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Photo by Peter Hvizdak, ŽŶŶĞĐƟĐƵƚ DĂŐĂnjŝŶĞ James Magner, MD is a ʹ >ĞŽŶĂƌĚ ŶŐĞů͕ WƌŽĨĞƐƐŽƌ ŵĞƌŝƚƵƐ ŽĨ ŶŐůŝƐŚ͕ YƵŝŶŶŝƉŝĂĐ hŶŝǀĞƌƐŝƚLJ
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COVID-19: SPECIAL VACCINE UPDATE p.20
SCIENCE THAT MATTERS ®
DECEMBER 2020
ARE WE
ALONE?
• HOW TO SEARCH
FOR LIFE ACROSS
GALAXIES p.32
• THE LIMITS
OF OUR HUNT
FOR E.T. p.40
Confessions of a Perfectionist p.26 BONUS
A Toy Inventor and an Engineer Walk Into a Lab p.48
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CONTENTS December 2020 Website access code:
DSD2012
VOL. 41, ISSUE 8
Enter this code at: www.
DiscoverMagazine.com/code
to gain access to exclusive
subscriber content.
Will the James
Webb Telescope
be the tool
that leads us
to intelligent
extraterrestrial
life? This issue’s
special section
(p. 30) explores
the possibilities.
COVER: JOHN A DAVIS/SHUTTERSTOCK. THIS PAGE: NASA/CHRIS GUNN 30 Are We Alone? 48 Scientist in Toyland
SPECIAL SECTION What six decades of the search for From medicine to space travel,
extraterrestrial intelligence can Chuck Hoberman’s shape-shifting is
teach us. expanding scientific research.
SARAH SCOLES AND STEVE NADIS STEPHEN ORNES
32 Looking for Signs 56 Talk to the Hand
Out-there ideas may point the way We’re more than just opposable
to E.T. thumbs — our hands gave us tools,
new skills and better communication.
STEVE NADIS
MADELAINE BÖHME, RÜDIGER BRAUN
40 Science … or AND FLORIAN BREIER
Just Fiction? DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 3
Life beyond might not exist — or
we just don’t know how to find it.
SARAH SCOLES
CONTENTS
p. 62 p. 66
COLUMNS & DEPARTMENTS
6 EDITOR’S NOTE 22 VITAL SIGNS tough to sift through. What CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: SMEERJEWEGPRODUCTIES/SHUTTERSTOCK; NAVEEN MACRO/SHUTTERSTOCK;
can they learn from bats? RUSLAN SEMICHEV/SHUTTERSTOCK
Explore the unknown Anything but
with us. Predictable RALEIGH MCELVERY
8 INBOX His nausea and vomiting 66 20 THINGS YOU DIDN’T
just wouldn’t stop. But
Readers share their the culprit behind this KNOW ABOUT ...
thoughts on the pandemic, 50-year-old’s distress
mental health and the came as a surprise. Glaciers
search for alien life.
TONY DAJER We’re living in an ice age,
HOT SCIENCE P. 11 but climate change is
26 PIECE OF MIND still making glaciers’ fate
Mesmerizing spiral hives precarious.
follow the same mathematical Confessions of
principles that build crystals, a Recovering JONATHON KEATS
the science of whiskey, why Perfectionist
the COVID-19 vaccine is so p. 14
important for society, and more. Take it from a seasoned
pro (and mental health
4 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM experts): You are not
alone. But your lofty, self-
imposed standards may
be isolating you.
AGATA BOXE
62 TECH NOTE
Cut the Clutter
Robots can use echoes
to navigate, but the
cacophony of sound is
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EDITOR’S NOTE
BY STEPHEN C. GEORGE ®
Strange Visitors MAGAZINE
Growing up in New Hampshire, I had no problem supporting the idea STEPHEN C. GEORGE Editorial Director
of extraterrestrial intelligence. In my youth, my home state was a hot- ELIZABETH M. WEBER Design Director
bed for sightings of unidentified flying objects and alleged encounters
with strange visitors from other worlds. We didn’t need Area 51—we EDITORIAL
had an area of our own, a patch of meadow on the family farm where my own
father claimed to see mysterious lights in a triangular pattern hovering above TIMOTHY MEINCH Features Editor
him, then peeling off into the starry night faster than any airplane. ELISA R. NECKAR Production Editor
ANNA FUNK Associate Editor
Now, the old man was a famous teller of tall tales, but he wasn’t the only one ALEX ORLANDO Assistant Editor
with such stories. And given that we lived in an era when humans themselves JENNIFER WALTER Assistant Editor
were launching spacecraft into the heavens with some regularity, it didn’t seem so HAILEY MCLAUGHLIN Editorial Assistant
far-fetched that our little world might be getting
visitors from way out of town, that we might not Contributing Editors
be alone in the universe.
BRIDGET ALEX, TIM FOLGER,
Those early tales of UFO encounters sparked JONATHON KEATS, LINDA MARSA,
my lifelong passion for science fiction, but as an KENNETH MILLER, STEVE NADIS,
adult, it was something I was shy about admit- JULIE REHMEYER,
ting. This was especially the case after I became DARLENE CAVALIER (special projects)
a journalist, and most definitely after my first
stint as editor of Discover in 2012. I certainly DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM
didn’t want to be known as “the UFO editor” by
those of you — all seven of you — who just might MEGAN SCHMIDT Digital Editor
remember me.
Contributors
So it was both a joy and relief to read this issue’s
special section on the state of the ongoing search BRIDGET ALEX, ERIC BETZ, ERIK KLEMETTI,
for signs of extraterrestrial intelligence. (It begins LESLIE NEMO, NEUROSKEPTIC,
on page 30.) I was particularly gratified to learn COREY S. POWELL, SCISTARTER, TOM YULSMAN
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INBOX
WHAT ROBOTS CAN’T DO
(“Will A.I. Make Medicine More Human?” June 2020)
I am a real fan of Dr. Topol and often listen to his well-informed opinion pieces on
Medscape, but his views on mental health treatment expose a serious misunderstanding
of how it actually works.
While Dr. Topol waxes almost poetic about the relationship between the medical fellow
and his patients, he somehow does not think that this pertains to mental health. Years of
research into why and how psychotherapy works underscore that it is the relationship
between the patient and the doctor that is healing. That people may be comfortable
disclosing their “innermost secrets” to an avatar in no way suggests that disclosure and
diagnosis are curative. It is analogous to suggesting that because an X-ray can see deep into
a person’s body, it alone can be curative. The gathering of innermost secrets, like an X-ray,
may expose the problems, but it is the doctor-patient relationship that is curative.
Richard S. Miller, psychologist and director of training, emeritus
California State University, Northridge
REASON FOR HOPE From the Web
(“Why a Pandemic Brings Out Our Worst,” In this issue, we explore why 56%
the Search for Extraterrestrial YES
July/August 2020) Intelligence (SETI) Institute
hasn’t turned up anything since 44%
As a faithful teenaged reader and consumer of Discover, I its founding in the 1980s. (See NO
page 30 for more.) We asked
wanted to pose an alternative perspective to your article about our Facebook followers: Do
you think that astronomers
our innate psychological responses to a pandemic. Although will find evidence of alien life
in your lifetime?
valid points are made in regard to our being gripped by fear,
our anxious habits, and our aloofness and prejudices toward
others who look different than us, we must not lose sight of
something that was not mentioned:
how mass disease unites us, in a sort SPECIAL REPORT » COVID-19 Loran McCormick: simply say the public is not
of unimaginable, inconceivable way. I think they already have ready for this information.
DiscoverSCIENCEFORTHECURIOUS it. Judging by the sudden Jenna Walsh:
With any kind of pervasive ® industrialization, I figure I think we already see it,
JULY/AUGUST 2020 they found something but just don’t realize what
that’s probably been here it is. Intelligent alien life
illnesses, our fragile human nature EVERYTHING since before humans probably doesn’t want
and condition is challenged and WORTH KNOWING: walked the Earth. anything to do with the
brought to the forefront of our minds. Jens Avery: disaster that is Earth at
People may look out for each other OUR BODIES We may find life, but it may this point, so no doubt
not want anything to do they’re playing it safe and
BOOST YOUR IMMUNE SYSTEM p. 44 with us. We are not very observing from a safe
CUT HEART DISEASE RISK p. 48 advanced and can’t even distance.
FORM STRONG MEMORIES p. 36 get along with each other. Christopher Harvey:
GET A HEALTHY GUT p. 56 Steven Buhrow: By alien life, do you mean
BUST EXERCISE MYTHS p. 53 I think the more important intelligent alien life? Then
question is will any no. It would be extremely
more, even from a distance. We government ever publicly hard to find, short of them
admit it in our lifetime? I coming down to Earth. But
may feel lonely in isolation, while fully believe that we could if you mean unintelligent
discover alien life today alien life, like bacteria or
understanding that almost everyone and the government would single cell, we might.
else is also in isolation, and thus
likely also melancholy or lonely. We realize and recognize our
vulnerabilities, no matter our age or outward appearances;
not everyone has a weak immune system, but they may carry
other non-physical burdens. Our lives may not exactly mirror
one another, but they’re more similar than different. We care
for our loved ones. We seek reassurance and deep connections
through friendship and social networks.
In this calamity, let us pledge to see past these stories of
panic-buying, for example, to embrace our disorderly present
and see it for what it is: an opportunity for the epiphany that a
pandemic can indeed bring out our best.
Hannah Steenkamer (age 17)
Newark, Del.
