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| Srl | Item |
| 1 |
ID:
193471
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| Summary/Abstract |
The search for intelligent life elsewhere in the universe has continued for decades without yielding any tangible results, as experts debate active versus passive approaches and the risks involved in sending signals of humans’ presence.
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| 2 |
ID:
103929
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| Publication |
2011.
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| Summary/Abstract |
The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) is a human activity with profound implications for society and culture that fall within the purview of astrosociology. In this article, we review some of the astrosociological aspects of SETI and identify ways to seek evidence-based, rather than purely speculative, answers. Recurrent issues include the organization and conduct of the search; human-alien comprehension and communication; human reactions to the discovery of extraterrestrial life; and the comparative analysis of possible extraterrestrial civilizations. Over the past 50 years, a small but growing number of anthropologists, artists, historians, philosophers, political scientists, psychologists, sociologists, and theologians have applied their expertise to SETI and its possible consequences. The current challenge for astrosociology is not gaining entree to SETI; rather, it is one of increasing the interest of more social and behavioral scientists in the search and its potential effects.
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| 3 |
ID:
158355
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| Summary/Abstract |
Since the late 1940s, a tenacious disconnect between popular interest and professional disinterest in unidentified flying objects (UFOs) has typified the controversy surrounding the subject. Numerous high-profile scientists have seen the topic of UFOs as an opportunity to denounce and rectify a popular, yet allegedly misguided, conviction—that some UFOs are physical anomalies indicating the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence—and thus to advance the explanatory authority of science. Rather than constituting rigorous, informed, and effective assessments, however, the ways in which many prominent scientists publicly address the UFO question often exemplify both the problematic “boundary-work” of scientific discourse in this area and, more specifically, the role that logical fallacies can play in the rhetorical construction of scientific authority in public domains. Through a critical discourse analysis, this article argues that ignorance of UFO phenomena is socially and discursively constructed in ways that are conducive to the public faces of individuals and institutions. More broadly, it suggests that the rudimentary standard of science communication attending to the extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) hypothesis for UFOs inhibits public understanding of science, dissuades academic inquiry within the physical and social sciences, and undermines progressive space policy initiatives.
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