This is Hotel Mars, Episode N.
Dr. David M. Livingston, Dr. Space of The Space Show, is here as my colleague and co-host. Tonight, SETI — the search for extraterrestrial intelligence — and the question that has shadowed the field for more than half a century: if a signal arrives, what is to be done? Many people have spent decades thinking about exactly that, and we welcome one of them. Michael Garrett is chair of the SETI Permanent Committee of the International Academy of Astronautics.
The committee has just issued an update to the post-detection protocols first formalized in 1989. It is deliberately short — three or four pages, because nobody reads ten — and it sets out what to do when something appears in the data that nature cannot explain. Verify before you announce. Protect the name of the astronomer who comes forward, because online harassment is now part of the equation. And if the signal turns out to be an artifact in the telescope, say so as loudly as you said the first thing.
Watch the full conversation above, or listen to an audio version below:
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