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Are we ready as a society to discuss what the\h
next steps are if we find life beyond earth?

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Hi, I'm Jim Green, Chief Scientist at NASA and this is\h
Gravity Assist. On this season of Gravity Assist,\h\h

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we're looking for life beyond Earth. I'm here\h
with Dr. Steven Dick and he's an astronomer\h\h

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an author and a historian of science - most noted\h
for his work in the field of astrobiology. Steven\h\h

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also has served as Chief Historian for NASA and\h
he's been the Bloomberg Chair at the Library of\h\h

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Congress in astrobiology. So, let's say if we find\h
life beyond Earth, what do you think will be the\h\h

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reaction by the public, and what will happen next?\h

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Uh, I usually put it in terms of world views.

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I think our cosmological worldview would change,\h
our philosophical and theological worldviews would\h\h

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change and our cultural worldviews would change.\h
By cosmological, I mean that we will we will know\h\h

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that we no longer live in a physical universe,\h
entirely physical universe, where we are the only\h\h

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kind of freak biology, the freak intelligence,\h
that we live in what I call a biological universe.\h\h

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Uh, and that, uh, you know, that makes a big\h
difference for for our future, our sort of\h\h

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human destiny. If you have a biological universe\h
where we have to interact with intelligence.\h\h

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So there's the cosmological aspect, then there's\h
the philosophical and theological aspect.\h\h

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If we engage with extraterrestrials, we will find\h
out something about our own knowledge. Do they\h\h

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know the same things that we know? Do they\h
see the universe the same way that we do?\h\h

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This is a big philosophical problem. Do we have\h
objective knowledge? So that's a huge question in\h\h

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philosophy. One of the points I like to make is it\h
very much depends on what the discovery scenario\h\h

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is. You know it's almost, it's almost meaningless\h
to say what's the impact of discovering life.\h\h

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Are you talking about microbial life, or\h
intelligent life, or intelligent life with\h\h

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a signal, or with a signal that's deciphered\h
and what do they say? Those are all different\h\h

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scenarios that you have to consider when you\h
talk about what's the reaction going to be.