The Chronicle of Higher Education: Colloquy

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Creating a new science in the search for extraterrestrial life

Author: Colloquy Moderator
Date: 03-26-04 10:36

The new discipline of astrobiology is booming, backed by millions of research dollars from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and fueled by the recent discoveries of planets orbiting other stars and of conditions that might support or might once have supported life elsewhere in the solar system. The reach of astrobiology is enormous, encompassing studies on the origins of life, the search for life in the universe, and plans for humanity both on Earth and in space. Is this a field with a future? Or is it destined to be a fringe field for years to come, more science fiction than science, that will achieve a firm basis in fact only when scientists, not just robotic explorers, can visit Mars? Can a discipline so broad hope to develop a core constituency of faculty members and students? And can astrobiology establish itself as a true scientific discipline if it relies so heavily on one federal agency for money and organization? Read more ...

Re: Creating a new science in the search for extraterrestrial life

Author: Jeff Carney, Snow College
Date: 03-29-04 16:51

The central issue is whether there is a compelling need for experts in the field. I think the answer is yes.

Politicians may have a vision that extends only as gar as the next election, but the world is disserved by this. As populations grow and resources are depleted, we will turn first to the planets and then to the stars for solutions. Granted this may take thousands of years, but the planning should begin sooner rather than later.

Furthermore, I suspect it is in man's nature to build and explore. I also suspect that the world is slowly going mad, most likely because opportunities for ordinary folk to build and explore grow fewer and fewer.

We need space. We need fresh planets. We need to interact with outlandish cultures (assuming such exist). In short, we need a realm in which millions of people, rather than dozens, can jump on a horse and see what's around the next bend. Our spirits demand it.

The problem as things stand now is the risk of dilletantism: experts in one field dabbling in many others and achieving a false sense of expertise therein. This could lead (may already be leading) to many wasted years of research.

Just as the paleontologist (to name the closest analogue) must be a bona fide expert in several distinct fields, so must the astrobiologist (or whatever you want to call it). Giving legitimacy to the field is the essential first step. Scholars must be encouraged to publish. A rigorous curriculum for students must be codified.

Who shall fund these efforts is a whole other question.

Re: Creating a new science in the search for extraterrestrial life

Author:�me
Date: 03-30-04 14:02

Jeff Carney, Snow College wrote:

"The central issue is whether there is a compelling need for experts in the field. I think the answer is yes."

Sorta begs the question about whether or not such a "field" exists in the first place.

Naively, the study of extraterrestrial life would appear require actual extraterrrestrial life in order to study it. There aren't many specialists in "unicorn anatomy" in the world's veterinary schools. The need for experts right now is to establish whether or not there is anything there to study.

If the experts find something, then they will have simultaneously established the field and validated their existence. If they don't find anything,.... well, as my first research supervisor put it, "if I knew what I was doing, it wouldn't be research." And I think the single-source of funding is a direct result of this. NASA seems to think that the possibility of useful results from this study makes it worth the money, while NSF and NIH (and everyone else) thinks otherwise. And, of course, scientists are resourceful -- a lot of the NASA funding is going to other projects that might have been funded through other sources.

I'm not willing to second-guess either NASA or the NSF. But at this stage of the game, I don't think that we should go out of our way to legitimize a field that may not even exist.

Response to "me"

Author: Jeffrey Carney
Date: 03-31-04 12:00

Dear Me:

Granted, the existence of ET life has yet to be proven and may never be so. But I guess you missed the article on which this thread is based. Let me sum up some key issues that argue for astrobiology being (or needing to become) a true discipline.

1. As we search for ET life (and this will continue, like it or not) we need to have an excellent idea what we're looking for, especially when our observations are made remotely. Signs of water on Mars and Europa already have engineers planning the next several landers/probes. It would be a collossal waste of cash if we didn't have an excellent idea what hypotheses to test when we get there.

