December 10, 2025 • 48 mins
A massive new study reveals that almost everyone believes intelligent extraterrestrial life exists, yet we vastly underestimate how many of our friends and neighbors share this belief — hiding our convictions like a shameful secret even though nearly all of us feel the same way.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
A massive new study reveals that almost everybody believes intelligent
extraterrestrial life exists, yet we vastly underestimate how many of
our friends and neighbors share this belief, hiding our convictions
like a shameful secret, even though nearly all of us
feel the same way. I'm Darren Marler, and this is
weird dark news. There's a peculiar silence that settles over
(00:35):
dinner tables when the conversation drifts towards life beyond Earth.
People shift in their seats, change the subject, or offer
non committal responses that betray nothing of their actual convictions.
Maybe you've done this yourself, given a vague answer about
how the universe is pretty big, rather than saying what
you actually think. The reason for this awkwardness, according to
(00:58):
the groundbreaking new study from Harvard University in Reichman University,
isn't skepticism. It's the exact opposite. Almost everyone at that
table believes we're not alone in the universe. They just
don't realize that everybody else at the table believes that too.
They're all staying quiet for the same reason, fear of
being the odd one out while surrounded by people who
(01:19):
feel exactly the same way. In other words, you might
be sitting there thinking that you're the weird one for
believing in aliens, while the person across from you is
thinking the exact same thing about themselves, and so is
the person next to them, and so is everybody else
at the table. You're all keeping quiet to avoid judgment
from people who would actually agree with you. It's like
(01:40):
a room full of people who all secretly love the
same guilty pleasure song, but nobody will admit it because
they assume everyone else has better taste. Then one day
someone finally plays it out loud and suddenly everyone's singing along.
That's what this study discovered, except instead of a song,
it's the belief that intelligent life exists somewhere out there
(02:03):
in the cosmos. In November twenty twenty five, researchers omer
Aldaandi from Reichman Universities, be Eaveter School of Psychology, Gershan Tennenbaum,
and Harvard astronomer Abraham A. Vi Loebe published their findings
after surveying six one hundred fourteen people. The sample was
not random, and that's actually important to understanding what makes
(02:24):
these results so striking. These were highly educated individuals with
strong scientific engagement. More than seventy seven percent held at
least a bachelor's degree, and roughly sixty eight percent reported
high to very high interest in scientific topics. These are
exactly the kinds of people you'd expect to be the
most cautious about extraordinary claims, the people most likely to
(02:47):
demand evidence before accepting anything. The folks who pride themselves
on skeptical thinking. So we're not talking about people at
a UFO convention here. These are scientists, engineers, professors, doctors,
people trained to be skeptical, people who would normally say,
show me the proof before believing anything, especially the unusual.
(03:08):
If any group of people it was going to be
cautious about claiming aliens exist, it would be this crowd.
The results were stark. When asked whether intelligent extraterrestrial life
exists somewhere in the universe, ninety five point zero one
percent of participants said yes. We're not talking about a
tentative maybe they exist or probably exist. The majority expressed
(03:33):
strong conviction. A full sixty two point five to nine
percent selected definitely exists rather than merely probably exists. Another
thirty two point four to two percent chose probably exists.
Add those together and you get that ninety five percent figure.
Only one point zero two percent, just sixty two people
(03:54):
out of more than six thousand people believed intelligent extraterrestrial
life definitely or probably does not exist. The remaining roughly
four percent said they were uncertain. Let me put that
another way to help it sink in. If you gathered
one hundred highly educated, scientifically minded people in a room
and asked them privately whether they believe intelligent alien life
(04:16):
exists somewhere out there, ninety five of them would say yes,
only one would say no. The other four would shrug
and say eh. Maybe. That's how overwhelming this belief is
among people who pride themselves on careful, evidence based thinking.
The strange part came when those same participants were asked
a follow up question, how many people in your social
(04:39):
circle do you think share your belief? They estimated around
forty eight point nine four percent, basically half in practical terms.
They looked at their friends, family, and colleagues, people drawn
from the same educated, scientifically engaged population, people statistically just
as likely to believe in extraterrestrial intelligence as they were,
(05:00):
and assumed roughly half of them were skeptics. They figured
they were part of a slim majority at best, maybe
even a minority depending on their particular social group. Think
about what that means for a moment. Nearly everyone believes,
but everyone thinks they're in the minority. It's like being
at a concert where ninety five percent of the audience
(05:20):
secretly loves the band, but everyone's afraid to cheer because
they assume they're surrounded by people who got dragged there
against their will. So everyone just sits there politely, keeping
their enthusiasm to themselves, completely unaware that almost everyone around
them feels the same excitement. The gap between what people
actually believe and what they think others believe measured forty
(05:43):
six point zero seven percentage points. To put that in perspective,
imagine you're taking a test and the correct answer is
ninety five, but you guess forty nine. You'd be off
by almost half. That's how wrong people are about what
their friends and neighbors actually believe about alien life. The
researchers gave this phenomenon a name, the cosmic closet. It's
(06:03):
a vivid metaphor, and it captures something real about how
people treat this particular belief, they keep it tucked away,
hidden from view, brought out only in safe company. If ever,
just like somebody might hide an unpopular opinion or an
embarrassing hobby, people are hiding their belief in extraterrestrial intelligence,
even though that belief turns out to be almost universal.
(06:27):
The term draws on a specific pattern that social psychologists
have been studying for almost a century. They call it
pluralistic ignorance. Now that's a mouthful of academic jargon, so
let me break that down into play. In English, pluralistic
just means involving a group of people. Ignorance means well,
not knowing something. So you put them together and you
(06:47):
get a situation where a whole group of people are
all ignorant, not about the facts, but about what everyone
else in the group is actually thinking. Everyone assumes they
are the odd one out, when in reality, almost everyone
feels the same way. It's ignorance of others' opinions, not
ignorance about the topic itself. This pattern was first identified
(07:09):
way back in the nineteen thirties by a psychologist named
Floyd H. Allport and his students Daniel Katz and Richard L. Shank.
They kept noticing a puzzling pattern in their research groups
of people all pretending to go along with something that
privately none of them actually supported. Everyone was faking agreement
with a position that basically nobody actually agreed on. You've
(07:31):
probably experienced this yourself without knowing it had a fancy name.
Here are some everyday examples that researchers have documented over
the decades. College students who privately feel uncomfortable with heavy
drinking stay silent because they think their peers approve of
the party culture. Meanwhile, their peers are staying silent for
(07:51):
the exact same reason. The result, the drinking culture perpetuates
itself even though most people aren't actually enthusiastic about it.
Everyone's going along with something they think everyone else wants,
when actually most people would prefer something different. Workers and
offices who think a company policy is ridiculous keep their
(08:12):
mouths shut because they assume everyone else supports it. They
don't want to be the one complaining, the negative person,
the troublemaker, but their colleagues are doing the same exact
thing mentally, reaching the exact same conclusion in their own minds,
but stay quiet, so the bad policy continues because nobody
realizes that almost everybody else thinks it's bad too. Here's
(08:37):
an example that might hit a little closer to home,
the classroom scenario. When a professor asks if anyone has
questions and no hands go up, each confused student looks
around at their classmates sitting there calmly, and they make
an assumption. They think to themselves, I'm completely lost, but
I'm not going to raise my hand because I don't
(08:57):
want to look stupid. Besides, nobody else raising their hands,
so they must all understand it. I must be the
only one who's confused. But here's what's actually happening. Every
other confused student in that room is thinking the exact
same thing. They are all lost. They're all afraid to
admit it, though they're all looking at each other's calm
(09:18):
faces like you just did. Assuming everybody else gets it,
the result is a room full of confused people, none
of whom will admit it, all of whom think they
are uniquely lost. The lecture ends, everyone leaves still confused,
and nobody ever finds out they were all in the
same boat. If you've ever sat in a class completely
(09:39):
lost but refused to raise your hand, because you didn't
want to look dumb, only to find out later that
everyone else was just as confused as you. That's this
pattern in action. You were not alone, you just thought
you were. The cosmic closet works the same way, but
the stakes feel higher and the topic feels more loaded.
(10:00):
Admitting you believe intelligent life exists beyond Earth risks being
labeled as gullible on scientific or prone to conspiracy. Thinking
people worry about being lumped in with UFO enthusiasts who
claim to have been abducted, or with folks who think
the government is hiding alien bodies and underground bunkers. The
belief itself that somewhere in a universe containing hundreds of
(10:24):
billions of galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars,
intelligence has arisen more than once is actually fairly modest
when you think about it. It's not claiming aliens of
visited Earth. It's not claiming the government is covering anything up.
It's only saying that, in a universe this impossibly huge,
we're probably not the only intelligent beings who ever existed.
(10:48):
It's a pretty reasonable position given the sheer numbers involved,
but the social associations attached to the topic can feel toxic.
Say you believe in extraterrestrial intelligence at a dinner party,
and suddenly people might wonder if you also believe in
alien abductions, government conspiracies, and crop circles. So people keep quiet.
(11:09):
All because everyone keeps quiet, everyone assumes they are alone
in their belief. It's the difference between believing that statistically
life probably exists somewhere in the vast universe, a pretty
reasonable position given the numbers, and believing that little gray
men are mutilating cattle in Nebraska. Most people can absolutely
(11:29):
separate those two ideas in their own minds, but they're
afraid others can't or won't, so they stay silent about
both just to be safe. The Aldotti ten in bomb
Lobe study built on earlier research that established what scientists
in relevant fields actually believe about extraterrestrial life. This matters
because part of what the researchers wanted to understand was
(11:51):
how accurately regular people perceive expert opinion, and whether learning
what experts actually think changes anyone's mind. In twenty twenty five,
Peter Vickers and colleagues at Durham University's UK Center for
Astrobiology published a survey of five hundred and twenty one
astrobiologists in a scientific journal Nature Astronomy. Now, astrobiologists are
(12:14):
the scientists whose actual job involves thinking about life beyond Earth.
