another rare exception to SETI’s STEM-centrism – seems the most likely to develop a range of contact scenarios. The possible circumstances imagined include finding ET artifacts, detecting signals from thousands of light years away, dealing with linguistic incompatibility, finding microbial organisms in space or on other planets, and biological contamination of either their or our species. Whether the U.S. government or heads of military would heed these scenarios is another matter.

SETI-affiliated scholars tend to reassure critics that the intentions of those listening for technosignatures are benevolent, since “what harm could come from simply listening?” The chair emeritus of SETI Research, Jill Tarter, defended listening because any ET civilization would perceive our listening techniques as immature or elementary.

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But our working group drew upon the history of colonial contacts to show the dangers of thinking that whole civilizations are comparatively advanced or intelligent. For example, when Christopher Columbus and other European explorers came to the Americas, those relationships were shaped by the preconceived notion that the “Indians” were less advanced due to their lack of writing. This led to decades of Indigenous servitude in the Americas.

The working group statement also suggested that the act of listening is itself already within a “phase of contact.” Like colonialism itself, contact might best be thought of as a series of events that starts with planning, rather than a singular event. Seen this way, isn’t listening potentially without permission just another form of surveillance? To listen intently but indiscriminately seemed to our working group like a type of eavesdropping.

It seems contradictory that we begin our relations with aliens by listening in without their permission while actively working to stop other countries from listening to certain U.S. communications. If humans are initially perceived as disrespectful or careless, ET contact could more likely lead to their colonization of us.

Histories of contact

Throughout histories of Western colonization, even in those few cases when contactees were intended to be protected, contact has led to brutal violence, pandemics, enslavement and genocide.

James Cook’s 1768 voyage on the HMS Endeavor was initiated by the Royal Society. This prestigious British academic society charged him with calculating the solar distance between the Earth and the Sun by measuring the visible movement of Venus across the Sun from Tahiti. The society strictly forbade him from any colonial engagements.

Though he achieved his scientific goals, Cook also received orders from the Crown to map and claim as much territory as possible on the return voyage. Cook’s actions put into motion wide-scale colonization and Indigenous dispossession across Oceania, including the violent conquests of Australia and New Zealand.

The Royal Society gave Cook a “prime directive” of doing no harm and to only conduct research that would broadly benefit humanity. However, explorers are rarely independent from their funders, and their explorations reflect the political contexts of their time.

As scholars attuned to both research ethics and histories of colonialism, we wrote about Cook in our working group statement to showcase why SETI might want to explicitly disentangle their intentions from those of corporations, the military and the government.

Although separated by vast time and space, both Cook’s voyage and SETI share key qualities, including their appeal to celestial science in the service of all humanity. They also share a mismatch between their ethical protocols and the likely long-term impacts of their success. https://www.youtube.com/embed/5gZwLGrJQrM?wmode=transparent&start=0 This BBC video describes the modern ramifications of Captain James Cook’s colonial legacy in New Zealand.

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The initial domino of a public ET message, or recovered bodies or ships, could initiate cascading events, including military actions, corporate resource mining and perhaps even geopolitical reorganizing. The history of imperialism and colonialism on Earth illustrates that not everyone benefits from colonization. No one can know for sure how engagement with extraterrestrials would go, though it’s better to consider cautionary tales from Earth’s own history sooner rather than later.

This article has been updated to correct the date of James Cook’s voyage.

