The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence

Fifty years ago, a young astronomer named Frank Drake pointed a radio telescope at nearby stars in the hope of picking up a signal from an alien civilization. Thus began one of the boldest scientific projects in history, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). But after a half century of scanning the skies, astronomers have little to report but an eerie silence-eerie because many scientists are convinced that the universe is teeming with life. The problem, argues leading physic...