Life on Mars?

Posted by Mac Tonnies, May 22, 2008 at 10:00 AM by Mac Tonnies
The Mars Phoenix lander is scheduled to descend to the surface of Mars on May 25.  Designed to analyze soil for indications that Mars was (or is) capable of supporting primitive life, the Phoenix mission's bearing on SETI is far from trivial.  Although the Phoenix won't be able to conclusively establish the presence of life--if it exists--it has the potential to hasten additional probes with more robust instrumentation.  (It's sobering to note that the last time Martian soil was directly tested for life was in 1976.)


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A SETI Taxonomy?

Posted by Mac Tonnies, May 19, 2008 at 10:00 AM by Mac Tonnies

If our galaxy is home to advanced ET civilizations, it would be helpful if we knew what we were looking for.  For instance, how do we define "advanced"--and might a civilization's level of development make it easier (or harder) to detect?

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The "Great Filter"

Posted by Mac Tonnies, May 13, 2008 at 10:00 AM by Mac Tonnies

Oxford philosopher Nick Bostrom recently wrote an article for "Technology Review" championing the concept of a "Great Filter"--a sort of existential black hole assumed to either preclude the emergence of complex life or else destroy advanced civilizations (thus SETI's failure to detect intelligent signals). Bostrom posits that we should hope to find our own solar system devoid of primitive life, since such a discovery would indicate that the Great Filter lies in our future instead of our past, thereby effectively condemning humanity to extinction before we're able to announce our presence to the galaxy (assuming we'd want to).

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The Roswell Controversy

Posted by Mac Tonnies, May 09, 2008 at 11:00 AM by Mac Tonnies

To newcomers to ufology, the alleged Roswell UFO crash of 1947 would seem to be the best case on record. If popular wisdom is to be trusted, the Roswell case incorporates everything an investigator might need to conclusively establish an extraterrestrial origin for UFOs: exotic hardware and alien bodies--hardly the sort of evidence one might expect from even the most ambitious of hoaxes. And the government's schizophrenic stance on the reality of the event positively begs speculation about some form of high-level cover-up--what nuclear physicist turned UFO researcher Stanton Friedman has repeatedly described as a "Cosmic Watergate."

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UFOs, Aliens and Consciousness

Posted by Mac Tonnies, May 06, 2008 at 10:40 AM by Mac Tonnies

While I'm agnostic as to the ultimate nature of UFOs, I'm comfortable asserting that the phenomenon is both physically real and under intelligent control. Too brash a deductive leap? Given the available evidence, I don't think so. Indeed, my position isn't nearly as hard-set as that of most speculators among the loosely knit UFO "community." So what are we dealing with? Does intelligence imply an extraterrestrial origin? And is my agnosticism simply a mask with which to deter meandering conspiracy theories and hoary notions of human-ET treaties?

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10 Must-See "First Contact" Movies

Posted by Mac Tonnies, May 01, 2008 at 12:00 PM by Mac Tonnies

After posting a list of 10 favorite novels about extraterrestrial contact, I suppose I'm obligated to comment on movies that reflect upon the search for alien intelligence.  This list is by no means intended to be exhaustive or even particularly representative; if you have any additions, feel free to mention them in the comments section.

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