David Delgado Shorter, Professor of World Arts and Cultures/Dance, University of California, Los Angeles; Kim TallBear, Professor of Native Studies, University of Alberta, and William Lempert, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Bowdoin College

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The science section of our news blog STM Daily News provides readers with captivating and up-to-date information on the latest scientific discoveries, breakthroughs, and innovations across various fields. We offer engaging and accessible content, ensuring that readers with different levels of scientific knowledge can stay informed. Whether it’s exploring advancements in medicine, astronomy, technology, or environmental sciences, our science section strives to shed light on the intriguing world of scientific exploration and its profound impact on our daily lives. From thought-provoking articles to informative interviews with experts in the field, STM Daily News Science offers a harmonious blend of factual reporting, analysis, and exploration, making it a go-to source for science enthusiasts and curious minds alike. https://stmdailynews.com/category/science/

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Ester Lázaro Lázaro, Centro de Astrobiología (INTA-CSIC)

One night, upon returning to the cave that his tribe calls home, the monkey-humanoid Moon-Watcher finds a strange crystal object, a kind of monolith that fascinates him at first, but then quickly loses his interest when he discovers that it is not edible. Soon after, the true purpose of the monolith is revealed to be none other than penetrating the minds of our ancestors to induce new abilities that, over time, will cause the development of an intelligence capable of creating new technology.

Many readers will recognise this scene from the novel 2001, A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke, and the film of the same name, directed by Stanley Kubrick. It almost goes without saying that the crystal monolith in question is the work of an extraterrestrial civilisation that observes life on other planets and “experiments” on them to encourage the development of intelligence in as many parts of the cosmos as possible.

Seeking simple answers to complex questions

Understanding how we, as a species, came to be intelligent is one of the great enigmas of evolutionary study. Small mutations, followed by a process of natural selection to choose the most advantageous, seems too slow a process for structures as complex as the human nervous system or brain to emerge. It is this very complexity that allows millions of neurons to communicate with each other, resulting in the emergence of qualities such as the ability to respond voluntarily to environmental stimuli, or to ask questions about the very nature of humankind and the universe.

Nowadays, we know that there are evolutionary mechanisms that have lead to great leaps in terms of complexity, but that does not stop people from turning to non-human forces – Gods, extraterrestrials, spiritual energies – to explain things that are difficult to comprehend.

This has always been the case, in all human cultures. A classic example would be attributing atmospheric events – thunder, lightning, floods – to the wrath of God. These ideas came about before humans had ever left the ground, so it is no surprise that we turned our eyes even higher – to extraterrestrials – to explain other phenomena that we could only observe once travelling at high altitudes became part of our daily lives.

The allure of the unknown

The possibility that we might have been visited by beings from other worlds has always fascinated us. The element of mystery, of the unknown, only makes it more interesting.

Any phenomenon is made all the more enticing when it seems it is being covered up or hidden for secretive reasons. The attractiveness of conspiracies often leads people towards ideas which have no scientific basis, such as the belief that the Earth is flat, that humans never set foot on the Moon, or that vaccines can control our behaviour.

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Even though these ideas have repeatedly been shown to be untrue, their rapid dissemination through social media, using simple, blunt language that appeals to emotion over logic, makes them very powerful weapons.

The supposed “proof” of alien visits to our planet ranges from specific Bible passages to ancient stone carvings portraying creatures or objects that may appear to be aliens or spacecraft. The latter often take the form of flying saucers.

However, we cannot forget that humans have always created imaginary creatures that resemble them and attributed them with magical powers. When imagining Gods, humans have given them a human appearance, and almost always imagined them as living in the sky.

When we look at these representations through modern eyes, we associate them with extraterrestrial beings or structures, when in fact they could be referring to a range of different things.

When unproven stories become larger than life

Recently, in the United States Congress, UFOs (currently known as UAPs: “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena”) are back in the limelight. This is because a former air force intelligence official has made claims that the Pentagon is in possession of remains of extraterrestrial craft and “non-human biological matter”. The claims have been backed up by the testimony of a retired navy commander and a former navy pilot.

What we can be certain of is that the more we explore our skies, the more likely it is that we will encounter phenomena that we cannot explain. However, this does not mean that they are extraterrestrial. Past experience has shown us that most of these events can be attributed to optical illusions, spy or weather balloons, space junk, or even satellites that we ourselves have made.

