December 22, 2017 2:25 pm

On Tonight’s Podcast, Neil deGrasse Tyson and Company Search for ET

This week on StarTalk Radio we’re bringing together your favorite discussions on extraterrestrials: where to search for them, how to communicate with them, and even whether to send signals of our own. We’ve had a lot of great conversations, debates, and explorations on finding and communicating with extraterrestrial intelligence – so if you enjoy aliens, this episode is right up your alley.

To start, Neil sits down with Jill Tarter, former director of SETI and inspiration behind Jodie Foster’s character Ellie Arroway in Contact, to discuss the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. I love this segment because Jill uses an analogy that perfectly captures just how little of the universe we’ve explored, but still manages to vastly inspire the continuation of exploration. Whenever someone is skeptical of the search for alien life, from now on I’ll use Jill’s analogy to put it into perspective.

Following that, you’ll hear another one of my favorite segments featuring Seth Shostak, Chuck Nice, Allen Saakyan, and Doug Vakoch, president of METI, as they discuss how and where to send signals when trying to communicate with ET and what they would say. I enjoy this segment because it’s clear that Seth and Doug have somewhat differing views on how to go through this process, but instead of arguing they engage in a friendly, intelligent debate and it’s very fun to hear.

You’ll also hear from David Grinspoon, Chuck Nice, and acclaimed science-fiction author David Brin as they ponder how discovering extraterrestrial intelligence would impact society, more specifically, religion. They also explain why establishing a global conversation is crucial before sending out signals that represent all of humanity.

This episode is packed full of great discussion on ET and features some of your favorite hosts, co-hosts, and guests. So, be sure to tune in!

Please join us tomorrow night for Extraterrestrial Mashup at 7pm ET right here on our website, as well as on our All-Stars channels on Apple Podcasts, Google Play Music, SoundCloud, Stitcher, and TuneIn. If you’re an All-Access subscriber, you can watch or listen to this episode ad-free at 7pm, too. And remember that you can also catch next week’s StarTalk All-Stars episode one week early on TuneIn, at tunein.com/startalkallstars.

That’s it for now. Keep Looking Up!
–Ian Mullen