This quick opening activity will get you thinking about what type of alien life might exist in the Universe. What would this alien’s planet look like? How would it survive and communicate? What might be the ingredients and Goldilocks Conditions for a new alien complexity in the Universe?

Have you ever read a story or seen a TV show or movie that featured alien life? What kind of world was that alien from?

Use the Alien Life – What Might It Look Like? Worksheet to sketch your idea of what an alien life form might look like. Leave yourself time to answer the following questions, and be prepared to share your answers with the class:

• What kind of world does this alien come from? What is the climate and terrain like there?
• Does this alien move? How?
• Does this alien communicate with other members of its species? How?
• Has this alien species developed any technology?

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Even if the Universe were teeming with complex life, we will most likely never come into contact with aliens. The Fermi paradox reminds us that despite the probability of life on other planets, we have no evidence that it actually exists. Yet, we are driven to know if we are unique in the Universe, and if we are, perhaps we are destined to venture to other planets and bring life to places beyond Earth.

This video will introduce you to the Fermi paradox, and get you thinking about the high probability that life exists on other planets, despite the fact that we lack evidence about its existence.

Preview

Aliens: they could be out there! In fact, given the age of the Universe, the billions of stars with the right properties, and the trillions upon trillions of planets that likely have the perfect conditions for life to flourish, they should be out there. So where are they? This Kurzgesagt video introduces you to the basic concepts that drive this contradiction, which we call the Fermi paradox.

Key Ideas—Factual

Think about the following questions as you watch the video:

1. What are some reasons to believe there might be life beyond Earth?
2. Why will we never know if there is life beyond our galaxy?
3. What is the habitable zone?
4. How long do we think life has been possible in our Milky Way galaxy?
5. What are the three types of civilizations described in this video?
6. What is the Fermi paradox?
7. What kinds of filters might be preventing complex life on other planets?

Thinking Conceptually

Do you agree with the Fermi paradox? Could there be alien civilizations on other planets, even though we don’t have any evidence of their existence? Also, do you think it’s possible for humans to someday harness all the energy of the planet or the Sun? If the First Order could do it in Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens then could we?

This activity is going to get you to think about the possibility of intelligent life beyond Earth.  Starting with the large numbers of stars in the Milky Way, you will take a close look at the number of possible habitable worlds in our galaxy alone. You will use the most recent scientific evidence and discoveries to discuss, imagine, and come up with your own ideas about how many of these worlds there might be in the galaxy.

There are billions of stars across our galaxy. We might assume some of them have planets with just the right conditions for life. Of these, we might assume life has formed and developed. But, does this mean there are thousands of inhabited planets out there? Hundreds? Just a few? Or, none at all. Scientists don’t know how many intelligent civilizations might be in our galaxy right now, if any at all, but it’s a fascinating question. This activity will ask you to use some of the information scientists are using to think about the likelihood of intelligent life on other planets.

Your teacher will divide the class into six groups and assign each group a number. Each group should focus on the question on the Anyone Out There? Worksheet that corresponds with their group number. You will have two minutes to discuss your group’s question. There are no “right” answers to these questions. Your job is to make some educated guesses.

For this activity, we are going to estimate that there are 400 billion stars in our galaxy. That’s 400 billion potential locations for life.

Once you have completed your question, share your answer and rationale with the class. Each group will provide another variable to the equation.

If your class ended up with a one or a zero, you collectively predicted that we are alone in the galaxy. A number greater than one means that the group estimated that we could detect another intelligent, communicating civilization close by. A number less than 10 implies that they are far away, and that we won’t be able to detect them soon.

Currently, we only have the technology to detect stars with planets that are a few light years away. Therefore, we’ve only explored a tiny fraction of our galaxy. If we were ever to detect a signal from another intelligent civilization, we would have to figure out what they are saying, how to respond, and then come up with a way to send them a response. However, the biggest problem would be that it would take a very long time to both receive and send the message

In 1961, astronomer and astrophysicist Frank Drake took the six variables your class discussed in this activity and brought them to a SETI meeting. His goal was to get scientists to think about the main things we need to consider when thinking about the probability of communicating with other life.

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A planet needs to have the right conditions to support life, and that life needs to evolve over millions of years to become intelligent, at least by our definition of that term. Right now, we don’t know enough about our galaxy to accurately estimate how likely the existence of intelligent life is in the Milky Way. The odds that we could receive a communication sent from another part of the galaxy are extremely small; however, the possibility that we could make contact with another intelligent life form keeps SETI scientists and citizens all over the world wondering and watching the skies.