In Spain, UFOs were a hot topic between the 1960s and the 1980s. In this era, everyone knew someone who was convinced that they had seen a UFO. This even reached the point where an exoplanet, called Ummo, was made up. It was populated by a more advanced civilisation than ours who made contact with people on Earth. In the letters these aliens supposedly sent, the ‘Ummites’ explained concepts such as genetics and cell structure.

The truth is that nowadays, reading some of these letters can be quite amusing. The story of the planet of Ummo was ultimately proved to be a monumental hoax, a fact later admitted by its own creator.

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The Ummo hoax was even linked to the creation of a paedophile ring, which should make us reflect on the harmful consequences that the spread of fabricated news stories can have.

Can we deny the possibility that intelligent alien civilisations exist?

The answer, of course, is no. The universe is immense, and it is more than likely that circumstances similar to those which led to the appearance of life on Earth have been repeated on other planets. But there is a huge distance (literally and figuratively) between acknowledging the existence of these creatures and considering the possibility that they might have visited us.

Exoplanets, also known as extrasolar planets, are extremely far away, and we are limited by the speed of light which, as proven by Einstein, is the maximum possible speed at which anything can travel. Therefore, the journey to even a “nearby” exoplanet would take thousands of years. Maybe a civilisation more advanced than ours could find a way to do it faster, but not to the point of it being something easy or commonplace.

In any case, if the remains of alien life or spacecraft are stored away somewhere, why are they not being shown to us? Scientists would jump at the chance to analyse this organic matter to find out how it is structured, how it metabolises energy, or what molecules it uses to store genetic information.

Until there is proof, this is not a question of science, but rather, of stories. Stories can be very entertaining, but these kinds of stories do not help us to build a more accurate or helpful view of the world.

Ester Lázaro Lázaro, Investigadora Científica de los Organismos Públicos de Investigación. Especializada en evolución de virus, Centro de Astrobiología (INTA-CSIC)

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The science section of our news blog STM Daily News provides readers with captivating and up-to-date information on the latest scientific discoveries, breakthroughs, and innovations across various fields. We offer engaging and accessible content, ensuring that readers with different levels of scientific knowledge can stay informed. Whether it’s exploring advancements in medicine, astronomy, technology, or environmental sciences, our science section strives to shed light on the intriguing world of scientific exploration and its profound impact on our daily lives. From thought-provoking articles to informative interviews with experts in the field, STM Daily News Science offers a harmonious blend of factual reporting, analysis, and exploration, making it a go-to source for science enthusiasts and curious minds alike. https://stmdailynews.com/category/science/

Christopher Nichols, The Ohio State University

Curious Kids is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to [email protected].

What is most likely going on in Area 51? – Griffin, age 10, South Lyon, Michigan

One of the reasons people can never be entirely sure about what is going on at Area 51 is that it is a highly classified secret military facility. It was not until 2013 that the U.S. government even acknowledged the existence and name “Area 51.”

This information came out as part of a broader set of documents released through a Freedom of Information Act request, which is something regular citizens and groups can do to ask the U.S. government to provide details about government activities. In this case, the request made public formerly classified CIA information regarding the historical development and testing of the U-2 spy plane. The information also revealed where it was tested: Area 51!

As a national security historian, I know there’s a long history of secrets at Area 51. I also know that none of those secrets have anything to do with space aliens.

The place

The base commonly referred to as Area 51 is located in a remote area of southern Nevada, roughly 100 miles (161 kilometers) from Las Vegas. It is in the middle of a federally protected area of the U.S. Air Force’s Nevada Test and Training Range, now known as the Nevada National Security Site, which is inside the larger Nellis Air Force Range.

Area 51 is the name on maps for the area within the Nevada National Security Site where the government carried out secret operations. The airfield at Area 51 is called Homey Airport, and the overall facility is often referred to as Groom Lake. Groom Lake is a salt flat, or dried-out lake, adjacent to the airport.

