Author Description

This comprehensive book compilation reproduces NASA documents and Congressional testimony about the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) and cosmology. The first document is a 2014 NASA report, Archaeology, Anthropology, and Interstellar Communication, with fascinating insights into the history of the SETI concept, research efforts, and informed speculation about dealing with alien communications. Historically, most of the scientists involved with SETI have been astronomers and physicists. As SETI has grown as a science, scholars from the social sciences and humanities have become involved in the search, often focusing on how humans may react to the detection of extraterrestrial life. The present volume examines the contributions of archaeology and anthropology to contemporary SETI research, drawing on insights from scholars representing a range of disciplines. The remaining sections of this introduction provide a chapter-by-chapter overview of the book as a whole. As befits a volume published in the NASA History Series, this collection emphasizes the value of understanding the historical context of critical research questions being discussed within the SETI community today. Contents: Archaeology, Anthropology, and Interstellar Communication * Introduction * Chapter 1: SETI: The NASA Years * Chapter 2: A Political History of NASA's SETI Program * Chapter 3: The Role of Anthropology in SETI - Historical View * Chapter 4: A Tale of Two Analogues - Learning at a Distance from the Ancient Greeks and Maya and the Problem of Deciphering Extraterrestrial Radio Transmissions * Chapter 5: Beyond Linear B - The Metasemiotic Challenge of Communication with Extraterrestrial Intelligence * Chapter 6: Learning To Read - Interstellar Message Decipherment from Archaeological and Anthropological Perspectives * Chapter 7: Inferring Intelligence - Prehistoric and Extraterrestrial * Chapter 8: Anthropology at a Distance - SETI and the Production of Knowledge in the Encounter