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A formula is proposed to quantitatively estimate the signal emission rate of Communicating Extra-Terrestrial Intelligent civilizations (CETIs) in the Galaxy. I suggest that one possible type of CETI signal would be brief radio bursts…
Superhuman artificial general intelligence could be created this century and would likely be a significant source of existential risk. Delaying the creation of superintelligent AI (ASI) could decrease total existential risk by increasing…
Classical arguments for skepticism regarding the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence (SETI) are critically examined. It is suggested that the emerging class of "phase transition" astrobiological models can simultaneously account for…
The search for extraterrestrial intelligence by looking for signals from advanced technological civilizations has been ongoing for some decades. We suggest that it could possibly be made more efficient by focusing on stars from which the…
Our Universe is a vast, tantalizing enigma - a mystery that has aroused humankind's innate curiosity for eons. Begging questions on alien lifeforms have been thus far unfruitful, even with the bounding advancements we have embarked upon in…
First contact with another civilization, or simply another intelligence of some kind, will likely be quite different depending on whether that intelligence is more or less advanced than ourselves. If we assume that the lifetime distribution…
In the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), the highly incomplete sampling of the technosignature search space is often considered as a plausible explanation for the persistent lack of detections over six decades of searches. If…
A recently discovered group of nearby co-orbital objects is an attractive location for extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) to locate a probe to observe Earth while not being easily seen. These near-Earth objects provide an ideal way to…
The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) has historically focused on detecting electromagnetic technosignatures, implicitly assuming that alien civilisations are biological and technologically analogous to ourselves. This paper…
Cosmology seems extremely remote from everyday human practice and experience. It is usually taken for granted that cosmological data cannot rationally influence our beliefs about the fate of humanity -- and possible other intelligent…
The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) is a research activity that started in the late 1950s, predating the arrival of "Big History" and "Astrobiology" by several decades. Many elements first developed as part of the original…
At this early stage of its passage through our Solar System, 3I/ATLAS, the recently discovered interstellar interloper, has displayed various anomalous characteristics, determined from photometric and astrometric observations. As largely a…
Motivated by recent developments impacting our view of Fermi's paradox (absence of extraterrestrials and their manifestations from our past light cone), we suggest a reassessment of the problem itself, as well as of strategies employed by…
Humankind faces many existential threats, but has limited resources to mitigate them. Choosing how and when to deploy those resources is, therefore, a fateful decision. Here, I analyze the priority for allocating resources to mitigate the…
Technological systems increasingly mediate human information exchange, spanning interactions among humans as well as between humans and artificial agents. The unprecedented scale and reliance on information disseminated through these…
Imagining what life on other planets, and intelligent life in particular, may be like is a long-running theme in human culture. It is a manifestation of the innate human curiosity about the Cosmos, and it has inspired numerous works of art…
There is a substantial and ever-growing corpus of evidence and literature exploring the impacts of Artificial intelligence (AI) technologies on society, politics, and humanity as a whole. A separate, parallel body of work has explored…
Throughout recorded history, humans have crossed national borders to seek safety in nearby countries. The reasons for displacement have been generated by phenomena of terrestrial origin, but exposure to unexpected extra-terrestrial threats…
As progress in AI continues to advance, it is important to know how advanced systems will make choices and in what ways they may fail. Machines can already outsmart humans in some domains, and understanding how to safely build ones which…
Use of artificial intelligence is growing and expanding into applications that impact people's lives. People trust their technology without really understanding it or its limitations. There is the potential for harm and we are already…