SETI and Society

• Impossible to separate

• All definitions are arbitrary

• “Socio-cultural” solves the problem!

‘Society’ vs ‘Culture’

SETI and Society

• History, Anthropology, Archaeology

• Law

• Education

• Science, Mystery and Epiphany

Uses of History, Anthro, Etc

• Study of Past Impact

- Lowell, pulsars, impact of past worldview

changes (if it is a change in worldview!)

• Use of Analogs for Future Impact

- Must be used cautiously

- Transmission of knowledge to Latin West

- 10,000 years of history, but what lessons?

• Examine underlying assumptions

An Early Attempt at Studying Societal Impact of Spaceflight

• Part of a series of societal impact of spaceflight studies by American Academy of Arts and Sciences under contract to NASA (early 1960s; MIT, Bruce Mazlish et al)

• Uses and Abuses of Historical Analogy

• Cannot predict the future

• A guide for thinking: “terrain of the past suggestive of the topography of present and its future projection”

Make Use of Past Studies

SETI Societal Impact

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• Will depend on scenario (microbial or intelligent; near or remote, etc)

• Will vary in different societies

• Will affect religious doctrines in different ways (a long history of discussion)

• Will determine our place in the universe

• Implement the Denning research agenda

Societal Impact of SETI

• Impacting whom?‘Society’ is not monolithic – how to handle this problem?

• Impacting how?What is an ‘impact’? Scientific data refracted through many lenses

• What is the scope of the problem? Very different scenarios for contact.

• Etc, Etc

Prepare for the Outcome

We Are Not Alone (Walter Sullivan, 1966)

Are We Alone? (Rood and Trefil, 1981)

We are Alone … (possible SETI result)This outcome might also need preparation because there

seems to be a need for aliens

Law: The Problem of Response

• Need an expert group, funded over a period of years, to study response problem and give advice to the President (Tatel)

• IAA group?

SETI and Society: Education

• Better ways of communicating to public (Wagner) through multiple media

• SETI Institute doing some of this through

LITU curriculum

• More “SETI Girls”

• SETI is part of Cosmic Evolution (Drake Eqn), widely disseminated through Wright Center (Chaisson), SETI Institute, etc

Science, Mystery and Epiphany

• Astronomy raises questions traditionally reserved for religion

• Astronomical art heightens the sense of

mystery and beauty (especially Lomberg’s!)

• SETI may result in an epiphany (but which

one? “Stardust thou art and into Stardust thou shalt Return”