That's literally what they do for a living. They study
the conditions required for life to exist, the places in
the universe where those conditions might be found, and the
methods we might use to detect signs of life if
it's out there. If any group of scientists is going
to have informed opinions on whether extraterrestrial intelligence exists, it's
(12:39):
this one. These aren't hobbyists or enthusiasts or people who
just find the topic interesting. These are the professionals, the
people who have devoted their entire careers to studying whether
life could exist elsewhere and how we might find it.
They have spent years, sometimes decades, thinking about this question.
Their findings revealed an interesting pattern about how scientists think
(13:03):
about different types of alien life. The more complex the
life form, the less certain scientists are that it exists,
but even at the highest level, a majority still think
it's out there. When asked about basic extraterrestrial life, what
scientists typically define as simple organisms, the kind of life
that might exist in underground oceans on Jupiter's moon Europa,
(13:25):
or floating in the clouds of Venus. Eighty six point
six percent of surveyed astrobiologists agreed it likely exists somewhere
in the universe. Only about two percent actively disagreed. That's
an overwhelming majority. This scientific near agreement on basic life
makes sense when you understand the reasoning behind it. Scientists
(13:46):
who hold the mainstream theories about Earth's history believe that
life appeared relatively early in our planet's timeline. The chemistry
required for life, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen isn't rare or special.
These elements are scattered all over the cosmos, and we
keep finding more in more places that might be habitable,
moons with underground oceans, planets in the right temperature zone
(14:09):
around their stars, even some places we never expected. In
other words, the building blocks for life aren't rare or
unique to Earth. They're everywhere. Scientists who subscribed to naturalistic
models theorized that life might arise wherever conditions allow. Those
who hold to a creation model would say that the
presence of these building blocks simply reflects a creator's design
(14:32):
and that life exists because it was intentionally created, not
because it's spontaneously emerged from chemistry. The numbers shifted when
the question turned to complex life multicellular organisms, plants, animals. Here,
sixty seven point four percent of astrobiologists agreed such life
probably exists somewhere, still a solid majority, but noticeably lower
(14:55):
than the eighty seven percent for simple life. The drop
reflects uncertainty about how complex life comes to exist in
the first place. Mainstream scientific theory proposes that complex life
developed gradually from simpler forms over immense stretches of time.
From this viewpoint, that transition might be rare or difficult,
(15:16):
meaning many planets could have simple life, but few would
develop anything more complicated. The creation model offers a different perspective,
that complex life exists because it was designed and created
that way, not because it emerged step by step from
simpler organisms. Under this view, the question of whether complex
life exists elsewhere depends on whether a creator chose to
(15:38):
create it elsewhere, not on probabilities and timelines for intelligent
extraterrestrial life beings capable of technology, communication, the kind of
life we might actually detect or make contact with fifty
eight point two percent of astrobiologists expressed agreement that it
likely exists somewhere. That's still a majority, though smaller than
(15:59):
the other categor sgories. Less than two percent of astrobiologists
actively disagreed with the idea. The rest said they weren't sure,
which is a perfectly reasonable position given that we have
no direct evidence either way. So here's where the experts
actually stand. Among the scientists who study this question for
a living, about eighty seven percent think simple alien life
(16:21):
probably exists somewhere, about sixty seven percent think complex alien
life probably exists somewhere, and about fifty eight percent think
intelligent alien life probably exists somewhere. The numbers drop as
the bar gets higher simple life than complex life than
intelligent life, but even for intelligent beings capable of building technology,
(16:45):
a majority of experts say it's likely real. Scientists from
other fields who were surveyed alongside the astrobiologists showed remarkably
similar numbers, with eighty eight point four percent agreeing basic
life likely exists elsewhere. This similarity challenges a common assumption
that scientists who study astrobiology are unusually optimistic about extraterrestrial
(17:10):
life compared to scientists in other fields they're not. Physicists, chemists,
and biologists who took the survey held essentially the same views.
The belief that life exists elsewhere is not limited to
people who've dedicated their careers to looking for it. This
expert agreement creates an interesting comparison point for understanding how
(17:32):
regular people perceive scientific opinion. When the six one hundred
and fourteen participants in the Eldotti study were asked what
percentage of astrobiology experts believe an intelligent extraterrestrial life, they
guessed sixty seven point sixty three percent. It's actually a
bit higher than the real number of fifty eight point
two percent, so people slightly overestimated how many scientists believe.
(17:56):
That overestimation might seem like good news. It suggests to
regular people have a reasonable sense of what experts think,
maybe even giving scientists a bit more credit than they deserve.
But there's a second layer to this that the researchers identified,
and this one reveals a more interesting gap between perception
and reality. The researchers also asked how strongly do you
(18:18):
think scientists believe this? Not just do they believe, but
how confident are they. When asked what percentage of scientists
definitely believe an intelligent extraterrestrial life as opposed to just
thinking it probably exists, participants guest only twenty one point
one percent. That guest imagines scientists as extremely cautious and hedging,
(18:41):
never really committing to anything without absolute proof, But that's
not what the actual data shows. Scientists who study these
questions aren't all sitting on the fence saying, well, maybe,
I guess we can't be sure. Many of them have
strong convictions based on their interpretation of the evidence, the
size of the universe, the abundance of potentially habitable planets,
(19:05):
and their theoretical models about how life originates. They've concluded
that we're probably not alone. They're not just saying maybe,
a lot of them are saying probably yes. We tend
to imagine scientists as permanently skeptical, always hedging their bets,
never committing to anything without absolute proof, but that's not
how it works in practice. Scientists are humans with opinions
(19:29):
and convictions. They form views based on how they interpret
evidence through their particular frameworks, and when that interpretation points
in a direction, they're willing to say so. On this
particular question, many of them have looked at the data
through the lens of their theoretical models and concluded that
intelligent life elsewhere is more likely than not. Perhaps the
most revealing part of the study came when researchers try
(19:52):
to influence participants' beliefs by revealing the actual expert agreement.
This is a standard technique in research on how people
respond to scientific information. You tell people what experts think
and see if it shifts their views. It often works
in other areas. For example, learning that ninety seven percent
of climate scientists agree on human caused climate change tends
(20:14):
to move public opinion toward accepting climate science. Learning that
medical experts consider vaccines safe and effective tends to increase
vaccination rates. When people find out what the experts actually think,
they often update their own views to match. That's the theory. Anyway.
The thinking goes like this, if people only knew what
(20:34):
the experts actually believe, they'd adjust their own views accordingly.
We assume people want to align with expert opinion, at
least on scientific questions where experts have special knowledge. More
than five thousand participants were shown the Vicar's data. Fifty
eight point two percent of astrobiology experts believe intelligent extraterrestrial
(20:55):
life likely exists. The researchers then measured whether this information
shifted anyone's personal conviction about whether extraterrestrial intelligence is real.
The effect was essentially zero. Basically, nothing changed. People who
believed in extraterrestrial intelligence before learning the expert numbers continued
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believing afterward at the same rate and with the same intensity.
People who were skeptical remained skeptical. People who were uncertain
stayed uncertain. Learning that a majority of scientists share their
belief or don't share it for the skeptics had almost
no impact on what participants themselves thought was true. In
(21:37):
other words, telling people, hey, fifty eight percent of scientists
to study this stuff think intelligent aliens probably exist didn't
change a single person's mind. Not the believers, not the skeptics,
not even the fence sitters. Everyone just kept thinking whatever
they were already thinking. This resistance to expert influence is
(21:58):
surprising because it worked so differently than researchers expected based
on other topics. In many areas, learning that experts hold
a particular view shifts public opinion toward that view. That's
the whole idea behind science communication efforts that emphasize expert agreement.
If people know what scientists think, they'll update their own
(22:18):
beliefs accordingly. But convictions about extraterrestrial intelligence appear to run
deeper than that. They seem anchored in something beyond just
trusting or not trusting scientific authority. These beliefs seem rooted
in personal reasoning or gut feeling that doesn't bend when
somebody in a lab coat expresses an opinion. The researchers
(22:40):
were careful to check whether the information actually got through
to participants. They tested whether people remembered and understood what
they had been told. After showing people the expert agreement figure,
they asked participants to recall what percentage of scientists believed
in extraterrestrial intelligence. A full eighty three point five to
one percent to participants correctly remembered the fifty eight point
(23:03):
two percent figure. So the information got through. People heard it,
they processed it, they understood it, They could repeat it
back accurately. Still, it didn't change what they personally believed.
They heard the information, they understood it, they remembered it.
They just didn't care their minds were already made up.
(23:23):
This finding tells us something important about how beliefs regarding
extraterrestrial intelligence work. These aren't views that people update based
on new evidence or expert opinion, the way they might
update beliefs about, say, the effectiveness of a new medication
or the safety of a building material. These are convictions
that seemed to come from somewhere more fundamental. Maybe it's
(23:45):
from contemplating the sheer size of the universe and drawing
conclusions that feel self evident when you look up at
the night sky and think about the scale of it
all billions of galaxies, each with billions of stars, many
of those stars with their own planets. To conclude that
we must not be alone can feel less like a
belief and more like basic math. There's just too much
(24:06):
out there for us to be the only ones. Or
maybe those convictions come from a deeper philosophical stance about
humanity's place in the cosmos. Do we see ourselves as
special and unique or as one example of something that
probably happens all over the universe. Either way, once someone
has arrived at their conclusion about alien life, whether through
(24:28):
contemplating the numbers, through philosophical reasoning or through some gut
level intuition. No expert opinion seems capable of changing their mind.