The history

In the early years of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, both nations sought new technological developments that might give one country more power than the other. A great amount of information about scientific achievements, such as on rockets or weapons – but also even on ways to grow more food or make fuel more efficient – was kept secret as an issue of national security.

A key part of not fighting another world war was, and still is, developing technologies to see what the other side is doing – that is, surveillance technologies that can spy on the enemy. The information gathered by new and improved surveillance technologies about new innovations with planes and weapons was very important to governments.

This meant that both the surveillance information and the technology to get it were closely held national security secrets. Very few people in the governments of the U.S. and Soviet Union knew about the secrets from the 1940s all the way up until the end of the Cold War in 1991.

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Central to all this was the U.S.’s U-2 spy plane. It could fly higher than other airplanes and was made to travel over targets all around the world to take high-resolution photographs and measurements. Area 51 was selected in 1955 to test the U-2 in part because its remote location could help keep the plane secret.

Area 51 became the test site for other secret new aircraft. This included the A-12, which, like the U-2, was a fast-flying reconnaissance plane. The A-12 was first test flown at Homey Airport in 1962. It had a bulging disc-like center to carry additional fuel. Its shape and shiny titanium body could well have been responsible for some people’s reports about seeing spherical ships, also known as flying saucers.

Another important – and odd-shaped – aircraft first tested at Area 51 was the stealth fighter known as the F-117. It first flew at Homey Airport in 1981.

Secrets and speculation

“More Flying Objects Seen in Clark Sky,” read the June 17, 1959, headline in the Reno Evening Gazette newspaper. Reports like this of unidentified flying objects in the 1950s and 1960s fueled controversy and attention for Area 51. This was for three main reasons:

1. Area 51 was highly secret and not publicly accessible.
2. The area was home to test flights of secret new airplanes that moved fast and in different ways than expected.
3. The Cold War was an era of political tension, and there were many movies and TV shows about space aliens at the time.

When the government does not tell the public the full truth, no matter the reasons, secrets can lead to wild speculation. Secrecy can leave room for conspiracy theories to develop.

Area 51 remains off-limits to civilian and regular military air traffic, a decade after the government acknowledged its existence. The 68 years of government secrecy has helped to amplify suspicions, speculation and conspiracy theories. These conspiracy theories include crashed alien spaceships, space aliens being experimented on, and even space aliens working at Area 51.

There are much simpler explanations for what witnesses have seen near Area 51. After all, the public now knows about what was being tested at Area 51, and when. For example, as U-2 and A-12 flights increased in the 1950s and 1960s, so did local sightings of UFOs. As balloons and planes crashed, and secret testing of new technologies as well as captured Soviet equipment continued, so did reports of UFO crashes and landings.

In fact, many UFO sightings match almost exactly with dates and times of flights of then-classified experimental aircraft. We also know that prototype drones and more recent versions have been tested at the site.

In the end, there is no reason to think that anything other than earthly technologies have been behind the strange sights and sounds at Area 51.

This article has been updated to correct the descriptions of the name Area 51 and the U2 spy plane’s capabilities.

Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to [email protected]. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.

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And since curiosity has no age limit – adults, let us know what you’re wondering, too. We won’t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.

Christopher Nichols, Professor of History, The Ohio State University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The science section of our news blog STM Daily News provides readers with captivating and up-to-date information on the latest scientific discoveries, breakthroughs, and innovations across various fields. We offer engaging and accessible content, ensuring that readers with different levels of scientific knowledge can stay informed. Whether it’s exploring advancements in medicine, astronomy, technology, or environmental sciences, our science section strives to shed light on the intriguing world of scientific exploration and its profound impact on our daily lives. From thought-provoking articles to informative interviews with experts in the field, STM Daily News Science offers a harmonious blend of factual reporting, analysis, and exploration, making it a go-to source for science enthusiasts and curious minds alike. https://stmdailynews.com/category/science/

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