8 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM
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HOT SCIENCE
THE L ATEST NEWS AND NOTES
IS THE UNIVERSE INFINITE? • WHISKEY BARREL SCIENCE • DAILY STEP GOALS • BEAUTY IDEALS
ERUPTIONS ON THE SUN • BOOK REVIEWS • COVID VACCINES
CRYSTAL COLONY
Sometimes nature mimics nature — even if it’s not a conscious effort. Such is the case with a genus of
stingless bees called Tetragonula, native to Southeast Asia and Australia. Their mesmerizing spiral or
target-shaped hives follow the mathematical principles that shape crystals: The way these bees stack
pockets of wax to form the familiar hexagonal cells in their comb is surprisingly similar to how atoms
and molecules grow layer by layer to form a terraced crystal structure. Humans have even copied these
design principles for their own building projects, such as in spiral ramps or multi-story parking garages.
— JENNIFER WALTER; IMAGE BY TIM HEARD
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 11
HOT SCIENCE JAY SMITH
12 DISCOVERMAG A ZINE .COM
BIG IDEA
Is the Universe Infinite?
CENTURIES OF DISCOVERIES HAVE HIT A DEAD END. WE MAY NEVER KNOW THE TRUE
SIZE OF OUR UNIVERSE.
When Galileo Galilei pointed his first telescope You’d never come to an edge of this flat
to the heavens in 1610, he discovered “congeries universe; you’d only find more and more
of innumerable stars” hidden in the band of galaxies.
light called the Milky Way. Our cosmos grew
exponentially that day. Roughly three centuries later, the That’s all well and good with most
cosmic bounds exploded once again when astronomers built astronomers. A flat universe agrees
telescopes big enough to show the Milky Way is just one of with both observation and theory, so
many “island universes.” Soon they learned the universe was the idea now sits at the heart of modern
expanding, too, with galaxies retreating from each other at cosmology.
ever-accelerating speeds.
The problem is that, unlike a spherical
Since then, ever-larger telescopes have like the ancient Greek mathematician universe, a flat one can be infinite — or
shown the observable universe spans an Eratosthenes calculating Earth’s size not. And there’s no real way to tell the
incomprehensible 92 billion light-years using simple trigonometry. In theory, difference. “What could you look for to
across and contains perhaps 2 trillion our universe can have one of three pos- see whether there’s an infinite universe?”
galaxies. And yet, astronomers are still sible shapes, each one dependent on the Trimble says. “Nobody quite knows.”
left wondering how much more universe curvature of space itself: saddle shaped
is out there, beyond what they observe. (negative curvature), spherical (positive So instead, astronomers hope an
curvature) or flat (no curvature). answer can come from theory — a
“The universe has always been slightly
larger than what we can see,” says Few have championed a saddle- A spherical universe
Virginia Trimble of the University of shaped universe, but a spherical cosmos would let you sail
California, Irvine, an astronomer and makes sense to us earthlings. Earth is into the cosmos in
expert in the field’s history. round, as are the sun and planets. A any direction and
spherical universe would let you sail into end up back where
Building bigger telescopes won’t the cosmos in any direction and end up you started, like
help extend the cosmos anymore. back where you started, like Ferdinand Ferdinand Magellan.
“Telescopes only observe the observ- Magellan’s crew circumnavigating the
able. You can’t see back in time further globe. Einstein called this model a model that could offer indirect proof
than the age of the universe,” explains “finite yet unbounded universe.” one way or the other. For example, the
Nobel Prize-winning cosmologist John Standard Model of physics predicted
Mather of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight But starting in the late 1980s, a series the existence of numerous particles, like
Center, who’s also chief scientist for the of orbiting observatories built to study the Higgs Boson, years before they were
James Webb Space Telescope. “So we are the CMB made increasingly precise actually discovered. Yet physicists still
totally limited. We’ve already seen as far measurements showing that space has presumed those particles were real.
as you could possibly imagine.” At the no curvature at all. It’s flat to the limits
edge, we see the leftover glow from the of what astronomers can measure — if it “If you have a good description of
Big Bang — the so-called cosmic micro- is a sphere, it’s a sphere so huge that even everything you’ve observed so far and
wave background radiation (CMB). our entire observable universe doesn’t it predicts something is true, then you
But this isn’t some magical edge of the register any curvature. expect it is,” Trimble says. “That’s how
universe. Our cosmos keeps going. We most scientists think about how science
just may never know how far. “The universe is flat like an [endless] works.” — ERIC BETZ
sheet of paper,” says Mather. “According
In recent decades, cosmologists to this, you could continue infinitely
have tried to solve this mystery by far in any direction and the universe
first determining the universe’s shape, would be just the same, more or less.”
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 13
HOT SCIENCE
SCIENCE OF ... vanilla, smoky, leather, spice, creamy or
medicinal flavors,” says Livermore.
WHAT
GIVES YOUR Whiskey barrels are typically made
FAVORITE of oak, and the attributes of oaks vary
WHISKEY both by species and region. French
ITS SPECIFIC oak barrels make whiskeys with
FLAVOR? IT’S more astringency and spice, says Bill
ALL ABOUT Lumsden, master distiller for Scotland’s
THAT BARREL. Glenmorangie Co. American oak gets
you more smoothness and sweetness, he
Aged to Perfection says, boasting flavors such as vanilla and
coconut.
GLOBAL WHISKEY produc- All wood is made of cellulose, hemi- FROM TOP: NEW AFRICA/SHUTTERSTOCK; RUSLAN SEMICHEV/SHUTTERSTOCK
cellulose and lignin. These large mol- Water-soluble tannins are another
tion is at an all-time high. ecules come together like a brick wall, compound found in wood. When
The American whiskey explains Don Livermore, master blender burned, they convert to acids, which
industry — known for its for Canada’s Hiram Walker in turn react with any oxygen seeping
bourbon, rye and Tennessee whiskey and Sons. The cellulose and in through the sides of the barrel,
— reported U.S. sales spiked more than hemicellulose are bricks, Livermore says. The chemical chain
72 percent over the past decade, generat- and lignins are the mortar. reactions keep coming, including
ing nearly $4 billion in revenue in 2019 “As whiskey makers, [our] esterification, in which acid and alcohol
alone. But few whiskey drinkers could intent is to break apart these react to produce flavors ranging from
likely name what they’re actually tasting large molecules into smaller, fresh grass to green apple. (Craft beer
in that shot glass or tumbler. So, in the dissolvable molecules,” says lovers might recognize these flavor
name of science, we turned to the experts. Livermore. compounds, known as esters, as the
Whiskeys are made from grain — banana flavors in their hefeweizen.)
single-malt Scotch from malted barley, You’ve got to break down Leftover tannins provide a tealike
for instance, while bourbon is made the wall to access the flavors — that’s astringency. Meanwhile, evaporation
with a minimum of 51 percent corn why barrels are heated and charred. — the “angel’s share,” as it’s called in the
— and undergo an aging period in a “Cellulose and hemicellulose will business — concentrates the flavors in
wooden barrel. It’s this wood, some say, contribute caramel, toffee, nutty, maple, the remaining liquid.
that imparts as much as 70 percent of cardboard or cotton candy notes to
the spirit’s flavor. whiskey, whereas lignin contributes Some distillers move whiskey to
another barrel for secondary matura-
tion. These finishing barrels typically
held wine, sherry, port or even another
spirit before being repurposed.
Lumsden and Glenmorangie were early
innovators of this practice, which has
now become widespread across the
whiskey world.
“It’s a direct addition
of flavor from the residue
of whatever has been in
the barrel previously,”
says Lumsden. As a
fortified wine, sherry in
particular can deliver
flavors of dried fruits,
thanks to high levels of a
compound called furfural.
Next time you’re savoring a sultry
sip of your favorite whiskey, consider
raising a toast to the tried and true
scientific formulas that guided its
creation. — JAKE EMEN
14 D ISCOVERMAG A Z I N E .CO M
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HOT SCIENCE
WEB REPORT I’m Your Venus FROM LEFT: ANETLANDA/SHUTTERSTOCK; BJØRN CHRISTIAN TØRRISSEN/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
THE ONLY EXERCISE YOU NEED You’ve probably heard of the
Venus of Willendorf — or at
WALKING MIGHT BE ONE OF THE BEST EXERCISES least seen its photo. But if
FOR HEALTH — THOUGH THAT 10,000-STEP GOAL IS you want to beat your family
MORE MARKETING THAN SCIENCE. at Jeopardy!, you’d better learn the
backstory of one of the most iconic
TO WALK IS TO BE HUMAN. We’re the only primate that artifacts from the ancient world. Short,
fat and nearly 30,000 years old, Venus
gets around by standing up and putting one foot in of Willendorf is an Ice Age icon.
front of the other. In the more than 4 million years that Archaeologists found the 4-inch-tall
humanity’s ancestors have been bipedal, our ability to figurine in 1908 during excavations
walk upright has allowed humankind to travel great distances and along the Danube River in Austria. Since
survive changing climates, environments and landscapes. then, nearly 200 similar statuettes have
But walking is more than just transportation. It also happens to surfaced across Europe, dating between
be really good for us. Countless scientific studies have found that this 23,000 and 40,000 years old. Although
simple act can provide a number of health benefits and help people modern scholars call these artifacts
live longer. In fact, a walking routine — if done properly — might Venuses, after the Roman goddess of
be the only aerobic exercise people need. love and fertility, the actual sculptors
How much walking should one aim for? You’ve likely heard we need lived at least 20 millennia before
10,000 steps a day. That’s about 5 miles. But contrary to popular Classical Rome. It’s unclear why Ice
belief, this recommendation doesn’t come from science. Instead, Age people carved these figurines;
researchers propose they served
it stems from a 1960s as fertility symbols, self-portraits or
advertising campaign pornographic items. In any case, the
to promote a pedom- supposed sex appeal didn’t last, at least
eter in Japan. Perhaps for some cultures: On a 5-point scale
because it’s a round from unattractive to extremely attractive,
number and easy to Venus of Willendorf received an average
remember, it stuck. rating of 0.14 in a 2011 survey of 161
undergraduates in New Zealand.
Since the 1960s,
researchers have studied — BRIDGET ALEX
the 10,000-steps-a-day
standard and have
turned up mixed results.