The belief is just too deeply held. The Studi's psychological
analysis went beyond just measuring what people believe to identify
factors that predicted how strongly people believe that extraterrestrial intelligence.
(24:50):
Some of these predictors were expected, others were more surprising. First,
and most predictably, consumption of UFO and UAP content. People
who regu regularly read, watch, or listen to material about
unidentified aerial phenomena, We're more likely to express strong conviction
that intelligent extraterrestrial life exists. This connection makes intuitive sense,
(25:13):
but it does raise a chicken and egg question that
even the scientists couldn't answer definitively. Does UFO content create
believers by exposing them to evidence and arguments they find compelling?
In other words, do people start out skeptical, then watch
some documentaries or listen to some podcasts and gradually become convinced?
Or is it the other way around? Do people who
(25:35):
already believe seek out UFO content because it matches what
they already think is true? In other words, do you
enjoy the stories I bring you in the Weird Darkness
Podcast because I inform you and educate you on subjects
and change your point of view? Or do you enjoy
the stories because they simply reinforce what you already believe
(25:55):
to be true. Apparently even scientists have difficulty answering that question. Question.
The study found a clear connection between consuming this type
of content and believing strongly in extraterrestrial intelligence, but it
couldn't tell us which came first. Maybe both things are
true for different people. Second, low anthropocentrism. This is a
(26:17):
term for the degree to which someone believes humans occupy
a special or central place in the universe. Let me
unpack that in plain English. Some people believe humans are special,
that we are the pinnacle of creation, the most important
beings in the universe, the whole point of everything. This
view puts humanity at the center of cosmic significance. Other
(26:39):
people see humans as just one species among potentially many,
not uniquely special, just one example of what happens when
the right conditions come together on a planet. Participants who
rejected human specialness, who saw humanity as one species among
potentially many, rather than as the unique pinnacle of cosmic creation,
they were more likely to believe in extraterrestric real intelligence.
(27:01):
This makes logical sense if you think it through. Scientists
and philosophers sometimes call this the Copernican principle, named after
the astronomer who figured out that Earth is not the
center of the Solar System. The idea is that Earth
and humanity are not privileged observers sitting at the center
of everything. We just occupy a typical position in a
vast cosmos. The logic runs like this, If Earth is
(27:25):
not special, if there's nothing unique about our planet, or
our Solar system or our galaxy, then the conditions that
produced intelligent life here should have produced it elsewhere too.
The universe should be full of consciousnesses, not empty except
for one lonely outpost. That's opposed to the special creation belief,
where a creator brought the Earth into existence, making it
(27:46):
special in the universe, so only intelligent life would exist
here unless that same creator worked similarly on another world
elsewhere in the universe. Your view on human specialness shapes
how you interpret the evidence. If you think we are
cosmically unique, then our existence doesn't tell you anything about
what exists elsewhere. If you think we're cosmically typical, then
(28:08):
our existence suggests similar things probably happened in lots of
other places. Third, and perhaps most interesting from a psychological perspective,
institutional distrust. Participants who expressed less trust in official institutions, governments,
major organizations, established authorities showed greater openness to the possibility
(28:30):
of extraterrestrial existence. This finding can be interpreted in different ways,
and the researchers were careful not to jump to conclusions.
One interpretation is that belief in extraterrestrial intelligence connects to
conspiratorial thinking, the suspicion that governments are hiding evidence of contact,
that official denials are actually cover ups, that the truth
(28:52):
is being suppressed by powerful interests. The long history of
UFO conspiracy theories makes this interpretation reasonable, but there is
another way to read it. Institutional skepticism might simply mean
someone's more willing to think for themselves on topics where
official sources don't give clear answers. Someone who doesn't automatically
(29:12):
trust what authorities say might be more willing to form
their own independent judgments on all sorts of questions, including
questions where the official position is basically silence. So which
is it. Are people who distrust institutions more open to
alien life because they think the government is covering something up,
or are they simply more willing to think independently on
(29:34):
any topic where official sources don't provide clear guidance. The
study can tell us there's a connection between institutional distrust
and belief in extraterrestrial intelligence, but it cannot tell us
why that connection exists. Maybe it's both explanations, Maybe it
depends on the individual person. Religious factors also played a
(29:54):
role in shaping beliefs about extraterrestrial life, based on earlier
research from the Pere Research S. In June twenty twenty one,
Pew surveyed ten four hundred and seventeen American adults on
questions about intelligent life beyond Earth. The main finding was
that sixty five percent of Americans believed intelligent life exists
on other planets. That's lower than the ninety five percent
(30:17):
figure in the Aldatti study, but it makes sense. The
Aldatti sample was specifically selected for high education and strong
scientific interest, while the Pew survey was meant to represent
all American adults. What the Pew data revealed about religious
belief was striking. Americans who attend religious services on at
least a weekly basis were considerably less likely to say
(30:40):
intelligent life exists Elsewhere, only forty four percent agreed, compared
to seventy five percent of those who seldom or never
attend services. Similarly, around half of Americans who said religion
is very important to them believed in extraterrestrial intelligence, compared
to roughly three quarters of those who said religion is
less important in their lives. Atheists showed particularly strong belief
(31:04):
at eighty five percent, while only fifty seven percent of
Christians overall agreed. The connection between being more religious and
being more skeptical about extraterrestrial life makes sense when you
think about it from multiple angles. Many religious traditions emphasize
human specialness, the idea that humanity was created in the
image of God, or that Earth was specifically designed as
(31:26):
a home for human life, or that humans have a
unique relationship with the Divine that no other beings share.
Extraterrestrial intelligence complicates that story. If there are other intelligent
beings in the universe, it raises some difficult theological questions
that don't have easy answers. Does God have a relationship
with those beings too. Were they also created in the
(31:49):
divine image? If humans fell from grace and needed salvation,
did aliens fall to do they need saving? These are
genuine theological puzzles, and for some believers, the simpler solution
is to maintain that we're alone, that God created one
intelligent species on one special planet, and that's it. That's
not to say religious belief and belief in extraterrestrial life
(32:11):
can't coexist. Plenty of religious people believe in both. Yours
truly included. The Catholic Church, for example, has said the
belief in extraterrestrials would not contradict faith, But the pattern
in the data is clear. On average, the more important
religion is in someone's life, the less likely they are
to think intelligent aliens exist. Age also mattered in the
(32:33):
Pew data. Younger Americans believed most strongly. Seventy six percent
of adults under thirty said intelligent life exists on other planets,
compared to fifty seven percent of those over fifty. Men
were more likely than women to express this belief seventy
percent versus sixty percent. These demographic patterns have held relatively
stable across multiple surveys over the years. The cosmic closet
(32:57):
phenomenon carries real consequence is beyond individual awkwardness at dinner parties.
When nearly everyone holds a belief but assumes they are
in the minority, it shapes what gets discussed openly, what
gets funded by research institutions, and what gets taken seriously
by gigkeepers. In science and media, the collective silence creates
(33:18):
a feedback loop. People stay quiet because they think they
are unusual, and because everyone stays quiet, everyone continues to
think they are unusual. It's a self perpetuating cycle that
feeds on itself. Nobody talks about it because they think
nobody else believes it, and because nobody talks about it,
everyone continues to think nobody else believes it. Round and
(33:40):
round it goes. Alvielobe has spent years navigating this dynamic
in his own professional life. The Harvard astronomer is the
head of the Galileo Project, launched in twenty twenty one
to bring the search for extraterrestrial technological signatures in the
mainstream scientific research. The project's explicit goal is to move
(34:00):
the search for evidence of alien technology from accidental or
anecdotal observations and legends to the mainstream of transparent, validated,
and systematic scientific research. In plain terms, Loeb wants to
take the search for alien technology out of the realm
of UFO enthusiasts and amateur investigators and put it into
the hands of serious scientists using serious scientific methods. His
(34:24):
argument is that this is a legitimate scientific question that
deserves legitimate scientific investigation. Loeb's credentials are extensive by any measure.
He's the Frank B. Baar Junior Professor of Science at Harvard,
director of the Institute for Theory and Computation at the
Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, founding director of Harvard's Black
(34:45):
Hole Initiative, and previously served as chair of Harvard's Department
of Astronomy for nine years, the longest tenure in that role.
He's published over one thousand scientific papers with excellent citation records,
holds membership of the American Academy of Arts se Sciences,
and the American Psychical Society, and previously served on the
President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology at the
(35:07):
White House. He shared the Board on Physics and Astronomy
of the National Academies. His ted talk was among the
ten most popular of twenty twenty four by the standard
measures of academic success and influence. He's at the very
top of his field. This isn't some fringe character operating
out of a basement or someone with questionable credentials making
(35:27):
wild claims. This is one of the most accomplished and
respected astronomers in the world, someone whose credentials would make
most scientists envious, someone who's held positions of leadership and
major scientific institutions. Yet his work on potential extraterrestrial technology
has drawn criticism from some colleagues, who view such research
(35:48):
as outside the bounds of serious astronomy. His twenty twenty
one book Extraterrestrial The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth,
which argued that the interstellar object of Muamua It might
have been an artifact of alien technology based on its
unusual physical properties, sparked intense debate within the scientific community.
Some astronomers praised his willingness to consider unconventional possibilities. Others
(36:12):
accused him of making claims that went beyond what the
evidence could support. A prioritizing publicity over scientific caution of
wandering into territory where he lacked specific expertise. The Galileo
project itself receives private funding from donors rather than federal grants.