This video will introduce you to the tremendous odds the SETI researchers face as they search for intelligent life on other planets.

Preview

In the early 1950s, Ohio State University’s professor of astronomy, Dr. John D. Kraus designed the “Big Ear” radio telescope using a $71,000 grant from the National Science Foundation along with donations from a variety of other sources. This radio telescope was dedicated to scanning the cosmos for signals and became the world’s first continuous program to search for extraterrestrial intelligence, which was also known as SETI.

Key Ideas—Factual

Think about the following questions as you watch the video:

1. How do we define “intelligent life”?
2. What is one argument against the possibility of intelligent alien life?
3. How do researchers at SETI make sure that signals they receive aren’t stray transmissions from Earth?
4. Why do SETI researchers believe we should not yet have succeeded in making contact with intelligent alien life?
5. How much time could it take for a signal from the other side of the galaxy to reach Earth?

Thinking Conceptually

How would your thoughts about life on Earth change if somehow scientists were able to confirm that intelligent life exists on another planet?

Our ability to listen to the cosmos is growing as telescopes and computing power increases. And our ability to send a message that might be detected improves as we learn more about where potential life could exist in the galaxy. As we imagine making contact with intelligent life, we must also consider who we are as a species. Looking for alien life provides as many opportunities to look within ourselves, and amongst our fellow humans, as it does into the mysteries of the Universe.

This article is a call to action from Breakthrough Initiatives, and will get you thinking about the philosophical questions involved with searching for extraterrestrial intelligence.

Skimming for Gist

Understanding the cost of energy is about much more than understanding the price you pay at the pump for gasoline, or the cost of purchasing solar panels. There are other expenses that include the cost of the equipment needed to refine oil into gasoline, or to manufacture solar cells as well as the cost of the impact on the environment. This paper summarizes a study from Lazard comparing the costs of several common forms of energy.  

Understanding Content

By the end of the second close read, you should be able to answer the following questions:

1. What philosophical questions drive the search for alien life? 
2. How is our ability to search for alien life improving?
3. What logistical questions remain unanswered in the search for alien life?

Thinking Conceptually

Breakthrough Message is a program studying the ethics of sending messages into deep space. The program has pledged “not to transmit any message until there has been a global debate at high levels of science and politics on the risks and rewards of contacting advanced civilizations.” What are some things you think politicians and scientists should consider before we send out a transmission? 

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As the Vietnam War ended, relations between the US and the USSR started to improve, but both sides remained critical of the other’s space program. After the US landed on the Moon, each nation continued to lay claim to an impressive list of “firsts”. The Soviets were first to make a soft landing on Mars and put both a human-crewed observatory and space station into orbit; the US broke records for numbers of days with humans in space and sent probes past Venus and Jupiter.

The Arecibo Message contained no nationalistic messages; it was a message from the people of Earth, not members of a particular country. Eight months later, astronauts from the US and USSR docked in space and shook hands. In the 1990s, the two countries began routinely working together in space, and in 2015, US and Russian teams jointly completed a new first: a year-long mission in space aboard the International Space Station. The Arecibo Message will not reach its intended audience in the M13 cluster for 25,000 years, but its impact on humanity may have already been made on Earth.

This article will give you a good understanding of what the Arecibo Message was, how and why it was sent, and what kinds of things scientists consider when thinking about sending messages into space.

Skimming for Gist

If you sent a message into the stars, what would you say? How would you say it? What technology would you use? Where would you send it? How we answer these questions could be as important as the content of our inter-stellar messages. This article by Frank Drake’s daughter Nadia commemorates the 40th birthday of the Arecibo Message, the first intentional radio transmission sent from Earth. 

Understanding Content

By the end of the second close read, you should be able to answer the following questions:

1. Who authored the Arecibo Message sent into space in 1974? What was the Pioneer Plaque and who authored it?
2. Why did Drake decide to send pictures instead of a recorded spoken message?
   What were some pieces of information Drake included in the Arecibo Message?
3. What is binary code?
4. What is special about the number of bits in the Arecibo Message?

Thinking Conceptually

Listen to the three-minute recording of the team sending the Arecibo Message. How do you think they felt to be part of the first deliberate radio transmission from Earth?

This activity will give you a chance to review some of what you’ve learned in this lesson, and use it to think more deeply about what and how you would communicate with an alien species.

Get into small groups. Imagine that scientists have received a response radio transmission coming from the M13 star cluster, in the same binary-pictorial format as our Arecibo Message. Together with your team, answer the questions on the worksheet in preparation for sending another message to M13.

Be prepared to share your answers with the class.