THE JOURNAL OF ASTROSOCIOLOGY VOLUME 1

powerful broadcasts to unseen audiences. This is controversial because announcing our locationin the universe might attract predators rather than benign bystanders or new friends.The third type of CASETI research focuses on the human response to the discovery ofextraterrestrial life. This includes preparations for contact, and both the short-term and long-termimpact of the discovery on cultures, societies, and worldviews. The fourth category is theanalysis of extraterrestrial societies, political systems, institutions, and organisms (or their nonbiologicalequivalents). James Grier Miller’s Living Systems Theory, which cuts across geologicand historical epochs, cultures, and species, may provide a point of entry for this (Miller, 1978;Harrison, 1997).c. Human Responses to Extraterrestrial LifePeople’s reactions to the discovery has been a topic of interest ever since widespread butoverstated newspaper reports following Orson Wells’ 1937 Halloween broadcast led somepeople to believe that Martians had landed in New Jersey and were advancing on Manhattan(Cantril, 1940). Panic and other reactions have been portrayed in various ways in science fictionfilms and are the source of much scholarly and popular speculation. Some writers suggest thatattempts to anticipate human reactions will fail or have counterproductive effects (Denning,2013). The most formidable barrier to prediction is that people’s responses will depend on manyfactors such as nationality, demographics, religion, the unfolding of the contact scenario(protracted or instantaneous), and the nature of the “other” (humanoid or unfamiliar, benevolentor malevolent, open or secretive). Thus, it is tempting to walk away from this problem on thebasis that we do not know enough about extraterrestrials to make guesses as to how people willreact. But through historical precedents, case studies, public opinion polling, and othertechniques, we may be able to educate our guesses (Harrison, 2011a). We already knowsomething about people’s beliefs about the existence of extraterrestrial life, their perceptions andrepresentations of aliens, and how they think they and other people will respond to a confirmeddiscovery.Recently, Steven J. Dick has discussed the role of analogies in astrobiology (Dick, 2013;2014). This involves looking to something we have experienced (the analogue) that resembles tosome degree an anticipated future event (the target). Thus, we look to research conducted inisolated and confined environments such as in submarines or at polar research stations to helpplan for space missions which also involve teams working under conditions of isolation andconfinement (Harrison, 2001). As another example, in the nineteenth century many peoplebelieved that engineers had constructed canals on Mars and this analogy might inform ourexpectations about how present-day people will respond to the detection of an interstellarbeacon. Dick points out analogues have to be carefully chosen to get the best match between theanalogue (spying evidence of intelligent life on Mars) and the target event (discovering, fromEarth, evidence of advanced technology in another solar system). Dick offers a “GoldilocksPrinciple” that analogies must not be so broad and sweeping as to be meaningless, or so specificthat they are unlikely to match up with a plausible target event.People’s expectations will play powerful roles in initial reactions, especially underconditions of uncertainty and ambiguity, as is likely to be the case if contact consists ofintercepting a content-free beacon or indecipherable message (Denning, 2013; Harrison, 1997,2011a). In the case of a SETI detection, about all we will know is that “they” exist, so the initial© 2015 Astrosociology Research Institute19