This is not by choice. Federal agencies have declined to
(36:34):
fund extraterrestrial intelligence research since nineteen ninety three, when Congress
cut NASA's SETI program. SETI stands for the Search for
Extraterrestrial Intelligence, and it was a government funded program to
scan the skies for alien signals. After Congress pulled the plug,
the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute and other organizations focused
(36:55):
on detecting alien signals have survived on private donations ever since.
Think about what that means. A majority of the public
believes in extraterrestrial intelligence, a majority of relevant scientific experts
think it probably exists, and yet government funding for researching
the question remains essentially at zero. The topic is considered
(37:16):
too embarrassing, too fringe, too likely to attract ridicule, even
though the belief itself is mainstream by any measure. Let
that sink in for a moment. Most people believe aliens
probably exist. Most scientists who study the question believe aliens
probably exist, but the government won't spend money looking for
them because the topic is seen is too weird or
(37:38):
too risky. It's professionally embarrassing to work on, even though
almost everyone privately thinks it's a legitimate question. The studies
authors suggest this disconnect between private belief and public discussion
creates a barrier that has nothing to do with skepticism.
The challenge isn't persuading people that extraterrestrial intelligence might exists.
(38:00):
Most already believe it does. The general public believes it,
scientists believe it, The educated, scientifically engaged population surveyed in
this study believes it overwhelmingly. The challenge is creating additions
where that near universal belief can be expressed without professional
penalty for scientists or social penalty for everyone else. As
(38:21):
loeb Is pointed out in his writing, claiming that Earth
hosts the only technological civilization in a universe containing more
than ten to the twenty second power potentially habitable planets
requires stronger justification than simply remaining open to evidence of
extraterrestrial technology. That number ten to the twenty second power
is a one, followed by twenty two zeros. It's an
(38:44):
almost incomprehensibly large number. Of potentially habitable worlds. The extraordinary
claim by this logic isn't that aliens might exist. The
extraordinary claim is that we are cosmically alone, despite all
those opportunities for a life to arise elsewhere. When you
think about it from the mainstream scientific perspective, the burden
(39:04):
of proof flips around. Given the size of the universe
and the abundance of Earth like planets, shouldn't we have
to prove we're alone rather than prove we're not. From
this viewpoint, claiming where the only intelligent life in the
universe is the position that needs extraordinary evidence. Unfortunately, it's
also impossible to prove a negative. Those who hold to
(39:25):
a creation model see it differently, though. The questions not
about probability or time. It's about purpose and design. If
the Creator made Earth and its inhabitants for a specific purpose,
then the size of the universe tells us nothing about
whether life exists elsewhere. That would depend entirely on the
creator's intentions, not on statistics. The study's findings add an
(39:45):
unexpected psychological dimension to one of astronomy's oldest puzzles, the
Fermi paradox. In nineteen fifty physicist Enrico Fermi was having
lunch with some colleagues when the conversation turned to extraterrestrial life.
The the middle of the discussion, Fermi reportedly asked a
simple question, where is everybody? The question became famous because
(40:07):
it captured a genuine puzzle that scientists have been wrestling
with ever since. The logic goes like this, If the
universe is vast, it is, if it's as old as
mainstream science estimates, and it's full of habitable planets it
appears to be, and if intelligent life can emerge through
natural processes, then alien civilizations should have had plenty of
(40:30):
time to develop advanced technology, spread out across the galaxy
and either visit us or at least send signals we
could detect. Our galaxy alone contains hundreds of billions of stars.
Based on this reasoning, even if intelligent life is rare,
it should exist somewhere else by now, probably in multiple places.
(40:51):
So where is everybody? Why haven't we seen any evidence
of them? Of course, this puzzle assumes a particular framework,
one where life arises naturally given enough time and the
right conditions. Those who hold to a creation model might
frame the question differently, not why hasn't life had time
to develop elsewhere? But rather did the creator choose to
(41:13):
create life elsewhere? The Fermi paradox is really only a
paradox if you accept certain assumptions about how life originates
and how old the universe is. That's the Fermi paradox
in a nutshell, the apparent contradiction between the high probability
that alien civilizations exist and the complete lack of evidence
that they do. Various solutions to the Fermi paradox have
(41:36):
been proposed over the decades, at least for those who
accept its underlying assumptions. Maybe intelligent life is far rarer
than scientists assume. Maybe the steps required for life to
arise and develop intelligence through natural processes are so unlikely
that it basically never happens. Maybe civilizations tend to destroy
(41:57):
themselves before achieving interstellar travel nuclear weapons, or create environmental catastrophes,
or develop artificial intelligence that turns against them, and they
wipe themselves out before they can spread to other star systems.
Maybe the distances between stars are simply too vast to
cross even for advanced civilizations. Maybe aliens are out there
(42:19):
but have chosen not to contact us, perhaps because they're
not interested, or because they have concluded we're not ready,
or because they have a policy of non interference with
developing civilizations. Maybe they're communicating in ways we can't detect
or haven't thought to look for. The cosmic closet findings
suggest another factor worth considering. Maybe we're not looking hard enough,
(42:44):
and maybe we're not looking hard enough partly because the
topic carries social stigma that discourages serious engagement. If ninety
five percent of educated, scientifically engaged adults believe extraterrestrial intelligence exists,
but government funding for research on the topic remains near zero,
and scientists to pursue such research risk professional criticism and marginalization,
(43:08):
then our failure to find evidence might say less about
what's actually out there than about how seriously we've actually
been looking. Maybe the answer to where is everybody is
partly we haven't really been trying to find out, not
with the resources, funding, and seriousness the question deserves. Anyway.
This isn't to say that extraterrestrial intelligence definitely exists, or
(43:30):
that we'd find it if we just spent more money
on research. The universe might genuinely be empty of other minds,
that's possible, but the cosmic clauset creates a mystery of
its own, a situation where a scientific question is simultaneously
considered fascinating by almost everyone and embarrassing to pursue professionally.
(43:50):
That combination doesn't seem like it would lead to rigorous,
well funded investigation. The cosmic clauset represents a strange collective
state for humanity to find itself in. Billions of people
around the world are privately convinced that intelligence exists beyond Earth,
yet many of them are equally convinced they hold a
(44:10):
minority opinion. They stay quiet at dinner parties, hedge their
answers in casual conversation, and assume that people around them
would judge them for beliefs. Those sane people almost certainly share.
Everyone's hiding the same thing from everyone else, and no
one realizes they're all hiding the same thing. We are
(44:30):
a planet full of people who believe in aliens, all
pretending we don't because we think everyone else doesn't, and
the silence feeds on itself, reinforcing everyone's false assumption that
they're unusual. The Pure Research data from twenty twenty one
found demographic patterns that have remained consistent across surveys for years.
(44:51):
The generational differences in belief might suggest that conviction about
extraterrestrial intelligence is growing over time as older generations are
replace by younger ones who grew up with a different
cultural relationship to the idea. Kids today grow up with
stories about space exploration, with movies and TV shows featuring
alien life, with news about discovering planets around other stars.
(45:14):
Maybe that shapes how they think about the question. Or
the generational difference might reflect something about how beliefs change
as people age. Maybe young people are more open to
speculative ideas generally and become more skeptical as they get older.
Only research tracking the same individuals over decades could tell
us which explanation is right. A twenty seventeen survey by
(45:36):
the research firm Glocalities across twenty four countries found that
forty seven percent of respondents globally believed in the existence
of intelligent alien civilizations in the universe. That's lower than
the ninety five percent figure in the Aldotti study, but
the Glocalities survey was designed to represent the general population
rather than specifically educated, scientifically interested people. Even in the
(46:00):
general population, nearly half of humanity believes were not alone.
That's a lot of people sharing a belief they might
be hesitant to express out loud. Studies in Sweden and
Peru have found even higher rates of belief among university students.
A survey of Swedish high school and university students found
that ninety percent believed in the existence of extraterrestrial life.
(46:22):
A similar study of twelve hundred and thirty seven Peruvian
university students found ninety two percent believed in life beyond Earth.
Neither studies specified intelligent life versus basic life, so those
numbers likely include people who believe in alien microbes as
well as people who believe in alien civilizations, but they
reinforce the overall pattern. Belief in extraterrestrial life is common,
(46:45):
especially among educated young people. The gap between what we
believe and what we think others believe creates a peculiar
form of isolation. In a universe potentially teeming with intelligent life,
we've managed to make ourselves feel alone, even among our
own species, not because we disagree about what's out there,
(47:05):
but because we won't admit we agree. The silence perpetuates itself.
Each person who stays quiet reinforces everyone else's assumption that's
speaking up would be risky. The Aldanti tenenbaumb Lobe study
was submitted for peer review in November twenty twenty five
and posted to the ARCSIV preprint Server, a repository where
scientists share their research before it goes through the formal
(47:27):
publication process. It joins a growing body of research from
Reichman University and Harvard examining not just what people believe
about extraterrestrial life, but how those beliefs interact with social perception,
scientific communication, and the psychological barriers to discussing questions that
most of us, it turns out, already think we know
the answer to the cosmic closet exists not because people
(47:51):
disagree about whether we're alone in the universe, but because
they've been afraid to find out they agree, And maybe
the first step out of that closet is simply knowing
that almost everyone else is in there with you, waiting
for someone to speak up first. If you'd like to
read this story for yourself or share the article with
a friend, you can read it on the Weird Darkness website.
