Hacker News with Generative AI: Extraterrestrial Life

Ask HN: Why isn't anyone else bothered by the fact that life is only on Earth? (ycombinator.com)
I am aware of the aestivation hypothesis (counter to Fermi’s Paradox), and I am also aware of the Rare Earth Hypothesis. What I am trying to understand is why more effort isn’t expended to determine the state of other life in the universe?

Space Exploration, Fermi Paradox, Extraterrestrial Life

12 points by nis0s 6 days ago | 63 comments

If it moves, it's probably alive: Searching for life on other planets (arstechnica.com)
The search for extraterrestrial life has always been a key motivator of space exploration. But if we were to search Mars, Titan, or the subsurface oceans of Europa or Enceladus, it seems like all we can reasonably hope to find is extremophile microbes. And microbes, just a few microns long and wide, will be difficult to identify if we’re relying on robots working with limited human supervision and without all the fancy life-detecting gear we have here on Earth.

Space Exploration, Extraterrestrial Life, Microbiology, Robots

4 points by rbanffy 8 days ago | 0 comments

Do aliens exist? We studied what scientists think (theconversation.com)
News stories about the likely existence of extraterrestrial life, and our chances of detecting it, tend to be positive. We are often told that we might discover it any time now. Finding life beyond Earth is “only a matter of time”, we were told in September 2023. “We are close” was a headline from September 2024.

Extraterrestrial Life, Science, Space Exploration, Opinion

7 points by squircle 14 days ago | 1 comments

Earth Detecting Earth (seti.org)
February 3, 2025, Mountain View, CA – A research team led by Dr. Sofia Sheikh of the SETI Institute, in collaboration with the Characterizing Atmospheric Technosignatures project and the Penn State Extraterrestrial Intelligence Center, set out to answer a simple question: If an extraterrestrial civilization existed with technology similar to ours, would they be able to detect Earth and evidence of humanity? If so, what signals would they detect, and from how far away?

Extraterrestrial Life, Science, SETI, Earth

74 points by nabla9 18 days ago | 17 comments

What if we're alone? The philosophical paradox of a lifeless cosmos (bigthink.com)
The idea that we might have cosmic neighbors has captivated the human imagination for decades. It’s not just sci-fi enthusiasts who ponder the possibility of extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) — the general public seems to lean strongly toward the belief that we’re not alone.

Philosophy, Space, Extraterrestrial Life, Cosmos

15 points by rntn 19 days ago | 4 comments

Advanced Civilizations Could Be Indistinguishable from Nature (universetoday.com)
Sometimes in science you have to step back and take another look at underlying assumptions. Sometimes its necessary when progress stalls. One of the foundational questions of our day concerns the Fermi Paradox, the contradiction between what seems to be a high probability of extraterrestrial life and the total lack of evidence that it exists.

Extraterrestrial Life, Science, Fermi Paradox, Space, Astrophysics

145 points by joe_the_user 65 days ago | 140 comments

Alien life may look nothing like life on Earth (theconversation.com)
We have only one example of biology forming in the universe – life on Earth. But what if life can form in other ways? How do you look for alien life when you don’t know what alien life might look like?

Extraterrestrial Life, Biology, Science, Astronomy

12 points by Brajeshwar 67 days ago | 0 comments

Experts testify before lawmakers that the U.S. is running secret UAP programs (npr.org)
Is intelligent alien life darting around in space — and even in the skies above us here on Earth? Has the U.S. government been covering up unexplained phenomena, and using secret extraterrestrial discoveries to boost its own technology?

U.S. Government, UFOs, Extraterrestrial Life, National Security, Technology

5 points by nataz 100 days ago | 1 comments

Experts testify at UFO hearing in Congress (text.npr.org)
Is intelligent alien life darting around in space — and even in the skies above us here on Earth? Has the U.S. government been covering up unexplained phenomena, and using secret extraterrestrial discoveries to boost its own technology?

UFOs, Government, Extraterrestrial Life, Congress

41 points by samizdis 100 days ago | 99 comments

Aliens and the Enlightenment (historytoday.com)
In the 18th century the existence of extraterrestrial life went from debatable hypothesis to fundamental tenet of Enlightenment thought.

History, Enlightenment, Extraterrestrial Life

47 points by benbreen 159 days ago | 55 comments

'Thinking about a UFO as some kind of extraterrestrial spaceship is naive' (theguardian.com)

UFOs, Extraterrestrial Life, Science

5 points by Anon84 171 days ago | 2 comments

Thinking about a UFO as some kind of extraterrestrial spaceship is naive (theguardian.com)

UFOs, Extraterrestrial Life, Space, Science

7 points by mathgenius 173 days ago | 2 comments

Detecting Faster Than Light Travel by Extraterrestrials (hackaday.com)

Extraterrestrial Life, Physics, Science Fiction, Space Travel

15 points by rcarmo 201 days ago | 1 comments

The great silence: Just 4 in 10k galaxies may host intelligent aliens (space.com)