Meeting: July 23rd at 5 PM

Abstract: “When Will We Discover the Extraterrestrials?” The scientific hunt for extraterrestrial intelligence is now into its fifth decade, and we still haven't uncovered a confirmed peep from any cosmic company. Could this mean that finding aliens, even if they exist, is a project for the ages – one that might take centuries or longer? New technologies for use in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) suggest that, despite the continued dearth of signals from other societies, there is good reason to expect that success might not be far off – that we might find evidence of sophisticated civilizations within a few decades. Why this is so, what contact would tell us, and what such a discovery would mean, are the subject of this talk on the continuing efforts to establish our place in the universe of thinking beings.

About the Speaker: Seth is the Senior Astronomer at the SETI Institute, in Mountain View, California. He has an undergraduate degree in physics from Princeton University, and a doctorate in astronomy from the California Institute of Technology. For much of his career, Seth conducted radio astronomy research on galaxies, and has published approximately sixty papers in professional journals. Seth has written several hundred popular magazine and Web articles on various topics in astronomy, technology, film and television. He lectures on astronomy and other subjects at Stanford and other venues in the Bay Area, and for the last six years, has been a Distinquished Speaker for the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He is also Chair of the International Academy of Astronautics’ SETI Permanent Study Group. Every week he hosts the SETI Institute’s science radio show, “Are We Alone?”, broadcast on Discovery Channel Radio. Seth has edited and contributed to a half dozen books. He has also been the principal author of three. “Sharing the Universe: Perspectives on Extraterrestrial Life” appeared in March, 1998. His most recent books are “Life in the Universe” (2006, textbook with Jeff Bennett) and “Cosmic Company” (2003, with Alex Barnett).

E-scanner article (Sept-Oct 2008, pg 8): Click here