(48:11):
I've placed a link to it in the episode description,
and you can find more stories of the paranormal, true crime, strange,
and more, including numerous stories that never make it to
the podcast in my Weird darknewsblog at Weird Darkness dot
com slash news
A massive new study reveals that almost everybody believes intelligent
extraterrestrial life exists, yet we vastly underestimate how many of
our friends and neighbors share this belief, hiding our convictions
like a shameful secret, even though nearly all of us
feel the same way. I'm Darren Marler, and this is
weird dark news. There's a peculiar silence that settles over
(00:35):
dinner tables when the conversation drifts towards life beyond Earth.
People shift in their seats, change the subject, or offer
non committal responses that betray nothing of their actual convictions.
Maybe you've done this yourself, given a vague answer about
how the universe is pretty big, rather than saying what
you actually think. The reason for this awkwardness, according to
(00:58):
the groundbreaking new study from Harvard University in Reichman University,
isn't skepticism. It's the exact opposite. Almost everyone at that
table believes we're not alone in the universe. They just
don't realize that everybody else at the table believes that too.
They're all staying quiet for the same reason, fear of
being the odd one out while surrounded by people who
(01:19):
feel exactly the same way. In other words, you might
be sitting there thinking that you're the weird one for
believing in aliens, while the person across from you is
thinking the exact same thing about themselves, and so is
the person next to them, and so is everybody else
at the table. You're all keeping quiet to avoid judgment
from people who would actually agree with you. It's like
(01:40):
a room full of people who all secretly love the
same guilty pleasure song, but nobody will admit it because
they assume everyone else has better taste. Then one day
someone finally plays it out loud and suddenly everyone's singing along.
That's what this study discovered, except instead of a song,
it's the belief that intelligent life exists somewhere out there
(02:03):
in the cosmos. In November twenty twenty five, researchers omer
Aldaandi from Reichman Universities, be Eaveter School of Psychology, Gershan Tennenbaum,
and Harvard astronomer Abraham A. Vi Loebe published their findings
after surveying six one hundred fourteen people. The sample was
not random, and that's actually important to understanding what makes
(02:24):
these results so striking. These were highly educated individuals with
strong scientific engagement. More than seventy seven percent held at
least a bachelor's degree, and roughly sixty eight percent reported
high to very high interest in scientific topics. These are
exactly the kinds of people you'd expect to be the
most cautious about extraordinary claims, the people most likely to
(02:47):
demand evidence before accepting anything. The folks who pride themselves
on skeptical thinking. So we're not talking about people at
a UFO convention here. These are scientists, engineers, professors, doctors,
people trained to be skeptical, people who would normally say,
show me the proof before believing anything, especially the unusual.
(03:08):
If any group of people it was going to be
cautious about claiming aliens exist, it would be this crowd.
The results were stark. When asked whether intelligent extraterrestrial life
exists somewhere in the universe, ninety five point zero one
percent of participants said yes. We're not talking about a
tentative maybe they exist or probably exist. The majority expressed
(03:33):
strong conviction. A full sixty two point five to nine
percent selected definitely exists rather than merely probably exists. Another
thirty two point four to two percent chose probably exists.
Add those together and you get that ninety five percent figure.
Only one point zero two percent, just sixty two people
(03:54):
out of more than six thousand people believed intelligent extraterrestrial
life definitely or probably does not exist. The remaining roughly
four percent said they were uncertain. Let me put that
another way to help it sink in. If you gathered
one hundred highly educated, scientifically minded people in a room
and asked them privately whether they believe intelligent alien life
(04:16):
exists somewhere out there, ninety five of them would say yes,
only one would say no. The other four would shrug
and say eh. Maybe. That's how overwhelming this belief is
among people who pride themselves on careful, evidence based thinking.
The strange part came when those same participants were asked
a follow up question, how many people in your social
(04:39):
circle do you think share your belief? They estimated around
forty eight point nine four percent, basically half in practical terms.
They looked at their friends, family, and colleagues, people drawn
from the same educated, scientifically engaged population, people statistically just
as likely to believe in extraterrestrial intelligence as they were,
(05:00):
and assumed roughly half of them were skeptics. They figured
they were part of a slim majority at best, maybe
even a minority depending on their particular social group. Think
about what that means for a moment. Nearly everyone believes,
but everyone thinks they're in the minority. It's like being
at a concert where ninety five percent of the audience
(05:20):
secretly loves the band, but everyone's afraid to cheer because
they assume they're surrounded by people who got dragged there
against their will. So everyone just sits there politely, keeping
their enthusiasm to themselves, completely unaware that almost everyone around
them feels the same excitement. The gap between what people
actually believe and what they think others believe measured forty
(05:43):
six point zero seven percentage points. To put that in perspective,
imagine you're taking a test and the correct answer is
ninety five, but you guess forty nine. You'd be off
by almost half. That's how wrong people are about what
their friends and neighbors actually believe about alien life. The
researchers gave this phenomenon a name, the cosmic closet. It's
(06:03):
a vivid metaphor, and it captures something real about how
people treat this particular belief, they keep it tucked away,
hidden from view, brought out only in safe company. If ever,
just like somebody might hide an unpopular opinion or an
embarrassing hobby, people are hiding their belief in extraterrestrial intelligence,
even though that belief turns out to be almost universal.
(06:27):
The term draws on a specific pattern that social psychologists
have been studying for almost a century. They call it
pluralistic ignorance. Now that's a mouthful of academic jargon, so
let me break that down into play. In English, pluralistic
just means involving a group of people. Ignorance means well,
not knowing something. So you put them together and you
(06:47):
get a situation where a whole group of people are
all ignorant, not about the facts, but about what everyone
else in the group is actually thinking. Everyone assumes they
are the odd one out, when in reality, almost everyone
feels the same way. It's ignorance of others' opinions, not
ignorance about the topic itself. This pattern was first identified
(07:09):
way back in the nineteen thirties by a psychologist named
Floyd H. Allport and his students Daniel Katz and Richard L. Shank.
They kept noticing a puzzling pattern in their research groups
of people all pretending to go along with something that
privately none of them actually supported. Everyone was faking agreement
with a position that basically nobody actually agreed on. You've
(07:31):
probably experienced this yourself without knowing it had a fancy name.
Here are some everyday examples that researchers have documented over
the decades. College students who privately feel uncomfortable with heavy
drinking stay silent because they think their peers approve of
the party culture. Meanwhile, their peers are staying silent for
(07:51):
the exact same reason. The result, the drinking culture perpetuates
itself even though most people aren't actually enthusiastic about it.
Everyone's going along with something they think everyone else wants,
when actually most people would prefer something different. Workers and
offices who think a company policy is ridiculous keep their
(08:12):
mouths shut because they assume everyone else supports it. They
don't want to be the one complaining, the negative person,
the troublemaker, but their colleagues are doing the same exact
thing mentally, reaching the exact same conclusion in their own minds,
but stay quiet, so the bad policy continues because nobody
realizes that almost everybody else thinks it's bad too. Here's
(08:37):
an example that might hit a little closer to home,
the classroom scenario. When a professor asks if anyone has
questions and no hands go up, each confused student looks
around at their classmates sitting there calmly, and they make
an assumption. They think to themselves, I'm completely lost, but
I'm not going to raise my hand because I don't
(08:57):
want to look stupid. Besides, nobody else raising their hands,
so they must all understand it. I must be the
only one who's confused. But here's what's actually happening. Every
other confused student in that room is thinking the exact
same thing. They are all lost. They're all afraid to
admit it, though they're all looking at each other's calm
(09:18):
faces like you just did. Assuming everybody else gets it,
the result is a room full of confused people, none
of whom will admit it, all of whom think they
are uniquely lost. The lecture ends, everyone leaves still confused,
and nobody ever finds out they were all in the
same boat. If you've ever sat in a class completely
(09:39):
lost but refused to raise your hand, because you didn't
want to look dumb, only to find out later that
everyone else was just as confused as you. That's this
pattern in action. You were not alone, you just thought
you were. The cosmic closet works the same way, but
the stakes feel higher and the topic feels more loaded.
(10:00):
Admitting you believe intelligent life exists beyond Earth risks being
labeled as gullible on scientific or prone to conspiracy. Thinking
people worry about being lumped in with UFO enthusiasts who
claim to have been abducted, or with folks who think
the government is hiding alien bodies and underground bunkers. The
belief itself that somewhere in a universe containing hundreds of
(10:24):
billions of galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars,
intelligence has arisen more than once is actually fairly modest
when you think about it. It's not claiming aliens of
visited Earth. It's not claiming the government is covering anything up.
It's only saying that, in a universe this impossibly huge,
we're probably not the only intelligent beings who ever existed.
(10:48):
It's a pretty reasonable position given the sheer numbers involved,
but the social associations attached to the topic can feel toxic.
Say you believe in extraterrestrial intelligence at a dinner party,
and suddenly people might wonder if you also believe in
alien abductions, government conspiracies, and crop circles. So people keep quiet.
(11:09):
All because everyone keeps quiet, everyone assumes they are alone
in their belief. It's the difference between believing that statistically
life probably exists somewhere in the vast universe, a pretty
reasonable position given the numbers, and believing that little gray
men are mutilating cattle in Nebraska. Most people can absolutely
(11:29):
separate those two ideas in their own minds, but they're
afraid others can't or won't, so they stay silent about
both just to be safe. The Aldotti ten in bomb
Lobe study built on earlier research that established what scientists
in relevant fields actually believe about extraterrestrial life. This matters
because part of what the researchers wanted to understand was
(11:51):
how accurately regular people perceive expert opinion, and whether learning
what experts actually think changes anyone's mind. In twenty twenty five,
Peter Vickers and colleagues at Durham University's UK Center for
Astrobiology published a survey of five hundred and twenty one
astrobiologists in a scientific journal Nature Astronomy. Now, astrobiologists are
(12:14):
the scientists whose actual job involves thinking about life beyond Earth.