Although 10,000 steps
is certainly a healthy
and worthwhile goal,
it’s not a one-size-fits-all
recommendation.
For instance,
a recent Harvard
University study involving more than 16,000 senior women found
that those who got at least 4,400 steps a day greatly reduced their
risk of dying prematurely when compared with less active women.
The study also noted that these benefits continued up to 7,500 steps
before leveling off. This 7,500 mark isn’t surprising: It’s in line with
common public health recommendations, such as the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention’s recommendation of 150 minutes of
moderate physical activity a week for adults.
Research has shown that picking up the pace might be a good idea,
too — fast enough to raise your heart rate, even if just for a short
burst. The benefits of walking depend on frequency, intensity and
duration. So walk often, walk fast and walk long. —MEGAN SCHMIDT
16 DISCOVERMAG A ZINE .COM
NASA/ESA THE TOP STORIES FROM DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM
These swirls are solar flares on the sun’s very active surface, captured in this false-
color composite image by NASA’s Solar and Heliospheric Observatory.
Eruptions on the Sun Might
Trigger Earthquakes
LARGE, POWERFUL earthquakes tend to occur in groups, but exactly
why that is has long remained a mystery to scientists. Some research-
ers think the sun might be to blame.
Eruptions on the sun’s surface can cause coronal mass ejections —
energetic floods of particles including ions and electrons that careen through the
solar system at breakneck speeds. When they reach Earth, these charged particles
can interfere with satellites, and under extreme circumstances, take down power
grids.
Researchers at Italy’s University of Basilicata and the National Institute of
Geophysics and Volcanology in Naples combed through 20 years of data on both
earthquakes and solar activity, searching for any possible correlations. They found
that when protons streaming from the sun peaked, there was a spike in quakes on
Earth for the next 24 hours.
Electromagnetic activity has been recorded alongside earthquakes before, but
whether earthquakes were causing, or caused by, these electrical anomalies has
been debated. The new theory suggests that as positively charged protons from the
sun crash into Earth’s protective magnetic bubble, they create electromagnetic cur-
rents that propagate across the globe. Pulses created by these currents could then
go on to deform minerals like quartz in Earth’s crust, ultimately triggering quakes.
The idea has already been met with notable skepticism in the research com-
munity, and more research is needed. But if the team in Rome is right, keeping a
close eye on our star might help us better predict and prepare for when the ground
shakes beneath our feet. — MARA JOHNSON-GROH
HOT SCIENCE
BOOKS
WHAT WE’RE READING
The Light Ages: The Surprising Story of
Medieval Science by Seb Falk
When I think “medieval science,” not much
comes to mind — just a big, empty space
between ancient Greek thinkers like Plato and
Renaissance-era scientists like da Vinci or Galileo. But
the Dark Ages may not have been as devoid of progress
as its name implies; historian Falk argues it was actually More Pages to Turn
an era brimming with scientific inquiry. The Tangled Web We Weave: Inside the Shadow
System That Shapes the Internet
Falk gives us an insider’s look at medieval science
by James Ball
through the life of a single 14th-century Benedictine Once championed as a platform for our would-be saviors,
the internet has become a place for villains. (Sorry, Mark
monk: John Westwyk. By following notes from Westwyk Zuckerberg.) But what if that’s a product of the system
itself? In a gripping — and sadly, timely — tale, tech
and his contemporaries — a sketched diagram of a sun- journalist Ball reveals the forces behind our screens,
including the web’s original architects and the cable
dial, musings scribbled companies keeping the infrastructure itself connected.
in a manuscript’s An Outsider’s Guide to Humans: What Science
Taught Me About What We Do and Who We Are
margins — Falk is able to
by Camilla Pang
reconstruct the monk’s Biochemist Pang was only 5 years old when she started
to feel like a stranger among fellow humans. After being
story. He takes readers diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, generalized
anxiety disorder and ADHD, she harnessed her unique
from the meadows of brain — and love for science — to create an instruction
manual for our quirks and contradictions. In an easy-to-
Westwick to the halls of read mix of memoir and science, Pang shows how viewing
human behavior through a scientific lens can illuminate its
the University of Oxford, mysteries — like using Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle
to illustrate the paradox of living in the moment or using
even voyaging across molecular dynamics to talk about crowds.
the sea to march in the Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art
Crusades. Along the way, by Rebecca Wragg Sykes
Whether they’re adorning the covers of scientific journals
you learn the science or dominating Google searches, we’ve got a bit of a thing
for Neanderthals, explains archaeologist Wragg Sykes.
of the day, like doing She sketches a decidedly modern and nuanced portrait
of our evolutionary kin, ditching clichés of loincloth-clad
mathematical calcula- brutes fighting mammoths. Examining everything from
the size of their eye sockets to their tendency to recycle
tions with decimals on old tools, Kindred celebrates Neanderthals in all of their
complexity. — A.O.
your fingers, looking to Falk’s
the stars to tell time and bubbling
using an instrument called curiosity and
an astrolabe. strong sense
The book can sometimes
feel overstuffed, with a of storytelling
poem written in Middle always swept
English on one page and me along.
a diagram of how stars
move across the sky on
another. But Falk’s bubbling
curiosity and strong sense of storytelling always swept
me along. By the end, The Light Ages didn’t just broaden
my conception of science; even as I scrolled away on
my Kindle, it felt like I was sitting alongside Westwyk at
St. Albans abbey, leafing through dusty manuscripts by
candlelight. — ALEX ORLANDO
18 DISCOVERMAG A ZINE .COM
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HOT SCIENCE
SPECIAL REPORT
WHY A COVID-19 VACCINE IS KEY
FOR RETURNING TO NORMALCY
Dozens of vaccines are immunity thresholds could
in the works, with many be lower than 70 percent,
already in clinical trials. but Omer says we won’t
After approval, their know for sure until we start
effectiveness will depend vaccinating people in large
on participation. numbers. And, he says
reaching herd immunity is
For many, the COVID-19 pandemic to be immune before it not all about the threshold FROM TOP: PHOTOBYTAWAT/SHUTTERSTOCK; OLLIE THE DESIGNER/SHUTTERSTOCK
has reduced life to a sliver of what is safe to resume normal — vaccines start to offer
it was — with a restless feeling that life, according to the Johns protection before that
nothing can be done to reclaim it. Hopkins Bloomberg point. They directly protect
But there is one last crucial step for us to take School of Public Health. individuals from getting
before we can return to our pre-coronavirus Vaccinations are the safest the disease, he explains,
lives: Get a COVID-19 vaccine when it’s way to get there with the and they indirectly protect
available. fewest number of infections. communities, since those
And their success requires who are vaccinated decrease
“If we want a society where The goal is reaching herd an all-hands-on-deck the spread.
the economy is back and immunity — community approach.
people can have weddings protection from a virus that’s Think of vaccine effec-
again with their relatives, accrued once a sufficient Some newer models tiveness in a community
we have to have substantial percentage of the population suggest herd playing out in a dry forest,
uptake [of a vaccine],” says is immune. In the U.S., early where each individual is
Saad Omer, an infectious data suggested we will likely a tree, Omer says. When
diseases epidemiologist need at least 70 percent of you protect each person
and director of the Yale the population, or at least through vaccination, it’s
Institute for Global Health. 229 million Americans, as if you’re removing trees
and decreasing the chances
that an infection will spread
like wildfire throughout
the forest.
On June 30, the FDA
announced it would approve
a COVID-19 vaccine if it has
at least 50 percent efficacy.
Omer is hopeful that
COVID-19 vaccines will
have more than 50 percent
efficacy, but even at that
level, it would be good
news. “It would still be
an incredibly useful
vaccine,” he says.
He adds that
it might turn
out that it can
reduce the impact
20 DISCOVERMAG A ZINE .COM
LUANATEUTZI/SHUTTERSTOCK of the virus on vulner- LESS-EFFECTIVE VACCINES STILL PROTECT THE MASSES
able populations while a
higher efficacy vaccine is The measles vaccine is one of the most
developed.
effective vaccines ever produced — it’s 97 percent effective after two doses.
When the first vaccine is Meanwhile, the effectiveness of the annual flu vaccine fluctuates between
eventually approved, who about 40 and 60 percent. But that doesn’t mean you should skip your flu
can get it and where won’t shot. The flu vaccine during the 2017–18 flu season was found to be only
be entirely your choice. It’s 40 percent effective, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
likely that the first vaccine (CDC) estimates that it still prevented 6.2 million infections and 5,700
doses will be given to front- deaths. What’s more, a 2017 CDC study published in Pediatrics found that
line health care workers and flu vaccines reduce the risk of a child dying of influenza by 65 percent.
the most vulnerable among
us, including people over 65 By 2000, the spread
and those with underlying of measles in the
medical conditions. After U.S. had been
that, the vaccine will likely completely stopped.
be more widely available at But in 2019, an influx
pharmacies, doctor’s offices of the disease from
and workplaces. abroad met enough
non-vaccinated
But even when the plans Americans to bring
for vaccine distribution the disease back.
are set and ready to go,
enough people have to be How Hot Spots Crop Up
willing to get it. A Gallup
poll released in August In 2019, the CDC reported 1,282 cases of measles — the largest number seen since
revealed that 35 percent of 1992 — with over 73 percent linked to the same areas in New York. Two outbreaks
Americans would not get that began in late 2018 fueled the high numbers into 2019. Both were caused by the
a COVID-19 vaccine. “If return of an infected international traveler into communities with low vaccination
that happens, we will have rates. The World Health Organization included what’s called vaccine hesitancy in its top
reduced numbers because 10 list of global health threats in 2019. One study published in the Journal of the American
some people will get it, but Medical Association found that children whose parents opted them out of vaccination
we may continue to see were 35 times more likely to contract measles. The same study found that refusals
flare-ups for a while,” says of vaccinations tend to cluster in the same geographic areas, which is what leads to
Omer. “That’s not a good outbreaks. — A.W.
scenario.”
