In 1960, the astrophysicist Francis Drake pointed a radio telescope situated in Green Bank, West Virginia, in the direction of two Sun-like stars 11 light years away. His faith: to pick up a signal that would verify gifted life might be out there. Fifty years have departed by since Drake’s pioneering SETI experiment, and we’ve yet to perceive the aliens. But because of a host of discoveries, the idea that life might survive outside Earth now appears more believable than ever. For one, we now know that life can flourish in the most extreme surroundings here on Earth — from deep-sea methane seep and Antarctic sea ice to acidic rivers and our thirstiest deserts.







We’ve

also discovered that liquid water isn’t exclusive to our planet. Saturn’s moon

“Enceladus” and Jupiter’s moons “Ganymede” and “Europa” have large oceans

underneath their icy surfaces. Even Saturn’s largest moon “Titan” could seed

some kind of life in its lakes and rivers of methane-ethane. And then there’s

the finding of exo-planets, with more than 1800 alien worlds outside our Solar

System recognized so far. In fact, astrophysicists think there may be a million

and millions of planets in our galaxy alone, one-fifth of which may be like

Earth. As Carl Sagan excellently said: “The Universe is a pretty big place. If

it’s just us, seems like an awful waste of space.”



some researchers trust the hunt for life outside Earth may well repay in our

lifespan. “There have been 10K generations of humans before us. Ours could be

the first to know,” said SETI astrophysicist Seth Shostak. Nowsome researchers trust the hunt for life outside Earth may well repay in ourlifespan. “There have been 10K generations of humans before us. Ours could bethe first to know,” said SETI astrophysicist Seth Shostak.