That's literally what they do for a living. They study
the conditions required for life to exist, the places in
the universe where those conditions might be found, and the
methods we might use to detect signs of life if
it's out there. If any group of scientists is going
to have informed opinions on whether extraterrestrial intelligence exists, it's
(12:39):
this one. These aren't hobbyists or enthusiasts or people who
just find the topic interesting. These are the professionals, the
people who have devoted their entire careers to studying whether
life could exist elsewhere and how we might find it.
They have spent years, sometimes decades, thinking about this question.
Their findings revealed an interesting pattern about how scientists think
(13:03):
about different types of alien life. The more complex the
life form, the less certain scientists are that it exists,
but even at the highest level, a majority still think
it's out there. When asked about basic extraterrestrial life, what
scientists typically define as simple organisms, the kind of life
that might exist in underground oceans on Jupiter's moon Europa,
(13:25):
or floating in the clouds of Venus. Eighty six point
six percent of surveyed astrobiologists agreed it likely exists somewhere
in the universe. Only about two percent actively disagreed. That's
an overwhelming majority. This scientific near agreement on basic life
makes sense when you understand the reasoning behind it. Scientists
(13:46):
who hold the mainstream theories about Earth's history believe that
life appeared relatively early in our planet's timeline. The chemistry
required for life, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen isn't rare or special.
These elements are scattered all over the cosmos, and we
keep finding more in more places that might be habitable,
moons with underground oceans, planets in the right temperature zone
(14:09):
around their stars, even some places we never expected. In
other words, the building blocks for life aren't rare or
unique to Earth. They're everywhere. Scientists who subscribed to naturalistic
models theorized that life might arise wherever conditions allow. Those
who hold to a creation model would say that the
presence of these building blocks simply reflects a creator's design
(14:32):
and that life exists because it was intentionally created, not
because it's spontaneously emerged from chemistry. The numbers shifted when
the question turned to complex life multicellular organisms, plants, animals. Here,
sixty seven point four percent of astrobiologists agreed such life
probably exists somewhere, still a solid majority, but noticeably lower
(14:55):
than the eighty seven percent for simple life. The drop
reflects uncertainty about how complex life comes to exist in
the first place. Mainstream scientific theory proposes that complex life
developed gradually from simpler forms over immense stretches of time.
From this viewpoint, that transition might be rare or difficult,
(15:16):
meaning many planets could have simple life, but few would
develop anything more complicated. The creation model offers a different perspective,
that complex life exists because it was designed and created
that way, not because it emerged step by step from
simpler organisms. Under this view, the question of whether complex
life exists elsewhere depends on whether a creator chose to
(15:38):
create it elsewhere, not on probabilities and timelines for intelligent
extraterrestrial life beings capable of technology, communication, the kind of
life we might actually detect or make contact with fifty
eight point two percent of astrobiologists expressed agreement that it
likely exists somewhere. That's still a majority, though smaller than
(15:59):
the other categor sgories. Less than two percent of astrobiologists
actively disagreed with the idea. The rest said they weren't sure,
which is a perfectly reasonable position given that we have
no direct evidence either way. So here's where the experts
actually stand. Among the scientists who study this question for
a living, about eighty seven percent think simple alien life
(16:21):
probably exists somewhere, about sixty seven percent think complex alien
life probably exists somewhere, and about fifty eight percent think
intelligent alien life probably exists somewhere. The numbers drop as
the bar gets higher simple life than complex life than
intelligent life, but even for intelligent beings capable of building technology,
(16:45):
a majority of experts say it's likely real. Scientists from
other fields who were surveyed alongside the astrobiologists showed remarkably
similar numbers, with eighty eight point four percent agreeing basic
life likely exists elsewhere. This similarity challenges a common assumption
that scientists who study astrobiology are unusually optimistic about extraterrestrial
(17:10):
life compared to scientists in other fields they're not. Physicists, chemists,
and biologists who took the survey held essentially the same views.
The belief that life exists elsewhere is not limited to
people who've dedicated their careers to looking for it. This
expert agreement creates an interesting comparison point for understanding how
(17:32):
regular people perceive scientific opinion. When the six one hundred
and fourteen participants in the Eldotti study were asked what
percentage of astrobiology experts believe an intelligent extraterrestrial life, they
guessed sixty seven point sixty three percent. It's actually a
bit higher than the real number of fifty eight point
two percent, so people slightly overestimated how many scientists believe.
(17:56):
That overestimation might seem like good news. It suggests to
regular people have a reasonable sense of what experts think,
maybe even giving scientists a bit more credit than they deserve.
But there's a second layer to this that the researchers identified,
and this one reveals a more interesting gap between perception
and reality. The researchers also asked how strongly do you
(18:18):
think scientists believe this? Not just do they believe, but
how confident are they. When asked what percentage of scientists
definitely believe an intelligent extraterrestrial life as opposed to just
thinking it probably exists, participants guest only twenty one point
one percent. That guest imagines scientists as extremely cautious and hedging,
(18:41):
never really committing to anything without absolute proof, But that's
not what the actual data shows. Scientists who study these
questions aren't all sitting on the fence saying, well, maybe,
I guess we can't be sure. Many of them have
strong convictions based on their interpretation of the evidence, the
size of the universe, the abundance of potentially habitable planets,
(19:05):
and their theoretical models about how life originates. They've concluded
that we're probably not alone. They're not just saying maybe,
a lot of them are saying probably yes. We tend
to imagine scientists as permanently skeptical, always hedging their bets,
never committing to anything without absolute proof, but that's not
how it works in practice. Scientists are humans with opinions
(19:29):
and convictions. They form views based on how they interpret
evidence through their particular frameworks, and when that interpretation points
in a direction, they're willing to say so. On this
particular question, many of them have looked at the data
through the lens of their theoretical models and concluded that
intelligent life elsewhere is more likely than not. Perhaps the
most revealing part of the study came when researchers try
(19:52):
to influence participants' beliefs by revealing the actual expert agreement.
This is a standard technique in research on how people
respond to scientific information. You tell people what experts think
and see if it shifts their views. It often works
in other areas. For example, learning that ninety seven percent
of climate scientists agree on human caused climate change tends
(20:14):
to move public opinion toward accepting climate science. Learning that
medical experts consider vaccines safe and effective tends to increase
vaccination rates. When people find out what the experts actually think,
they often update their own views to match. That's the theory. Anyway.
The thinking goes like this, if people only knew what
(20:34):
the experts actually believe, they'd adjust their own views accordingly.
We assume people want to align with expert opinion, at
least on scientific questions where experts have special knowledge. More
than five thousand participants were shown the Vicar's data. Fifty
eight point two percent of astrobiology experts believe intelligent extraterrestrial
(20:55):
life likely exists. The researchers then measured whether this information
shifted anyone's personal conviction about whether extraterrestrial intelligence is real.
The effect was essentially zero. Basically, nothing changed. People who
believed in extraterrestrial intelligence before learning the expert numbers continued
(21:16):
believing afterward at the same rate and with the same intensity.
People who were skeptical remained skeptical. People who were uncertain
stayed uncertain. Learning that a majority of scientists share their
belief or don't share it for the skeptics had almost
no impact on what participants themselves thought was true. In
(21:37):
other words, telling people, hey, fifty eight percent of scientists
to study this stuff think intelligent aliens probably exist didn't
change a single person's mind. Not the believers, not the skeptics,
not even the fence sitters. Everyone just kept thinking whatever
they were already thinking. This resistance to expert influence is
(21:58):
surprising because it worked so differently than researchers expected based
on other topics. In many areas, learning that experts hold
a particular view shifts public opinion toward that view. That's
the whole idea behind science communication efforts that emphasize expert agreement.
If people know what scientists think, they'll update their own
(22:18):
beliefs accordingly. But convictions about extraterrestrial intelligence appear to run
deeper than that. They seem anchored in something beyond just
trusting or not trusting scientific authority. These beliefs seem rooted
in personal reasoning or gut feeling that doesn't bend when
somebody in a lab coat expresses an opinion. The researchers
(22:40):
were careful to check whether the information actually got through
to participants. They tested whether people remembered and understood what
they had been told. After showing people the expert agreement figure,
they asked participants to recall what percentage of scientists believed
in extraterrestrial intelligence. A full eighty three point five to
one percent to participants correctly remembered the fifty eight point
(23:03):
two percent figure. So the information got through. People heard it,
they processed it, they understood it, They could repeat it
back accurately. Still, it didn't change what they personally believed.
They heard the information, they understood it, they remembered it.
They just didn't care their minds were already made up.
(23:23):
This finding tells us something important about how beliefs regarding
extraterrestrial intelligence work. These aren't views that people update based
on new evidence or expert opinion, the way they might
update beliefs about, say, the effectiveness of a new medication
or the safety of a building material. These are convictions
that seemed to come from somewhere more fundamental. Maybe it's
(23:45):
from contemplating the sheer size of the universe and drawing
conclusions that feel self evident when you look up at
the night sky and think about the scale of it
all billions of galaxies, each with billions of stars, many
of those stars with their own planets. To conclude that
we must not be alone can feel less like a
belief and more like basic math. There's just too much
(24:06):
out there for us to be the only ones. Or
maybe those convictions come from a deeper philosophical stance about
humanity's place in the cosmos. Do we see ourselves as
special and unique or as one example of something that
probably happens all over the universe. Either way, once someone
has arrived at their conclusion about alien life, whether through
(24:28):
contemplating the numbers, through philosophical reasoning or through some gut
level intuition. No expert opinion seems capable of changing their mind.