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 21
With over 30 vaccines
in clinical trials around
the world, the race is on
to see which will be first.
But defeating the corona-
virus will depend, in part,
on how many people
show up at that finish line
to receive a vaccination.
— ALLISON WHITTEN
VITAL SIGNS
BY TONY DAJER
Anything but An hour “I can give you the blood pressure
Predictable later, the meds through the IV,” I suggested.
rest of his
HIS NAUSEA AND VOMITING JUST WOULDN’T STOP. BUT lab results His wife Diane, full of concern, piped
THE CULPRIT BEHIND THIS 50-YEAR-OLD’S DISTRESS were back. up. “Oh, they’re not staying down, doc.
CAME AS A SURPRISE. All were I’ve never seen him this bad.”
normal.
Curled up in misery, the 50-year-old man croaked out He had been hospitalized 10 days
a few words. “Still bad, doc.” earlier for a similar episode — agonizing, KELLIE JAEGER/DISCOVER
The man’s chief complaint had been nausea and unremitting vomiting that arrived out of
vomiting. His condition prompted my favorite doctor the blue. High-dose antiemetics hadn’t
trick: Take someone sick as the proverbial dog — retching, touched that bout either. The puzzling
defecating, cramping — pump in IV anti-nausea meds and a intractability had triggered a soup-to-
few bags of saline, steep a few hours, and voila! New person. nuts workup: abdominal CAT scan, diag-
Given the ubiquity of stomach viruses and food poisoning, we nostic testing for stool pathogens and a
see these unfortunate cases every day. Admittedly, bad things lab workup that measured everything
like sepsis and bowel obstruction can trigger vomiting. But for but copper levels. After two days, he had
such a dramatic symptom, it’s considered benign until proven cooled off. But now he was back.
otherwise.
LAID LOW
So when Brian didn’t get better, I took it personally. His blood “Aawrgh,” Brian moaned again. His
pressure also had spiked and wasn’t coming down as expected. faced swelled and his jaw worked in
slow motion like a python unhinging its
“I couldn’t take my blood pressure meds,” he explained, still mandible. Finally, he dry-heaved into the
clutching a large, condom-shaped vomit bag with a hard plastic bag, but that brought no relief.
rim. “Wouldn’t stay down.”
An hour later, the rest of his lab results
He was on his third round of IV antiemetics, a class of drugs were back. All were normal.
used to combat nausea and vomiting, as well as 2 liters of saline.
“Any change?” I asked, walking back
into his room.
“He’s laid low,” his wife answered.
“Let me reexamine you,” I said.
Eyes shut, Brian unclenched his arms,
unfolded his legs and rolled onto his
back. A civil engineer, he mostly worked
in an office, took occasional trips to
building sites, and never came in contact
with fumes. There were no space heaters
or kerosene lamps at home, so carbon
monoxide poisoning seemed far-fetched.
Plus, his wife was fine. I listened to his
heart and lungs, probed his abdomen
— still sore all over, but unchanged —
checked his skin for new rashes, but
found no clues. A fine-tooth-comb inter-
rogation regarding all possible exposures
and ingestions revealed nothing new.
Time to switch channels — this wasn’t
a stomach bug or food poisoning. Brain
tumors can cause vomiting, and so can
bizarre metabolic diseases like por-
phyria. The list is endless. But Brian was
a 50-year-old professional white male.
What else did that demographic suggest?
I stared at him, then asked as neutrally
as I could: “Have you ever smoked
marijuana?”
22 DISCOVERMAGAZINE .COM
VITAL SIGNS
“Every day,” he answered matter-of-factly, Cannabis holds that chronic stimulation of anti-vomiting
“for years.” use among receptors in the brainstem causes a rebound effect.
people over As to the syndrome’s on-and-off randomness,
“Ten years? More?” 50 has cannabinoids are stored in fat tissue, so weight
“Since my 20s, doc. Never gave me any trouble.” more than loss, alcohol use or fasting could trigger release
“Huh. I think your vomiting is caused by the doubled in of accumulated compounds. No one really knows.
marijuana.” the past What we do know is smoking marijuana daily for
“Don’t chemo patients use it to stop vomiting?” 10 years. years puts you at risk.
he asked.
“It’s a paradox, I’ll grant you,” I said. “But we’re None of that was of much immediate use to KELLIE JAEGER/DISCOVER
seeing this more and more.” Brian. My urgent worry was that all this retching
would rip his esophagus and he’d bleed out.
CANNABIS CULPRIT
Paradox or not, cannabis hyperemesis syndrome “The usual antiemetics don’t work with mari-
is here to stay. First described in 2004, recurrent juana vomiting,” I told him. “Sometimes Valium-
vomiting — painful, protracted and intractable like medications work better, so let’s try those.”
— is the hallmark. Striking at random, it cycles
as discrete episodes every few weeks or months. A quirk of marijuana hyperemesis is that hot
Daily marijuana use over a number of years is the showers or baths briefly make it better. Brian
common thread. remembered that, yes, he had been taking more
showers lately. Again, the mechanism is unclear,
With legalization cresting throughout the U.S., but marijuana may misdirect blood flow to the gut,
and marijuana more abundant and more potent, causing it to engorge; a hot shower diverts it back
cases of cannabis hyperemesis syndrome have to the skin.
spiked. About 10 percent of the adult population
used marijuana last year, double the rate of a decade Another puzzle is why no one had asked him
ago. Beyond that, the average THC content in about marijuana during his previous admission.
marijuana tripled from 1995 to 2014. Interestingly, But some studies show that it takes a half-dozen
the CBD content, thought to decrease pain and ER visits and up to four years of symptoms before
anxiety, has been halved, so the THC-to-CBD ratio nailing the hyperemesis diagnosis. Plus, asking
has soared sixfold. In Colorado, visits to emergency about marijuana use is tricky. Many people now
departments for hyperemesis syndrome doubled consider it as innocuous as morning coffee, so the
after legalization in 2009. Some estimates put the usual screening questions about drugs or medica-
number of those with hyperemesis in the U.S. tions may not be specific enough. On the other
between 2 million and 3 million each year. hand, asking point-blank risks sounding like a
pre-legalization reefer-madness dinosaur.
The cannabis plant contains some 100 different
cannabinoids, the chemicals found in cannabis, Demographics aren’t what they used to be, either.
so touting its effects as predictable is a triumph Cannabis use among people over 50 has more than
of head-shop marketing over biochemical reality. doubled in the past 10 years. These days, a 57-year-
Cannabinoid receptors abound in the central old is as likely to use marijuana as a 17-year-old.
nervous system. One theory on hyperemesis Eleven states have legalized recreational use, and
nearly 30 have decriminalized it. The wave of TCH-
24 D ISCOVERMAG A Z I N E .CO M tolerance is going tsunami.
I gave him a dose of IV Ativan, often used to treat
anxiety. After a while, that seemed to help, but my
unhappy patient was still cramping and nauseated.
“Probably a good idea to keep you overnight,” I
ventured. “This needs to stop. The reason you got
better in the hospital was no marijuana.”
“Is there a cure? Is it even worth asking?” Brian
muttered.
“Only one cure,” I said.
“I Googled it, honey,” Diane cut in. “You need
to quit.” D
Tony Dajer is an emergency medicine physician in New
York City. The cases described in Vital Signs are real, but
names and certain details have been changed.
INCREASE AFFECTION
Created by
Winnifred Cutler,
Ph.D. in biology from
U. of Penn, post-doc
Stanford. Co-
discovered human
pheromones in 1986
(Time 12/1/86; and
Newsweek 1/12/87)
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PIECE OF MIND
BY AGATA BOXE
Confessions of I always of burnout. The issue began threatening
a Recovering spent hours my sanity soon after I immigrated to
Perfectionist preparing the U.S. in my mid-20s. Growing inner
for every turmoil has accumulated over the 10
TAKE IT FROM A SEASONED PRO (AND MENTAL HEALTH lecture, years since my move. So, I recently
EXPERTS): YOU ARE NOT ALONE. BUT YOUR LOFTY, activity and decided to take a painful peek into my
SELF-IMPOSED STANDARDS MAY BE ISOLATING YOU. discussion psyche to confront the bad, the ugly and
to maintain the imperfect.
On a rainy January afternoon, I walked down the control
hallways of a huge building and entered a grim, and avoid OBSESSING OVER
windowless room. A frazzled adjunct college instruc- anything IMPERFECTIONS
tor, I was about to interview for a full-time faculty unexpected. I called Gordon Flett, a psychologist
position. I took a seat at the conference table and faced the search at York University in Toronto who has
committee. Soon, the nine members began firing questions at me. studied and theorized about the inner KELLIE JAEGER/DISCOVER
I tackled each without hesitation, until they asked about a class I workings of a perfectionist’s mind. He
had taught that hadn’t gone as planned. I started scrambling for painted a bleak picture: Many perfec-
an answer. The truth was that I always spent hours preparing for tionists spend a lot of time worrying and
every lecture, activity and discussion to maintain control and brooding, immersed in a secret dialogue
avoid anything unexpected. It’s part of my all-consuming quest with themselves about needing to be
for perfection. flawless. “When they’re falling short of
perfection, they’re constantly ruminat-
Besides making me fumble through a job interview, this ing about it,” he says.
tendency has driven me to fret over the tiniest mistakes, waste
ridiculous amounts of time procrastinating and stress to the point Flett has even developed a scale
to measure “mistake rumination” —
mulling over something one has done
wrong — and examined how it relates
to perfectionism. In a series of three
26 DISCOVERMAG A ZINE .COM
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PIECE OF MIND
studies involving more than 970 people, Flett and his The voice Perfectionists tend to feel self-
colleagues asked participants to think about the last driving me conscious about everything they do.
