1. SETI The Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence Science and Religion in School Unit 4b

2. Why bother looking? Answer to some fundamental questions Sharing of knowledge Medical Scientific Technological Helping Mankind out of its current problems

3. Would they be any help? Have been through the same problems as us and survived Open to question Why need they have had the same problems? Why need their solutions work for us? Why should they tell us? Perhaps they got through by good fortune

4. Where to look? Our own solar system? Highly unlikely - no evidence and space probes have been most places ‘lower’ forms of life are a different matter Mars Europa

5. Mars Traditionally thought of as a good candidate Evidence of water on surface Atmosphere (thin) Historical (Percival Lowell)

6. Percival Lowell Thought Mars was inhabited and covered in canals May 22nd 1894 Boston Scientific Society “The most self evident explanation from the markings themselves is probably the true one; namely, that in them we are looking upon the results of the work of some sort of intelligent beings” He had not looked at Mars through a telescope by this stage Set up an observatory in Flagstaff Arizona 1894

7. Lowell studied the canals and the seasonal variations in the ice caps Martians using the ice from the poles to irrigate desert areas of the planet

8. Surface of Mars Now we have been to the surface with robot probes (since the 1970s) We know what the surface is like No canals! However, we do think that there was once water on Mars This water is now locked in as frost under the surface

9. Evidence for water

10. The Face on Mars

11. Europa A ‘dark horse’ candidate for life in our solar system Surface appears to be ice Liquid ocean under the ice? Thin atmosphere detected containing oxygen Possibly life has evolved in the relative warmth of the ocean

12. Elsewhere? Growing evidence for planets round other stars Around 100 ‘extra-solar’ planets have now been observed If planets exist round other stars, then the basic conditions for life being found elsewhere seems much more likely. The search is now on for ‘Earth- like’ planets.

13. How do we look? Search for radio transmissions from the stars Hard to separate from natural sources There are a lot of stars to listen to! Beam a single out from Earth and rely on them hearing us Why nothing so far? Bad luck Lack of interest in us No one there

14. Consequences for Theology Theology needs to incorporate the possibility of life elsewhere in the universe Could impact on a variety of doctrines and faiths The Fall The Incarnation Re-incarnation Creationism Fundamentalism

15. Final thinking point Alien life on Earth What if we were to create artificial intelligence in our computers?