The belief is just too deeply held. The Studi's psychological
analysis went beyond just measuring what people believe to identify
factors that predicted how strongly people believe that extraterrestrial intelligence.
(24:50):
Some of these predictors were expected, others were more surprising. First,
and most predictably, consumption of UFO and UAP content. People
who regu regularly read, watch, or listen to material about
unidentified aerial phenomena, We're more likely to express strong conviction
that intelligent extraterrestrial life exists. This connection makes intuitive sense,
(25:13):
but it does raise a chicken and egg question that
even the scientists couldn't answer definitively. Does UFO content create
believers by exposing them to evidence and arguments they find compelling?
In other words, do people start out skeptical, then watch
some documentaries or listen to some podcasts and gradually become convinced?
Or is it the other way around? Do people who
(25:35):
already believe seek out UFO content because it matches what
they already think is true? In other words, do you
enjoy the stories I bring you in the Weird Darkness
Podcast because I inform you and educate you on subjects
and change your point of view? Or do you enjoy
the stories because they simply reinforce what you already believe
(25:55):
to be true. Apparently even scientists have difficulty answering that question. Question.
The study found a clear connection between consuming this type
of content and believing strongly in extraterrestrial intelligence, but it
couldn't tell us which came first. Maybe both things are
true for different people. Second, low anthropocentrism. This is a
(26:17):
term for the degree to which someone believes humans occupy
a special or central place in the universe. Let me
unpack that in plain English. Some people believe humans are special,
that we are the pinnacle of creation, the most important
beings in the universe, the whole point of everything. This
view puts humanity at the center of cosmic significance. Other
(26:39):
people see humans as just one species among potentially many,
not uniquely special, just one example of what happens when
the right conditions come together on a planet. Participants who
rejected human specialness, who saw humanity as one species among
potentially many, rather than as the unique pinnacle of cosmic creation,
they were more likely to believe in extraterrestric real intelligence.
(27:01):
This makes logical sense if you think it through. Scientists
and philosophers sometimes call this the Copernican principle, named after
the astronomer who figured out that Earth is not the
center of the Solar System. The idea is that Earth
and humanity are not privileged observers sitting at the center
of everything. We just occupy a typical position in a
vast cosmos. The logic runs like this, If Earth is
(27:25):
not special, if there's nothing unique about our planet, or
our Solar system or our galaxy, then the conditions that
produced intelligent life here should have produced it elsewhere too.
The universe should be full of consciousnesses, not empty except
for one lonely outpost. That's opposed to the special creation belief,
where a creator brought the Earth into existence, making it
(27:46):
special in the universe, so only intelligent life would exist
here unless that same creator worked similarly on another world
elsewhere in the universe. Your view on human specialness shapes
how you interpret the evidence. If you think we are
cosmically unique, then our existence doesn't tell you anything about
what exists elsewhere. If you think we're cosmically typical, then
(28:08):
our existence suggests similar things probably happened in lots of
other places. Third, and perhaps most interesting from a psychological perspective,
institutional distrust. Participants who expressed less trust in official institutions, governments,
major organizations, established authorities showed greater openness to the possibility
(28:30):
of extraterrestrial existence. This finding can be interpreted in different ways,
and the researchers were careful not to jump to conclusions.
One interpretation is that belief in extraterrestrial intelligence connects to
conspiratorial thinking, the suspicion that governments are hiding evidence of contact,
that official denials are actually cover ups, that the truth
(28:52):
is being suppressed by powerful interests. The long history of
UFO conspiracy theories makes this interpretation reasonable, but there is
another way to read it. Institutional skepticism might simply mean
someone's more willing to think for themselves on topics where
official sources don't give clear answers. Someone who doesn't automatically
(29:12):
trust what authorities say might be more willing to form
their own independent judgments on all sorts of questions, including
questions where the official position is basically silence. So which
is it. Are people who distrust institutions more open to
alien life because they think the government is covering something up,
or are they simply more willing to think independently on
(29:34):
any topic where official sources don't provide clear guidance. The
study can tell us there's a connection between institutional distrust
and belief in extraterrestrial intelligence, but it cannot tell us
why that connection exists. Maybe it's both explanations, Maybe it
depends on the individual person. Religious factors also played a
(29:54):
role in shaping beliefs about extraterrestrial life, based on earlier
research from the Pere Research S. In June twenty twenty one,
Pew surveyed ten four hundred and seventeen American adults on
questions about intelligent life beyond Earth. The main finding was
that sixty five percent of Americans believed intelligent life exists
on other planets. That's lower than the ninety five percent
(30:17):
figure in the Aldatti study, but it makes sense. The
Aldatti sample was specifically selected for high education and strong
scientific interest, while the Pew survey was meant to represent
all American adults. What the Pew data revealed about religious
belief was striking. Americans who attend religious services on at
least a weekly basis were considerably less likely to say
(30:40):
intelligent life exists Elsewhere, only forty four percent agreed, compared
to seventy five percent of those who seldom or never
attend services. Similarly, around half of Americans who said religion
is very important to them believed in extraterrestrial intelligence, compared
to roughly three quarters of those who said religion is
less important in their lives. Atheists showed particularly strong belief
(31:04):
at eighty five percent, while only fifty seven percent of
Christians overall agreed. The connection between being more religious and
being more skeptical about extraterrestrial life makes sense when you
think about it from multiple angles. Many religious traditions emphasize
human specialness, the idea that humanity was created in the
image of God, or that Earth was specifically designed as
(31:26):
a home for human life, or that humans have a
unique relationship with the Divine that no other beings share.
Extraterrestrial intelligence complicates that story. If there are other intelligent
beings in the universe, it raises some difficult theological questions
that don't have easy answers. Does God have a relationship
with those beings too. Were they also created in the
(31:49):
divine image? If humans fell from grace and needed salvation,
did aliens fall to do they need saving? These are
genuine theological puzzles, and for some believers, the simpler solution
is to maintain that we're alone, that God created one
intelligent species on one special planet, and that's it. That's
not to say religious belief and belief in extraterrestrial life
(32:11):
can't coexist. Plenty of religious people believe in both. Yours
truly included. The Catholic Church, for example, has said the
belief in extraterrestrials would not contradict faith, But the pattern
in the data is clear. On average, the more important
religion is in someone's life, the less likely they are
to think intelligent aliens exist. Age also mattered in the
(32:33):
Pew data. Younger Americans believed most strongly. Seventy six percent
of adults under thirty said intelligent life exists on other planets,
compared to fifty seven percent of those over fifty. Men
were more likely than women to express this belief seventy
percent versus sixty percent. These demographic patterns have held relatively
stable across multiple surveys over the years. The cosmic closet
(32:57):
phenomenon carries real consequence is beyond individual awkwardness at dinner parties.
When nearly everyone holds a belief but assumes they are
in the minority, it shapes what gets discussed openly, what
gets funded by research institutions, and what gets taken seriously
by gigkeepers. In science and media, the collective silence creates
(33:18):
a feedback loop. People stay quiet because they think they
are unusual, and because everyone stays quiet, everyone continues to
think they are unusual. It's a self perpetuating cycle that
feeds on itself. Nobody talks about it because they think
nobody else believes it, and because nobody talks about it,
everyone continues to think nobody else believes it. Round and
(33:40):
round it goes. Alvielobe has spent years navigating this dynamic
in his own professional life. The Harvard astronomer is the
head of the Galileo Project, launched in twenty twenty one
to bring the search for extraterrestrial technological signatures in the
mainstream scientific research. The project's explicit goal is to move
(34:00):
the search for evidence of alien technology from accidental or
anecdotal observations and legends to the mainstream of transparent, validated,
and systematic scientific research. In plain terms, Loeb wants to
take the search for alien technology out of the realm
of UFO enthusiasts and amateur investigators and put it into
the hands of serious scientists using serious scientific methods. His
(34:24):
argument is that this is a legitimate scientific question that
deserves legitimate scientific investigation. Loeb's credentials are extensive by any measure.
He's the Frank B. Baar Junior Professor of Science at Harvard,
director of the Institute for Theory and Computation at the
Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, founding director of Harvard's Black
(34:45):
Hole Initiative, and previously served as chair of Harvard's Department
of Astronomy for nine years, the longest tenure in that role.
He's published over one thousand scientific papers with excellent citation records,
holds membership of the American Academy of Arts se Sciences,
and the American Psychical Society, and previously served on the
President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology at the
(35:07):
White House. He shared the Board on Physics and Astronomy
of the National Academies. His ted talk was among the
ten most popular of twenty twenty four by the standard
measures of academic success and influence. He's at the very
top of his field. This isn't some fringe character operating
out of a basement or someone with questionable credentials making
(35:27):
wild claims. This is one of the most accomplished and
respected astronomers in the world, someone whose credentials would make
most scientists envious, someone who's held positions of leadership and
major scientific institutions. Yet his work on potential extraterrestrial technology
has drawn criticism from some colleagues, who view such research
(35:48):
as outside the bounds of serious astronomy. His twenty twenty
one book Extraterrestrial The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth,
which argued that the interstellar object of Muamua It might
have been an artifact of alien technology based on its
unusual physical properties, sparked intense debate within the scientific community.
Some astronomers praised his willingness to consider unconventional possibilities. Others
(36:12):
accused him of making claims that went beyond what the
evidence could support. A prioritizing publicity over scientific caution of
wandering into territory where he lacked specific expertise. The Galileo
project itself receives private funding from donors rather than federal grants.