time they made a major mistake. The people then toward “That leads to a lot of self-reflection,
rated how much they had agonized about the event. perfection and for some, to feeling like they’re an
echoed in impostor,” Flett says, “that they’re not as
The researchers identified a link between my mind. good as others.”
amplified mistake rumination and two flavors of No amount
perfectionism. One entailed having an internal drive of wine, nor FEELING PHONY
for perfection; the other involved believing others comforting Indeed, a body of research has shown
require you to be impeccable — which may or may nudges that perfectionism often goes hand
not coincide with reality. The results of Flett’s study, from my in hand with impostor syndrome —
published in 2019 in the Journal of Psychoeducational cats, would doubting your accomplishments and
Assessment, also revealed a strong connection silence fearing you will be sniffed out as a
between overthinking past mistakes and an uptick the self- fraud. Kevin Cokley, a psychologist
in incessant thoughts urging a person to be perfect inflicted at the University of Texas at Austin,
— what some call perfectionistic automatic thoughts. shame. examined feelings of intellectual
phoniness, self-esteem and two kinds
I’ve struggled with both mistake rumination and of perfectionism — adaptive and KELLIE JAEGER/DISCOVER
thoughts demanding flawlessness. I once took up an maladaptive — in 468 people. Adaptive
obsessive hobby: inspecting my past job applications perfectionists simply have high
for errors. One night, armed with a glass of cabernet personal standards, while maladaptive
and accompanied by my three cats, I pored over ones set a bar that they believe is out
the cover letter I had submitted to the nine-person of reach. (Some researchers, includ-
committee. Then I found it. A missing comma, star- ing Flett, contend that no form of
ing me down in the first paragraph. I beat myself up perfectionism is healthy. But there are
over it for days, panicking that someone might have certainly shades of severity.)
noticed. The voice driving me toward perfection Cokley found a relationship between impostor
reverberated in my mind. No amount of wine, nor syndrome and indicators of maladaptive perfec-
comforting nudges from my furry assistants, would tionism, but not the adaptive form. The link grew
silence the self-inflicted shame. stronger if a person’s self-esteem was low, according
to the findings published in 2018 in Personality
and Individual Differences. “Even if an individual is
competent, smart and highly accomplished, having
these maladaptive perfectionism tendencies can lead
to one feeling like an impostor,” Cokley says.
My struggles with maladaptive perfectionism and
impostor syndrome escalated when I was a journal-
ism graduate student in New York. During my first
week, a classmate asked where I was from, upon
hearing my foreign accent. I said I was from Poland
and he asked if I knew any jokes about Polish people.
I swallowed my discomfort, but the interaction
lingered deep in my subconscious. It chipped away at
my self-esteem. It made me feel like I was a joke.
And so I tried to wipe out my otherness through
perfection. I obsessed about crafting flawless stories
for class, but the fear of not hitting my unreasonable
standards stalled my writing process. It sometimes
made me miss deadlines — procrastination, research
has shown, is also tied to perfectionism. It also
caused me to regularly burst into tears in crowded
subway cars. Grades below an A-minus often sent me
into despair. I labored over schoolwork seven days a
week, which paved a road to workaholism.
28 DISCOVERMAGA ZINE .COM
LONELY AND BURNED OUT
Ironically, perfectionism has a way of distancing
people who want to fit in. For me, it made me lonely.
In one 2016 study of more than 270 people, published
in Personality and Individual Differences, research-
ers looked at participants’ levels of neuroticism,
social anxiety and perfectionism. The investigators
concluded that people who worried about being seen
as less than perfect and those who did not like to
admit their shortcomings were more prone to feeling
uneasy about interpersonal interactions. Unpublished
data from other work revealed that the ensuing
isolation may lead to increased loneliness among
perfectionists. They avoid other people, says Flett,
who co-authored the study. “That can set them up for
not getting the kind of support they need when other
problems arise.”
I’ve definitely dodged interactions due to my
perfectionism. I even became a freelance writer so
I could work alone. At home, only my cats judge
me. I eventually crawled out of my hermitlike shell
and started teaching classes as an adjunct, but still
hesitated to make friends. When I later embarked on
a search for a full-time academic job, I lacked social
support and paid an exorbitant emotional price for it.
I felt alone in the seemingly endless cycle of applying,
interviewing and getting rejected.
Living in the shadow of your own unreachable
standards can exhaust you. In 2015, an analysis
of more than 40 studies in Personality and Social
Psychology Review linked perfectionistic concerns to
burnout. The exhaustion arises when people worry
about making mistakes, fear negative evaluation by
others and see a mismatch between their own tower-
ing expectations and performance. “When you’re high
in perfectionism, even trivial things can be stressful,”
says lead study author Andrew Hill, a psychologist at
York St John University in the U.K.
My burnout reached its peak toward the end of
that academic job search season. I was teaching four
adjunct classes at two different colleges and still
working as a full-time freelance writer. I got the silent
treatment from one search committee, and a rejection
email from a similar promising opportunity. I had
one remaining scheduled interview, at a lush green
campus adorned with a fountain, and could not sleep
the night before the big day. Then it finally happened:
I was too tired to be perfect. I no longer attempted
to hide my flaws. I took the chance to be myself and
talked about how I tried to manage my time but
sometimes failed.
It worked. I got the job. D
Agata Boxe is a New York-based freelance writer.
SPECIAL SECTION
ARE WE
ALONE?
WHAT SIX DECADES OF THE
SEARCH FOR EXTRATERRESTRIAL
INTELLIGENCE CAN TEACH US.
SDECORET/SHUTTERSTOCK INSIDE
• LOOKING FOR SIGNS
• SCIENCE ... OR JUST
FICTION?
HUMANS HAVE, FOR MILLENNIA,
LOOKED TO THE NIGHT SKIES AND
SEEN THEMSELVES, THEIR GODS,
THEIR PAST AND THEIR FUTURE.
But they have not yet seen their neighbors. It’s not for a lack of trying.
Sixty years ago, the official quest for such answers, aptly named the
Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI), launched in Green Bank,
West Virginia. Young astronomer Frank Drake trained a radio telescope on
two sunlike stars, looking for hints of intelligent life. Drake’s pilot survey
of a few months, called Project Ozma, had been inspired by physicists
Giuseppe Cocconi and Philip Morrison, who published an article in 1959
in the journal Nature suggesting that if alien civilizations communicated
long distance, they’d probably use radio waves, arguably the most
efficient method of sending communications between stars at the time.
Drake’s instruments unfortunately detected only the static of the
universe itself. In the following decades, SETI expanded. NASA
ran the High Resolution Microwave Survey, a two-pronged
alien hunt that deeply analyzed nearby stars and more
shallowly surveyed the whole sky. When the agency
canceled that initiative, the SETI Institute started its similar
Project Phoenix. Harvard University and the University of
California, Berkeley, have run their own radio initiatives for
many years. Most recently, Russian billionaire Yuri Milner
funded a 10-year project called Breakthrough Listen.
Scientists also diversified their strategies while widening
the swath of the signals they search for. They’ve cast about
for alien engineering projects, seeking, for example, evidence of
Dyson spheres, star-enveloping devices that capture extrasolar energy.
Still, nothing.
The universe, though, holds so many stars, radiating energy among
so many frequencies of light, and emitting so many kinds of signals, that
those decades of research represent a drop in the bucket.
So, although some experts conclude that humanity is alone, other
scientists say we haven’t looked hard enough to make a pronouncement,
one way or the other. As SETI celebrates six decades of searching,
we explore physicist Stephen Webb’s struggle to come to terms with
humanity’s potentially singular existence, as well as the novel strategies
astronomer Avi Loeb is proposing to prove naysayers wrong — or at
least demonstrate that this effort warrants a sustained and serious
commitment. — SARAH SCOLES AND STEVE NADIS
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 31
COVER
STORY
OUT-THERE IDEAS
MAY POINT THE
WAY TO E.T.
LOOKING for
SIGNS
BY STEVE NADIS
32 DISCOVERMAG A ZINE .COM
SPECIAL SECTION
Astronomers are
looking far beyond
our familiar view of
the moon and sun
for evidence of life
in the universe.
The Vera
C. Rubin
Observatory
(left) is expected
to start
searching the
skies in 2022. An
artist’s concept
(right) shows
the TRAPPIST-1
planetary
system, with its
seven Earth-
sized, temperate
exoplanets
orbiting an
ultra-cool dwarf
star. It’s unusual
to have so many
planets in the
habitable zone.
