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None of us needs an introduction to UFOs or
Unidentified Flying Objects. At various times, people from varied
parts of the Earth claim to have seen sausage shaped or other
objects moving across the night skies. Between the years 1952 and
1969 alone, twelve thousand investigations were made to probe
similar happenings that were reported, as part of a secret project
that came to be called Project Bluebook. The investigations threw up
no extraordinary results and most of the UFOs were identified as
bright planets or stars, strange clouds or an aircraft, peculiar
bird, aerial flares or at best meteors and satellites. Only seven
hundred of the UFOs could not be explained. The investigators
reported no extraterrestrial (E.T.) being. |
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However, scientists say
this does not mean that there are no extraterrestrials at all. (An
extra terrestrial is a thing or form of life not from the Earth.) The
universe and the part that we know of and can see contains billions
of galaxies. Each of these galaxies contains billions of stars. Not
every star has planets orbiting around it. Those stars that do must
produce steady light and heat, long enough for life to evolve, which
could take billions of years. Based on these facts, scientists are
supposing there is a likelihood of extraterrestrial life. It is
their guess that perhaps one out of every one hundred thousand stars
has a planet with some kind of life on it. A quick calculation
shows that there could be a million planets with life within the
Milky Way galaxy. Whether and how many of these planets have
intelligent life is anybody’s guess.
In the meantime, many
people have kept special radios to listen for signals sent by other
intelligent beings. One such project launched by these never-say-die
scientists is called Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI).
Members of SETI are, however, faced with two major problems. The
radio signals, if they are there at all, is likely to be very weak
and is likely to sound even weaker with lots of unwanted noise
mingling with it. Therefore, SETI needs to set up huge antennas that
can pick up enough signals for the members to hear them. The
antennas that SETI has set up measure around two hundred feet
across.
The second problem is
that the radios should be able to listen to millions of channels,
and each for a long time, long enough to be able to let the
scientists decide if it’s some kind of message. Overcoming all their
problems to the extent possible, the SETI have been doggedly
listening for signals, but all their efforts seem to have been
exercises in futility. However, they continue waiting. In the
meantime, they are fine tuning their radio systems and improving
upon them.
Sometimes, SETI
scientists send radio messages intended for extra terrestrials. On
November 16, 1974, a message was sent from Puerto Rico to a giant
cluster of stars twenty five thousand light years away. Of course,
the message will reach our extraterrestrial neighbors, if they are
there, twenty five thousand years later. |
