We need to talk about aliens

"No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's."

"So starts H G Wells's 1898 novel The War of the Worlds, which continues with a military invasion by Martians. While contact with aliens may be a common theme in science fiction, could it also be a serious topic in science?

Indeed it could. Ever since 1960 with the first serious search for radio transmissions from other civilisations (known as Seti, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence), scientists have been thinking about what would happen if evidence for ET were found. Examples of their efforts include the 2010 Royal Society conference on "The detection of extra-terrestrial life and the consequences for science and society".

Last week the Guardian reported on a recent paper led by Seth Baum of Pennsylvania State University on this topic, categorising some of the possible consequences – ranging from beneficial through neutral to harmful.

So what's the point? We have never seen these Little Green Men, so why expend effort thinking about what might happen?"
By Alan Penny | Science | guardian.co.uk/continue reading