LIMITS search space. Surveys in optical wavelengths have been much PREVIOUS SPREAD: NASA IMAGES. TOP LEFT: RUBIN OBS/NSF/AURA. ABOVE: NASA/JPL/CALTECH
DON’T SIT less extensive. For any new technology we develop, Loeb says,
WELL WITH we should consider whether, somewhere, an alien civilization
AVI LOEB. might have developed it, too, possibly leaving behind some
detectable traces. “As our technology improves, that can help us
The Harvard University astrophysicist doesn’t imagine things we haven’t imagined before and explore things
like being told that a problem is too difficult we haven’t searched for before.”
to solve or not worth pursuing. Nor does he
like hearing that the search for intelligent life When it comes to imagination, Loeb — cited in The New
beyond Earth is pointless, since, as some argue, York Times “for his creative and prolific attempts to understand
we’re clearly alone in the universe. The numbers the … universe” — appears to have no shortage. Nor, would it
suggest otherwise. seem, is he lacking in productivity. For over two decades, he has
turned out an average of two academic papers each month, in
Loeb quickly reels some off to me over the phone (hands- addition to regular essays. He’s director of Harvard’s Institute of
free) during a drive home from work: About 25 billion stars, Theory and Computation, a member of the President’s Council
roughly one-quarter of those that reside in the Milky Way, lie of Advisors on Science and Technology, founding director of
in a habitable zone. He rounds that down to an even 10 billion Harvard’s Black Hole Initiative and chair of the Breakthrough
to keep the calculations simple. “And then there are about a Starshot Advisory Committee — an endeavor aimed, among
trillion galaxies like the Milky Way,” he says, “which means other things, at sending miniature spacecraft to other stars.
there are about 1022 [10 billion trillion] planets in the observable
universe that could potentially host life as we know it.” In other Florida Tech physicist Manasvi Lingam described his
words, searches for extraterrestrial life have barely scratched the collaboration with Loeb during a postdoctoral fellowship as
surface. “As in other areas of exploratory science,” Loeb says, “exhilarating.” From 2017 to 2019, Lingam and Loeb wrote
“we should investigate thoroughly before making sweeping 25 research papers and a forthcoming book, Extraterrestrial
pronouncements.” Life: From Biosignatures to Technosignatures, that provides a
wide-ranging discussion of SETI techniques. “With Avi, there’s
Most of the searching so far, he adds, has been in the radio
range, where scientists have examined a tiny fraction of the
possible frequencies in an equally tiny fraction of the possible
34 DISCOVERMAGAZINE .COM
always a fast turnaround time,” Lingam says. “We always try outer space, Loeb and Turner started to wonder whether our
to look for left-field ideas that are nonetheless testable.” telescopes could pick up light from an alien city. After some
Loeb is fearless because some of his out-there ideas have quick calculations, they determined that the Hubble Space
been publicly rebuked by other astronomers, says Penn State Telescope (HST) would be able to detect light pollution from a
astronomer Jason Wright. city on the outer edges of the solar system, well beyond Pluto,
But Loeb is rarely deterred by disapproving remarks, saying and new, more advanced telescopes could extend that range
skepticism “can be a self-fulfilling prophecy.” It’s far better to considerably farther.
look, he says, than to assume there’s nothing to be seen. That Although there aren’t any known planets lying in the solar
attitude is apparently shared by NASA. It recently gave Loeb and system’s periphery, Loeb and Turner have come up with a
others the first SETI-related grant in over 30 years that specifi- method for determining whether a newly discovered light
cally supports innovative search strategies. Here are some of the source is natural or artificial. Their technique is based on the
unconventional notions he and his colleagues have advanced principle that light drops off in intensity according to the square
for enlarging the scope of SETI, and perhaps of the distance traveled.
catching a glimpse of E.T. in the process. “ABOUT 25 Suppose we measure the brightness of a radi-
ant object and repeat that measurement after
FAR FROM THE CITY LIGHTS BILLION STARS, the object has moved twice as far away from us,
Loeb and Princeton University astronomer ROUGHLY ONE- heading away from the sun. If the object was
Edwin Turner are kindred spirits who enjoy QUARTER OF natural, such as a previously unknown planet
batting around speculative ideas. “The THOSE THAT or asteroid, and merely reflecting light from the
conservative impulse that serves science well in RESIDE IN THE sun, its brightness would decrease by a factor
some ways doesn’t serve us well when it comes MILKY WAY, LIE of 16: Its brightness (as measured from Earth)
to generating hypotheses,” says Turner. While IN A HABITABLE would have dropped off fourfold during the
touring Abu Dhabi a decade ago, and learning ZONE. light’s journey from the sun to the object (since
that Dubai is so bright it can be seen from two squared equals four) and another fourfold
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 35
The James Webb Telescope, with its optical
portion shown at left, could help detect signs
of alien pollution by looking for molecules that
indicate serious contamination.
during its journey back to us. If, on the other hand, the object concept. But the HST has already started
was a luminous spacecraft, its brightness would drop off only examining the atmospheres of planets
by a factor of four since it produces its own light rather than around other stars, called exoplanets.
reflecting it from the sun. And its successor, the James Webb Space
Telescope, which is scheduled for launch
If our measurements of a distant light source indicate a four- in 2021, will soon probe atmospheres of
fold drop in intensity, we should not immediately start worrying even more distant planets, looking for
about an alien invasion, says Turner. “But we will want to point biological signatures of life.
other telescopes there and … try to figure out what’s going on.”
In 2014, Loeb and two collaborators,
POLLUTION AS THE SOLUTION TO DILUTION Henry Lin and Gonzalo Gonzalez Abad,
In 1990, as the Galileo spacecraft flew past a planet in our solar decided to flip the switch: Instead of look-
system, its instruments found evidence of an atmosphere rich ing for signs of life, they suggested looking
in oxygen and methane — signs that the scientific team, led for signs of death, or at least serious
by Carl Sagan, deemed “strongly suggestive of life.” The planet contamination. “Anthropogenic pollution
in this case was Earth, and the exercise was mainly a proof of could be used as a novel biosignature for
intelligent life,” wrote the Harvard team,
which proposed looking for two chloro-
fluorocarbon (CFC) gases, tetrafluoro-
methane and trichlorofluoromethane, that
can survive tens of thousands of years and
cannot be synthesized by known natural
processes. The James Webb telescope
could spot the presence of these molecules
in an exoplanet’s atmosphere, the research-
ers concluded, if concentrations were 10
times current terrestrial levels. Observing high levels of these
long-lived pollutants and no signs of life-sustaining molecules
like oxygen, Loeb and his coauthors said, “might serve as an
additional warning to the ‘intelligent’ life here on Earth about the
risks of industrial pollution.”
THE EDGE EFFECT
A 2005 paper in the journal Astrobiology by MIT astronomer
Sara Seager and three other researchers identified a distinct
feature of an Earthlike planet covered with large stretches of
vegetation. Plants appear green because they reflect light in the
green part of the spectrum, but at higher wavelengths, between
the red and infrared range, reflectance shoots up dramatically.
A graph of reflectance versus wavelength shows a steep rise at a
wavelength of 700 nanometers that creates a pronounced “red
ARE WE THERE YET? 99.959 % How much searching astronomers still have to NASA/CHRIS GUNN
You wouldn’t dip a glass in the ocean, come up with no fish inside and do to cover 1 million stars.
conclude, “No fish exist.” Astronomer Jill Tarter often says that’s where
humans are with SETI. To fill enough glasses to get a good sense, 0.041 % How much of that search they have
researchers want to look at 1 million stars within 1,000 light-years of
Earth and scan all the frequencies between 1 and 10 gigahertz. When completed, for all radio SETI projects.
they’ve done that, maybe they’ll have caught a fish or two — or will
at least be able to say more about how many swim in the cosmic sea.
Here’s how close they’ve gotten, proportionally, to that goal.
36 DISCOVERMAGA ZINE .COM
MEASURING FREQUENCIES
ROEN KELLY/DISCOVER edge” — a feature, though not evident to the human eye, that’s Although these photovoltaic arrays would undergo wear and
readily observable by telescopes with spectral sensitivity. tear, Lingam and Loeb wrote in the Monthly Notices of the Royal
Astronomical Society, “they can remain functional for a duration
In 2017, Lingam and Loeb got to wondering: What if an of time that is not insignificant by astrophysical standards
exoplanet was covered by vast tracts of photovoltaic arrays and would thus represent genuine extraterrestrial artifacts.” If
instead of boundless greenery? Massive structures like this, artifacts are someday spotted, they write, it could be an early, if
Lingam and Loeb reasoned, would produce an artificial spectral not the first, example of a new field: “interstellar archaeology.”
edge analogous to the red edge caused by vegetation, though
occurring at different wavelengths (depending, of course, on THE MYSTERY OF FRBS
the materials making up the arrays). They calculated where the The first fast radio burst (FRB), an intense blast of radio waves
spectral edge would lie for silicon-based solar cells — a reason- emanating from outside our galaxy and lasting just a few mil-
able choice given silicon’s abundance in the universe — and liseconds, was spotted in 2007. Astronomers have since seen
those composed of other widely used photovoltaic ingredients, more than 100 others. “The popular view is that these bursts
including gallium arsenide and perovskite. Future telescopes, come from young neutron stars with very strong magnetic
such as WFIRST, set to launch in the mid-2020s, would be fields,” says Loeb. But that supposition has not been confirmed.
capable of detecting a “silicon edge,” should it exist. And there may not be a single source, he adds, because there
are at least two types of bursts — a small minority that repeat
Lingam and Loeb believe that such an analysis would be and most that do not.
particularly powerful when applied to exoplanets that are
“tidally locked,” meaning they keep the same orientation with Lingam and Loeb offered a provocative solution to the puzzle:
respect to the parent star and therefore have permanently light Maybe some of the FRBs are artificial. If that were the case,
and dark sides. An inhabited planet equipped with large-scale what would be the purpose of such incredibly powerful bursts?
solar-electric generation could illuminate the dark side, and In a 2017 paper in Astrophysical Journal Letters, Lingam and
other installations might release significant amounts of waste Loeb raise two possibilities: It could be a beacon to broadcast
heat on the cooler, darker side — developments that could be the presence of an alien civilization, which they deem “rather
visible from afar and might remain visible after an alien civiliza- implausible.” Or, it could power large spaceships tugged by even
tion has gone extinct or migrated to another home.
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 37
The hypothetical MARC WARD/SHUTTERSTOCK
Dyson sphere, a
giant structure
that wraps
around a star and
capitalizes on its
energy, is one
alien contraption
yet to be found.
38 DISCOVERMAGA ZINE .COM
larger (in area, not in mass) light sails. “The optimal frequency features that don’t match those of asteroids or comets: For one
for powering the light sail is shown to be similar to the detected thing, it’s extremely elongated, about 10 times longer than it is
FRB frequencies,” they write — a fact that, when combined wide. The object’s acceleration is also unexplained, as there’s no
with other technical arguments, could “lend some credence to sign of outgassing, propulsion caused by the release of gas that’s
the possibility that FRBs might be artificial in origin.” normally seen in comets. Loeb and Shmuel Bialy of Harvard
Naysayers might dismiss this, insisting that “extraordinary suggested that ‘Oumuamua was being pushed and sped up
claims require extraordinary evidence,” Loeb notes. “I say that by solar radiation, in which case it must be shaped more like
they require evidence, but why should they be held to a higher a thin pancake than a cigar as was commonly assumed. That
plane? We should not automatically dismiss explanations just raised the possibility that ‘Oumuamua “might be a lightsail of
because they seem exotic to some people.” artificial origin” — a case they made in a November 2018 paper
in Astrophysical Journal Letters.
