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Final Essay Prompt

Essay Prompt: "Most of the participants in the debate over extraterrestrials (and almost all we have read) are scientists, many of them quite prominent. This might suggest (and indeed is implied strongly in our readings) that the question of extraterrestrials is fundamentally scientific, and can be answered definitively by the methods of science. Why is this suggestion probably not true?"

Possible Theses:

Extrerrestrials exist.  .

Extraterrestrials do not exist.

Maybe they exist (agnostic).

(Good, Bad) Arguments can be made for both the existence and non-existence of ets. Lack of evidence for both sides of the argument. Is teleology relevant for answering this question? How do arguments for origin of life relate to the answer to this question?

Are we in a better position to answer this question than people of the past?

What would constitute incontrovertible evidence for either side of the argument?

Why is the principle of plentitude so attractive an argument?

It seems like these are the theses we are going to stick with. Anything else?

Introduction

     The question of plurality has been a popular topic of debate for centuries, and has taken many forms, including fictional works, philosophical debates, "hoaxes," and scientific experiments.  Going back as far as Ancient Greece, philosophers, astronomers, mathematicians, physicists and many more have put forward their thoughts about how alone the human race may be in the universe. Amazingly enough however, no definitive answer has been achieved. There is no evidence to say that extraterrestrial life does or does not exist. We have neither been (to the best of our knowledge) visited by the infamous silver disc of certain extraterrestrial origin nor have we simultaneously explored every planet in the universe which would both give us a definitive answer to the debate. Despite the popularity of the topic and the advancements of science, there are an equal amount of plausible arguments for each side of the debate. Throughout the ages, many arguments have been put forward and many of those have been shot down due to an increase in technology, but that increase has also created more questions to be answered. In fact, despite the vast advances in science and technology humans have obtained in the past 100 years, it has probably only brought us a stone's throw further than Aristotle's and the Ancients Greeks' ideas on plurality. 

     Despite a lack of evidence supporting the existence of extraterrestrial life, we continue to establish and fund large, expensive programs (e.g. the Viking Landers and S.E.T.I.). Perhaps it is the simple human emotional need to not feel alone that causes us to continue and expand the search. The Viking landers provided seemingly negative evidence for life on Mars, but nothing was conclusive, so scientists are still searching.  They were able to come up with alternative reasons as to why life could still exist on Mars, despite evidence to the contrary. This has resulted in what appears to be an ongoing search that will continue until evidence of life is found.

     There have been many arguments proposed both for and against plurality over the years and no definitive answer has been found. This is due to that lack of evidence on both sides of the argument. There have been many different types of arguments used to justify the various viewpoints on plurality over the years, including analogy, the principle of plenitude, scientific theories, religion, natural theology, and the Coperincan principle.  Many of these arguments have been used both as support for plurality and as evidence against plurality.  The variablity of the arguments shows that none of them in and of themselves are very strong evidence for or against plurality, but some are stronger when combined with others.

The search for extraterrestrial life on Mars is a great example of a question that is verifiable, but not falsifiable. In this sense, the search for life on Mars is similar to the broader search for extraterrestrial life in general. According to Karl Popper’s principle of falsification, which is accepted among most scientific circles, the search for extraterrestrial life and intelligence is not science, because we can only search for confirmations of life, and inherently cannot find evidence to disprove plurality.This brings us to a question that has persisted through every aspect of the extraterrestrial life debate: defining science itself and applying these definitions to the search for extraterrestrial life.   The problem of the "demarcation of science" (distinguishing between sciences and pseudo-sciences or non-sciences) is an important one, even if it only affects the realms of public funding and social acceptance.

     Teleology, the study of a purpose or reason, and Christianity played a big part in the denial of plurality. Religious arguments used theological statements and beliefs but had little proof or evidence to support the claims that extraterrestrials did not exist. However, due to the increase of new discoveries being made about the world and how it works, these arguments found themselves falling short of their purpose. New philosophers, such as William Whewell, however, changed that by introducing a new level of depth within an argument that provided more than just the thoughts previously held through Church doctrine.  He used science to provide support for his stance against plurality.  The role of religious thought, thus, had to be significantly adjusted to accommodate the developing scientific discoveries involving astronomy, biology, and geology. 

  Another man to write about extraterrestrials from a theological viewpoint was Alfred Russel Wallace.  He and Charles Darwin worked independently on the problem of the evolution of life on Earth. For Wallace, it was unlikely that the same circumstances would align again on another planet because of the rarity of life evolving under such perfect circumstances. He was one of the first to use evolution as an argument against plurality, believing that natural selection was the best explanation.  Later, when Wallace could not make natural selection work to explain the emergence of intelligent life he turned to God. His idea that there is a supreme purpose, we are unique, was based on Astronomy.

     Thomas Paine, in 1794, published Age of Reason, Part I, an extremely popular extended argument that accepting extraterrestrial life entails rejecting Christianity and its central doctrines of the divine incarnation and redemption.  Using knowledge that had derived from the Enlightenment regarding the immensity of our universe, he believed that the two were simply incompatible because God can’t send Jesus to die on each infinite world, constantly dying.  It would lead to absurdity.  In order to maintain any sense of credibility, he made it known that religion had to be “consistent with the ever-existing world of God that we behold in his works”, or in other words, what we have come to know about the world through science (Paine, The Age of Reason, p. 229 in Michael J. Crowe).

(Next Page) Part 1: Plurality From Ancient Times to the 18th Century

Links to other parts of the essay:

Part 1: Plurality From Ancient Times to the 18th Century

Part 2: The 19th Century

Part 3: The Principle of Plentitude

Part 4: Mars

Part 5: The Origin Of Life

Part 6: SETI, Fermi and the Anthropic Principle