2. Ditto in the search for technologically advanced ET life. The SETI program has been active for decades, but proponents still cannot agree what to look for as we scan the heavens for ET communication. The problem is as psychological as it is technical, and it is hampered by an inescapable anthropomorhism. That is, we can imagine how humans would communicate to the stars, but we cannot guarantee that our method would be an ET's method. (Imagining an ET's biology is an important first step; eg, a blind ET is unlikely to send visual data.) If we're going to invest cash in this project (we have, we are, and we will) then we'd better have some specialists coming up with good hypotheses to be tested. And that means establishing a set of criteria for determining who is a specialist and what counts as a reasonable hypothesis.

3. We also have engineers working out the basics for sending humans to other bodies, including asteroids as well as planets. If we're going to do this, we'd better have an excellent idea what it will take to survive in otherworldly conditions. Again, more hypotheses to be tested. Long range projects, such as terraforming a planet, will require engineers, geologists, and biologists working on a vast array of problems for which no substantial training currently exists.

Now, you may not want to explore space, you may not want to spend the cash. These are other questions.

But the fact is that bona fide questions already exist and scholars are already trying to answer them. My argument is that if we're going to do it (and I have little doubt that we will) we'd better do it as well as we can.

This does not however mean that the field should (initially) be imagined as huge or that graduate students should be duped into thinking that hundreds of job openings await them. But again, these are other questions.

Re: Creating a new science in the search for extraterrestrial life

Author: Loren C. Wingblade, Ph.D.
Date: 03-31-04 21:34

I think it would be pretty naive to assume that we are not going to stumble across either past extraterrestrial life forms or currently live ones--especially when we touch down on Europa. We even might get fooled by the planet Mercury. Of course we need specialists. How can we find anything or interpret the findings without them? One question is how much is this space exploration going to cost and how badly do we want to know the answer to the forms of extraterrestrial life? I think the public at large wants to know--maybe even for the wrong reasons e.g. religious. You know from human history if there is a mountain out there we have to climb it. I would rather have it climbed by people trained in the field than someone stumbling over something and not having a clue how it fits into the scheme of things. It's not so much the life forms we are after but rather the whole mosaic/pattern of life in the universe. How many ways can life be constructed and what are the interconnections between the life forms. We are on the right track.

Re: Creating a new science in the search for extraterrestrial life

Author: Donald L. Wolberg
Date: 04-05-04 16:11

I must admit some concern about the expenditure of positively enormous dollar amounts on a field still in search of a real sample. As a paleontologist, I am certainly pleased that what all the hoopla on Mars is about is really a new field, "exo-paleontolgy" but I am distressed that perhaps 1% of the Martian excursion expenditures would actually be an increase in annual expenditures for all of research paleontology in all of the world (our world). I am also distressed that rather than spending dollars on actual, documentable, fossil based projects on Earth, where we have in 200 or so stop and start research years documented perhaps .1% of the totality of organisms that have existed on Earth, dollars have been squandered in the Mars effort to show that water that once existed on Mars flowed downhill, crossbeds exist, and hematite is just as red on Mars as on Earth. Unfortunately, the instrumentation available on those delightful but very expensive Martian machines, cannot detect microscopic organisms, and indeed, have not demonstrated that anything has ever been "alive" (whatever that may mean on Mars). It may take more missions and more billions of dollars to find out if life ever existed on Mars at all. I will not dwell here on my unease of conclusions of Martians oceans, Martian evaporites, Martian sedimentary environments, or indeed the new push for humanities need to push out to Mars. I would suggest that by the time that people are ready to get there, and if the billions and billions of dollars are spent to get there, and even if the dubious possibility that Martian microscopic life existed 3.5-4.5 billion years ago, what will be the condition of state of American geology and paleontology at that marvelous time. I suggest that there will be precious few active, graduate geology and paleontology programs and students to participate (perhaps we can out-source). I also suggest that there is a monumental need to invest in struggling geology and paleontology programs, museums with archival capabilities to house collections, as well as research efforts to discern the only documented record of life we have access to and data for, right here on Earth.