SEARCHING FOR ARTIFACTS In a July 2019 article in Nature Astronomy, an international
“When exploring habitable worlds around other stars, we team of 14 astronomers reached a different conclusion,
might … find planets with burnt-up surfaces, abandoned contending that ‘Oumuamua is a natural object, despite its
mega-structures or planetary atmospheres rich with poisonous peculiar properties.
gases and no sign of life,” Loeb has written. One might also see In the meantime, a second interstellar visitor, Comet
an extensive network of unnatural platforms or
satellites orbiting another star — perhaps part of
a hypothetical energy-gathering enclosure called
a Dyson sphere.
Something like this, if sufficiently large, could
be spotted by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet
Survey Satellite (TESS), which looks for dips in
the brightness of a star caused by a planet passing
in front of it. TESS could also detect dips caused
by the passage of giant artificial mega-structures.
Officials announced in October 2019 that TESS
would collaborate with Breakthrough Listen — a
$100 million SETI initiative, the largest and most
generously funded in the field’s history.
Listen’s ground-based telescopes would focus
on potentially habitable planets identified by Interstellar visitor ‘Oumuamua has defied easy classification — Loeb has suggested it’s an
TESS. Loeb cites the example of Tabby’s Star: artificial lightsail — but a team of astronomers concluded in 2019 that it’s a natural object.
Discovered in 2016, two years before the TESS
launch, it exhibited a peculiar dimming pattern, prompting Borisov, was discovered in 2019, whipping around the sun
some to speculate that it was surrounded by some kind of alien at 110,000 mph. This object is “clearly not artificial,” Loeb
structure. It turns out that our view was blocked by an oddly says, “because it looks like any other comet we’ve seen before.”
shaped disk of dust, Loeb says, but that’s the kind of irregularity But there soon should be many more interlopers to look at.
TESS scientists would be looking for. The Pan-STARRS observatory has given us the capacity to
survey the entire sky, and the Vera C. Rubin Observatory,
SEARCHING FOR INTERSTELLAR VISITORS expected to begin an even broader survey in 2022, “will
On Oct. 19, 2017, an astronomer using Hawaii’s Pan-STARRS be much more sensitive,” Loeb says, “a bigger and better
telescope discovered an object moving past the sun at telescope that could potentially detect an ‘Oumuamua-type
196,000 miles per hour, so fast that it almost surely originated object every month.”
from outside the solar system. The object, dubbed ‘Oumuamua When it comes to SETI, evidence ultimately carries the day,
— Hawaiian for “first scout from a distant place” Loeb insists. “We should collect evidence without
— was initially classified as an asteroid and prejudice, without assuming we know the truth
AUNTSPRAY/SHUTTERSTOCK then a comet and more recently as a chunk of “WE SHOULD in advance, and see what we learn.” On the
hydrogen ice. other hand, he says, we should be open-minded
COLLECT and allow for some risk-taking in our pursuit
But Loeb has analyzed all of these ideas EVIDENCE of that evidence. As the physicists Giuseppe
and finds that they still leave some questions WITHOUT Cocconi and Philip Morrison wrote in 1959,
unanswered. He doesn’t see a plausible way that PREJUDICE ... one year before SETI began: “The probability of
a “large hydrogen iceberg” could form. And AND SEE WHAT success is difficult to estimate, but if we never
even if it did, he says, an object like that WE LEARN.” search, the chance of success is zero.” D
could not survive its interstellar journey to the
solar system because hydrogen evaporates so Steve Nadis is a contributing editor to Discover.
readily. Furthermore, ‘Oumuamua has unusual
— Avi Loeb, astronomer
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 39
COVER
STORY
LIFE
BEYOND
MIGHT
NOT
EXIST –
OR WE JUST
DON’T KNOW
HOW TO
FIND IT.
science ...
or just
fiction?
BY SARAH SCOLES
40 DISCOVERMAGAZINE .COM
SPECIAL SECTION
This artist’s concept
shows exoplanet Kepler-
1649c orbiting around its
host red dwarf star. The
exoplanet is in its star’s
habitable zone — the
distance where liquid
water could exist on the
planet’s surface. After
searching for signs of
alien life for nearly 60
years, some astronomers
wonder whether it’s really
out there.
The early days of the space program (here, During that same childhood period, he was immersing PREVIOUS SPREAD: NASA/AMES RESEARCH CENTER/DANIEL RUTTER. THIS PAGE, TOP LEFT: NASA
Surveyor 1 launches in 1966) inspired Stephen himself in actual science fiction, in addition to this nonfictional
Webb and others like him to look to the stars and reality that was so cool it seemed fake. He devoured books by
wonder what — or who — might be out there. canonical authors like Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov. In
the universe-webs the writers spun, humans rocketed around
WHEN and interacted with interplanetary species. That lens shaped
PHYSICIST his view of everything — and everyone — in space. He came of
and age, he says, with “that idea that the galaxy contains weird and
author wonderful life-forms that one day we would go out and meet.”
Stephen
Webb Webb held on to that idea tightly — until, that is, as a young
was a kid man studying physics, he read an August 1984 article in the
magazine Asimov’s Science Fiction, written by geologist and
in the 1960s, humans were finally reach- science fiction author Stephen L. Gillett. It was called simply
ing beyond Earth. Satellites orbited the “The Fermi Paradox,” and it proposed something Webb had
planet. Rockets blasted people into space. never considered: If the universe is so big, it likely produced
Astronauts walked on the moon. And in intelligent life on other planets. Some of those lives must have
the distance, Mars, with its red soil and built spaceships. Even at relatively slow speeds, given enough
hints of ancient water, titillated imagina- time, they’d disperse across the galaxy, just as humans had
tions and beckoned Earthlings onward. across the globe. And if that’s the case, as physicist Enrico Fermi
“I grew up — I guess you’d say — in a
science fictional world,” says Webb, a bald
British man whose alternately arched
and furrowed eyebrows can tell a story of
excitement and confusion almost as well
as words do.
42 DISCOVERMAG A ZINE .COM
Whether it’s staring
up at the Milky Way
or studying images
of Mars (below),
humans have long
wondered about
life beyond Earth.
FROM TOP: ANON MUENPROM; NASA/JPL famously wondered, where is everybody? Why haven’t we met and the Problem of Extraterrestrial Life. In it, Webb argues with
any extraterrestrials? himself, vacillating between his childhood vision of a populated
universe and that metaphorical sledgehammer. Maybe SETI
“It just hit me with the force of a sledgehammer that all these scientists have not found any extraterrestrials because none
things that science fiction, and science as well, had told me exist. Other scientists hold up the possibility that extraterrestrial
to expect — that one day soon we would make contact with smarts don’t resemble ours, or that scientists are so stuck on
aliens, and that maybe we’d go out and have all these Star Trek Earth’s current technology that they’re blinded to more exotic
adventures with them — maybe that was all wrong,” says Webb. possibilities. Perhaps if those same researchers set their agendas
Just as Asimov had given, Asimov had taken away, and Webb right, the coming set of 60 years will help
found himself in a new and unfamiliar uni- earthlings figure out which hypothesis — and
verse. The assault to his preconceptions needled which vision of the cosmos — is correct.
him, but he liked challenges, and he took this
one on. “I got into the habit of starting to collect THE MODERNITY PROBLEM
solutions to the so-called Fermi paradox,” “If you go outside and look up on a clear night,
he says. In notebooks and desk drawers and, it’s almost impossible to believe that we are
eventually, computer files, he amassed a set of alone,” says Webb. In England, he doesn’t get
explanations for where “everybody” might be. many clear nights. But when he does, and he
The pile of potentials became a book in 2002: If steps outside and sets his gaze skyward, he sees
the Universe Is Teeming With Aliens … Where the same constellations dot-to-dotting that he
Is Everybody? 75 Solutions to the Fermi Paradox
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 43
The discovery of
Kepler-186f, shown in
this artist’s concept,
confirmed that Earth-
size planets exist in
the habitable zones
of other stars, and
signaled a significant
step closer to finding
a world similar to
Earth.
did in the Apollo era. He still feels the pull of his childhood Many of Webb’s collected hypotheses suggest that aliens
ideas. “There’s something innate in this feeling that we cannot live where we’re not looking, talk how we’re not listening or
be alone,” he says. resemble something we haven’t sought out. Maybe the aliens
And that’s part of why he started collecting the Fermi solu- like to send messages or signals using neutrinos, nearly massless
tions and setting them down in sentences. With a doctorate in and barely-there particles that don’t interact with normal
theoretical particle physics from the University of Manchester, matter much, or tachyons, hypothetical particles that fly faster
he was equipped to find, review and evaluate the many ideas than light. Maybe they use the more-conventional radio or
in his scientific realm. Having published eight optical transmissions but at frequencies, or in a
science books with academic presses and having “THE ALIENS, form, astronomers haven’t sought out. Maybe a NASA/AMES/SETI INSTITUTE/JPL-CALTECH
been invited to give a 2018 TED talk about his signal is sitting on data servers already, escap-
research, Webb is a well-recognized figure in SHOULD ing notice. Maybe the extraterrestrials subtly
the landscape of SETI. “I didn’t enter [the book] THEY EXIST, alter the emissions of their stable stars, or the
with a particular ax to grind,” he says. “And, in MIGHT BE blip-blip-blip pulsations of variable stars. Maybe
fact, I think I wrote it to kind of explore this in USING they put something big — a megamall, a disk
my own mind.” Webb’s book — and the pile of TECHNOLOGY of dust — in front of their sun to block some of
papers before that — explores dozens of Fermi HUMANS WON’T its light, in a kind of anti-beacon. Maybe their
solutions, under section headers like “They Are INVENT FOR skies are cloudy, and they consequently don’t
(or Were) Here” and “They Exist, but We Have MILLENNIA, care about astronomy or space exploration. Or
Yet to See or Hear From Them.” — hear Webb out — perhaps they drive UFOs,
44 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM IF AT ALL.