This is not by choice. Federal agencies have declined to
(36:34):
fund extraterrestrial intelligence research since nineteen ninety three, when Congress
cut NASA's SETI program. SETI stands for the Search for
Extraterrestrial Intelligence, and it was a government funded program to
scan the skies for alien signals. After Congress pulled the plug,
the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute and other organizations focused
(36:55):
on detecting alien signals have survived on private donations ever since.
Think about what that means. A majority of the public
believes in extraterrestrial intelligence, a majority of relevant scientific experts
think it probably exists, and yet government funding for researching
the question remains essentially at zero. The topic is considered
(37:16):
too embarrassing, too fringe, too likely to attract ridicule, even
though the belief itself is mainstream by any measure. Let
that sink in for a moment. Most people believe aliens
probably exist. Most scientists who study the question believe aliens
probably exist, but the government won't spend money looking for
them because the topic is seen is too weird or
(37:38):
too risky. It's professionally embarrassing to work on, even though
almost everyone privately thinks it's a legitimate question. The studies
authors suggest this disconnect between private belief and public discussion
creates a barrier that has nothing to do with skepticism.
The challenge isn't persuading people that extraterrestrial intelligence might exists.
(38:00):
Most already believe it does. The general public believes it,
scientists believe it, The educated, scientifically engaged population surveyed in
this study believes it overwhelmingly. The challenge is creating additions
where that near universal belief can be expressed without professional
penalty for scientists or social penalty for everyone else. As
(38:21):
loeb Is pointed out in his writing, claiming that Earth
hosts the only technological civilization in a universe containing more
than ten to the twenty second power potentially habitable planets
requires stronger justification than simply remaining open to evidence of
extraterrestrial technology. That number ten to the twenty second power
is a one, followed by twenty two zeros. It's an
(38:44):
almost incomprehensibly large number. Of potentially habitable worlds. The extraordinary
claim by this logic isn't that aliens might exist. The
extraordinary claim is that we are cosmically alone, despite all
those opportunities for a life to arise elsewhere. When you
think about it from the mainstream scientific perspective, the burden
(39:04):
of proof flips around. Given the size of the universe
and the abundance of Earth like planets, shouldn't we have
to prove we're alone rather than prove we're not. From
this viewpoint, claiming where the only intelligent life in the
universe is the position that needs extraordinary evidence. Unfortunately, it's
also impossible to prove a negative. Those who hold to
(39:25):
a creation model see it differently, though. The questions not
about probability or time. It's about purpose and design. If
the Creator made Earth and its inhabitants for a specific purpose,
then the size of the universe tells us nothing about
whether life exists elsewhere. That would depend entirely on the
creator's intentions, not on statistics. The study's findings add an
(39:45):
unexpected psychological dimension to one of astronomy's oldest puzzles, the
Fermi paradox. In nineteen fifty physicist Enrico Fermi was having
lunch with some colleagues when the conversation turned to extraterrestrial life.
The the middle of the discussion, Fermi reportedly asked a
simple question, where is everybody? The question became famous because
(40:07):
it captured a genuine puzzle that scientists have been wrestling
with ever since. The logic goes like this, If the
universe is vast, it is, if it's as old as
mainstream science estimates, and it's full of habitable planets it
appears to be, and if intelligent life can emerge through
natural processes, then alien civilizations should have had plenty of
(40:30):
time to develop advanced technology, spread out across the galaxy
and either visit us or at least send signals we
could detect. Our galaxy alone contains hundreds of billions of stars.
Based on this reasoning, even if intelligent life is rare,
it should exist somewhere else by now, probably in multiple places.
(40:51):
So where is everybody? Why haven't we seen any evidence
of them? Of course, this puzzle assumes a particular framework,
one where life arises naturally given enough time and the
right conditions. Those who hold to a creation model might
frame the question differently, not why hasn't life had time
to develop elsewhere? But rather did the creator choose to
(41:13):
create life elsewhere? The Fermi paradox is really only a
paradox if you accept certain assumptions about how life originates
and how old the universe is. That's the Fermi paradox
in a nutshell, the apparent contradiction between the high probability
that alien civilizations exist and the complete lack of evidence
that they do. Various solutions to the Fermi paradox have
(41:36):
been proposed over the decades, at least for those who
accept its underlying assumptions. Maybe intelligent life is far rarer
than scientists assume. Maybe the steps required for life to
arise and develop intelligence through natural processes are so unlikely
that it basically never happens. Maybe civilizations tend to destroy
(41:57):
themselves before achieving interstellar travel nuclear weapons, or create environmental catastrophes,
or develop artificial intelligence that turns against them, and they
wipe themselves out before they can spread to other star systems.
Maybe the distances between stars are simply too vast to
cross even for advanced civilizations. Maybe aliens are out there
(42:19):
but have chosen not to contact us, perhaps because they're
not interested, or because they have concluded we're not ready,
or because they have a policy of non interference with
developing civilizations. Maybe they're communicating in ways we can't detect
or haven't thought to look for. The cosmic closet findings
suggest another factor worth considering. Maybe we're not looking hard enough,
(42:44):
and maybe we're not looking hard enough partly because the
topic carries social stigma that discourages serious engagement. If ninety
five percent of educated, scientifically engaged adults believe extraterrestrial intelligence exists,
but government funding for research on the topic remains near zero,
and scientists to pursue such research risk professional criticism and marginalization,
(43:08):
then our failure to find evidence might say less about
what's actually out there than about how seriously we've actually
been looking. Maybe the answer to where is everybody is
partly we haven't really been trying to find out, not
with the resources, funding, and seriousness the question deserves. Anyway.
This isn't to say that extraterrestrial intelligence definitely exists, or
(43:30):
that we'd find it if we just spent more money
on research. The universe might genuinely be empty of other minds,
that's possible, but the cosmic clauset creates a mystery of
its own, a situation where a scientific question is simultaneously
considered fascinating by almost everyone and embarrassing to pursue professionally.
(43:50):
That combination doesn't seem like it would lead to rigorous,
well funded investigation. The cosmic clauset represents a strange collective
state for humanity to find itself in. Billions of people
around the world are privately convinced that intelligence exists beyond Earth,
yet many of them are equally convinced they hold a
(44:10):
minority opinion. They stay quiet at dinner parties, hedge their
answers in casual conversation, and assume that people around them
would judge them for beliefs. Those sane people almost certainly share.
Everyone's hiding the same thing from everyone else, and no
one realizes they're all hiding the same thing. We are
(44:30):
a planet full of people who believe in aliens, all
pretending we don't because we think everyone else doesn't, and
the silence feeds on itself, reinforcing everyone's false assumption that
they're unusual. The Pure Research data from twenty twenty one
found demographic patterns that have remained consistent across surveys for years.
(44:51):
The generational differences in belief might suggest that conviction about
extraterrestrial intelligence is growing over time as older generations are
replace by younger ones who grew up with a different
cultural relationship to the idea. Kids today grow up with
stories about space exploration, with movies and TV shows featuring
alien life, with news about discovering planets around other stars.
(45:14):
Maybe that shapes how they think about the question. Or
the generational difference might reflect something about how beliefs change
as people age. Maybe young people are more open to
speculative ideas generally and become more skeptical as they get older.
Only research tracking the same individuals over decades could tell
us which explanation is right. A twenty seventeen survey by
(45:36):
the research firm Glocalities across twenty four countries found that
forty seven percent of respondents globally believed in the existence
of intelligent alien civilizations in the universe. That's lower than
the ninety five percent figure in the Aldotti study, but
the Glocalities survey was designed to represent the general population
rather than specifically educated, scientifically interested people. Even in the
(46:00):
general population, nearly half of humanity believes were not alone.
That's a lot of people sharing a belief they might
be hesitant to express out loud. Studies in Sweden and
Peru have found even higher rates of belief among university students.
A survey of Swedish high school and university students found
that ninety percent believed in the existence of extraterrestrial life.
(46:22):
A similar study of twelve hundred and thirty seven Peruvian
university students found ninety two percent believed in life beyond Earth.
Neither studies specified intelligent life versus basic life, so those
numbers likely include people who believe in alien microbes as
well as people who believe in alien civilizations, but they
reinforce the overall pattern. Belief in extraterrestrial life is common,
(46:45):
especially among educated young people. The gap between what we
believe and what we think others believe creates a peculiar
form of isolation. In a universe potentially teeming with intelligent life,
we've managed to make ourselves feel alone, even among our
own species, not because we disagree about what's out there,
(47:05):
but because we won't admit we agree. The silence perpetuates itself.
Each person who stays quiet reinforces everyone else's assumption that's
speaking up would be risky. The Aldanti tenenbaumb Lobe study
was submitted for peer review in November twenty twenty five
and posted to the ARCSIV preprint Server, a repository where
scientists share their research before it goes through the formal
(47:27):
publication process. It joins a growing body of research from
Reichman University and Harvard examining not just what people believe
about extraterrestrial life, but how those beliefs interact with social perception,
scientific communication, and the psychological barriers to discussing questions that
most of us, it turns out, already think we know
the answer to the cosmic closet exists not because people
(47:51):
disagree about whether we're alone in the universe, but because
they've been afraid to find out they agree, And maybe
the first step out of that closet is simply knowing
that almost everyone else is in there with you, waiting
for someone to speak up first. If you'd like to
read this story for yourself or share the article with
a friend, you can read it on the Weird Darkness website.
(48:11):
I've placed a link to it in the episode description,
and you can find more stories of the paranormal, true crime, strange,
and more, including numerous stories that never make it to
the podcast in my Weird darknewsblog at Weird Darkness dot
com slash news
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