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Search For Life
No claim has even made it halfway up the Confidence of Life Detection (CoLD) scale, but 21st century science is just beginning to unfold.
In 2025, Earth remains the only planet where life is known to exist. Without a second example, "The Stand" has a vital lesson to teach us.
Big Think spoke with astronomer David Kipping about technosignatures, "extragalactic SETI," and being a popular science communicator in the YouTube age.
Organic compounds can form through simple chemistry alone — making the search for true biosignatures trickier than it seems.
Finding life beyond our Solar System requires understanding its host planet.
This research team is working out how to detect extraterrestrial cells in the liquid water ocean hidden beneath Enceladus’s icy crust.
Life arose on Earth very early on. After a few billion years, here we are: intelligent and technologically advanced. Where's everyone else?
Sophisticated rovers have found the conditions for Martian life, as well as the building blocks of life, but never life itself. AI can help.
We may be the last generation born not knowing if we are alone in the Universe.
The space telescope's findings challenge the notion of a galaxy brimming with life.
A next-generation instrument on a delayed rover may be the key to answering the question of life on Mars.
Some microbes can withstand Earth's most inhospitable corners, hinting that life may be able to survive similarly extreme conditions on other worlds.
If life is common in the Universe, then where is everybody? Known as the Fermi Paradox, a new project may help solve the riddle.
Dead whales inspire a way to find extraterrestrial life on Mars.
Astronomers have been looking for radio waves sent by a distant civilization for more than 60 years.
Organic molecules can be produced by living or non-living systems. But the recent findings are very intriguing.
Earth is the Solar System's only known inhabited planet. Could Venus, if its phosphine signal is real, be our second world with life?
Some astrobiologists believe life is rare, while others believe it is common in the Universe. How can we find out which view is correct?
There really might be extraterrestrials out there, attempting to make contact. Here's how science, not fiction, is attempting to find them.
Life arose on Earth very early on. After a few billion years, here we are: intelligent and technologically advanced. Where's everyone else?
Purely physical and chemical processes can deceive us into thinking that life is present, when it actually is not.
If we succeed in contacting them, will that seal humanity’s doom? One of the most wondrous questions of all concerns our place in the Universe. After 13.8 billion years of […]
If you want to find life in the Universe, this is how you do it. When it comes to uncovering the ultimate truths about reality, we can only reap what we […]
How many potentially habitable planets are there? We sincerely don’t know. One of the most compelling scientific goals humanity has set for itself is to find extraterrestrial life: biological activity originating […]
One look at the uncertainties and the assumptions changes the story tremendously. Is there intelligent life out there in the Milky Way beyond our own Solar System? If so, how […]
We know a lot about what else is out there, but we still don’t know everything. In the quest for life in the Universe, it makes sense to look at […]
Is there life beyond Earth, even in our Solar System? This mission might be humanity’s best hope of finding it. The biggest question facing humanity might be, “Does life exists beyond […]
We assume that life is ubiquitous in the Universe. But what if it’s just us? When it comes to the question of extraterrestrial life, humans optimistically assume the Universe is prolific. […]
Welcome Seth Shostak, senior scientist at SETI, onto the show! Is there intelligent life out there in the Universe beyond planet Earth? If so, are they technologically advances, can they hear […]