PAULO AFONSO/SHUTTERSTOCK meaning they are here but not in a form that scientists typically The Allen Telescope Array in Hat Creek, California, is a 42-dish radio
recognize, investigate and take seriously. telescope that is a project of the SETI Institute.
In 2015, Webb published a second edition of the book, any given time, that aliens might have discovered technology
because in the intervening years, others had postulated even similar to whatever our latest-greatest innovations are. In
more ways of seeing a signal. His favorites involve phenomena the 19th century, canals transformed terrestrial cities. And
astronomers have studied closely only in the past decade or astronomer Percival Lowell popularized the idea that little green
so. Maybe aliens could “spin up” millisecond pulsars — dead people had constructed canals on Mars. After humans mastered
stars as dense as atomic nuclei that spin hundreds of times per radio communication, astronomers suddenly thought the aliens
second — giving them an energy bump like Hot Wheels cars might, too. Ditto, lasers. Ditto, gravitational waves.
passing over booster tracks. Or perhaps the cosmic cousins
prefer to communicate using gravitational waves, the ripples in The aliens, should they exist, might be using technology
spacetime that earthlings just learned how to detect in 2015. humans won’t invent for millennia, if at all. And while scientists
do sometimes see past Earth’s technological thresholds, they
There’s a problem with these ideas, though: They suffer (and the rest of us) are notoriously bad at imagining where our
from a modernity bias, a term historians and political scholars own technology is going (did anyone predict Uber would come
sometimes use. It means that we tend to conceive of society’s out of ARPANET?). How, then, could it be possible to imagine
current state as both inevitable and significant — the most where alien technology might go?
significant — and view all else through this lens. “We tend to
look at, to think about, what civilizations might do in terms of Anthropologist Michael Oman-Reagan, who studies SETI
our understanding of technology,” Webb says. We imagine, at scientists’ culture at Memorial University in Newfoundland,
thinks modernity bias might be keeping scientists from seeing
an alien fingerprint right in front of them. “It might look like
nature or magic, or any number of things,” he says. “It might
look like the background processes of the universe. It might
look like physics.”
MAYBE WE’RE ALONE
Webb thinks that maybe there is no right thing. It’s an idea he
lays out in the book’s most interesting section, with the scariest
subtitle: “They Don’t Exist.” There is no “everybody.” “It is just
us,” he says, almost trying the idea on. The notion, he says, can
feel as cold as the universe itself.
As he gathered his 75 solutions, Webb kept flipping between
that intuitive emotion and what he realized his forebrain truly
thought. “We’re just a rare fluke,” he says, sounding resigned.
Astronomers often suggest that’s unlikely. There are so many
exoplanets, possibly multiple trillions just in our galaxy, and
there are 2 million to 8 million (depending on which biologist
you ask) species on Earth inhabiting even the most hostile
places — from the cooling tanks of nuclear reactors to super-
salty lakes to the crushing depths of the way-down ocean. Given
the size of the universe and the sprawl of potentially habitable
real estate, sheer statistics mean life has to exist. At least, that’s
DECEMBER 2020 . DISCOVER 45
NASA’s Mars rover
Perseverance,
launched in July and
expected to land
on the planet in
February, will seek
out signs of ancient
microbial life.
the traditional line of thinking. “Ultimately, the argument they a winning evolutionary strategy,” Webb points out. After all, NASA/JPL-CALTECH
are putting forth is that there are, for the sake of argument, some of the oldest species on Earth, including cyanobacteria
a trillion places that life could get going on, and that’s a big (3.5 million years old), coelacanths (65 million years old) and
number,” Webb says. crocodiles (55 million years old), are not smart by human stan-
dards. They definitely wouldn’t be able build a radio telescope
There’s a problem with that logic, though: “We don’t know in or wonder if they were alone in the universe. Nevertheless, they
this context whether a trillion is a big number or not,” he says. persist, arguably better than we have.
That depends on statistical calculations.
Oman-Reagan’s research examines these kinds of assump-
Here’s how the statistical calculations work: To get intelligent tions, the ones scientists often bring without even realizing it.
life, you need solar systems with home stars that aren’t too The conception of humans as the most intelligent and capable
violent. Those systems have to have habitable planets. Those species on Earth? That might just be our ego talking. “The most
planets have to go from empty to alive somehow, in a process advanced species on Earth might be the one that does the least
called abiogenesis. Once life arises, it has to stay alive. Then, harm, not the most,” he says. To that end, he believes SETI
it not only has to evolve into something smart, but the smart would do well to abandon the idea that technological civiliza-
things also have to develop technology. No one knows how tions are superior, the progressive and predictable result of
likely any of those things is. Each if-then represents a kind of evolution. While the scientists themselves might not necessarily
turning point, a transition from one phase to another. “They put their thought process that way, the underlying idea is nev-
don’t need to be hugely rare transitions, if there are many of ertheless that advanced technology will result from long-term
them, for ‘a trillion’ to actually appear quite small,” says Webb. evolution. These scientists recognize that not all “smart” beings
may use technology like humans do, but the belief remains that
Many biologists, for instance, think abiogenesis is much more life trends toward increasingly complex tool-use.
difficult than many astronomers think, and no one knows how
it happened on Earth. While some scientists suspect that life That’s part of the traditional definition of cultural evolution,
inevitably progresses toward complication and intelligence, a social-science term. But it’s “not clear at all” that when a
that’s a human-centric bias. “We don’t know if intelligence is
46 DISCOVERMAGAZINE .COM
civilization in space?” he says. “To me it makes no sense. Just
being smart isn’t enough.”
If social scientists were in charge of the search, he says, it
might progress in a different direction. Such scientists do get
invited to SETI workshops and conferences, and to contribute
chapters to scholarly books about the search. But these religion
researchers, historians, anthropologists and communications
experts occupy the fringes of the field.
Webb thinks that may not matter. Chances are, he believes,
there are no civilizations to contact, and so perhaps our efforts
to undo assumptions, confront biases, and expand our intel-
lectual horizons don’t affect the end result: silence, emptiness.
Researchers at the University of Oxford’s Future of Humanity
Institute recently quantified that feeling. To calculate how many
intelligent, communicative civilizations may be in our galaxy,
scientists usually use the so-called Drake equation. It’s a way of
mathifying the evolutionary progression of a civilization from
nothingness to life, first introduced in 1961 by astrophysicist
Frank Drake, with each transition representing a term in an
equation. The problem with these terms, though, is that we
don’t know what number to assign them: The possibilities have
a range of uncertainties. Computational neuroscientist Anders
Sandberg and his colleagues at the institute wanted to include
all of that doubt in their own Drake calculations, to shed some
light on the dark, quiet universe. “It seemed to me that there
is important information in the empty sky,” says Sandberg.
Instead of assigning actual numbers to each term in the equa-
tion, they used the full range of numbers, for each term, that
reasonable research suggests.
The probability distributions that resulted surprised even
them: Humans, they found, are likely to be alone in the
observable universe, a possibility between 39 and 85 percent.
“It’s actually a fairly plausible thing,” says Sandberg. The team
calculated that in the Milky Way galaxy, there’s between a 53
civilization continues existing for a long time, it inevitably and 99.6 percent chance we’re alone.
becomes ever more technological, says University of Texas That is, of course, just one group’s estimate. And “alone”
anthropologist John Traphagan, who studies the relationship doesn’t necessarily mean that there never was anybody.
between culture, religion and science in SETI. There’s not Maybe they were and just are not anymore, because of nuclear
necessarily a reason, then, to think that old aliens would be holocaust, irreversible climate change, epidemics run amok,
engineering wormholes or spooling up beacon-broadcasters. asteroid impacts, nearby gamma-ray bursts, apocalypses we
Similarly, Traphagan takes issue with another SETI argument: can’t imagine. Or maybe they never existed in the first place.
The longer a technological civilization persists, the more likely it Sandberg spins this possibility positively. If civilizations never
is to be nice, because it’s learned how to resolve conflict without existed, then the sky isn’t silent because they all destroyed
apocalypse. “There’s no reason to think that altru- themselves. “An empty sky doesn’t mean we are
ism is going to be an outgrowth of technological doomed,” says Sandberg.
superiority,” says Traphagan. “Predators are “THE TEAM Webb maintains a similar mindset. “I do have
usually the ones that have the highest intel- that basic optimism, which probably comes
ligence.” Besides, why would a planetary society CALCULATED from science fiction,” he says, “that we will
be monolithic in any way — good or bad? THAT IN THE persist over centuries and millennia.” Perhaps
Humans certainly are not. Astronomers’ ideas MILKY WAY even long enough to find out through SETI —
on this point don’t make sense to him. GALAXY, which all of these naysayers actually believe
THERE’S we should continue — whether “everybody”
Given these quibbles, he’s frustrated that BETWEEN A includes anybody but us. D
astronomers often discuss the psychology of the 53 AND 99.6
cosmic “everybody.” “Why is it that an astrono- PERCENT Sarah Scoles is a science writer based in Denver,
mer who has no training in social science and CHANCE Colorado, and the author of They Are Already Here:
culture can write extensively about the nature WE’RE ALONE. UFO Culture and Why We See Saucers.
of these things as they apply to an imaginary
DECEM BER 2020 . DISCOVER 47
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