the antiquity of the ETI debate

The best in-depth account of the antiquity of the ETI debate is Michael
Crowe's 'The Extraterrestrial Life Debate 1750-1900 -- The Idea of the
Plurality of Worlds from Kant to Lowell", University of Cambridge Press,
1986. It's more than 600 pages of the actual writings of astronomers and
philospophers, and illustrates that the idea was widely accepted for
centuries before ufo crackpots claimed to 'discover' it, and empty-minded
reality-challenged credulous eager-believers actually believed such claims.

Preface:

Possibly tomorrow, or perhaps in a year or a century from now, astronomers
may make one of the most important discoveries that scientists have ever
sought: the detection of an extraterrestrial civilization. Establishing
contact with such a civilization could produce extraordinary effects,
possibly including solutions for our most pressing scientific and
technological problems. As has often been noted, even the discovery of
conclusive evidence for extraterrestrial life would have far-reaching
implications for our philosophical, religious, and social thought.

This book contains a more modest discovery than either of those. Although
appearing on nearly every page, it can be summarized in a sentence: The
question of extraterrestrial life, rather than having arisen in the
twentieth century, has been debated almost from the beginning of recorded
history. Between the fifth-centurv B.C. flowering of Greek civilization and
1917, more than 140 books and thousands of essays, reviews, and other
writings had been devoted to discussing whether or not other inhabited
worlds exist in the universe. Moreover, as documented in this book, the
majority of educated persons since around 1700 have accepted the theory of
extraterrestrial life and in numerous instances have formulated their
philosophical and religious positions in relation to it. To put this point
differently, even if no UFOs hover in our heavens, belief in
extraterrestrial beings has hovered in the human consciousness for dozens of
decades. Although the moon and Mars are as barren as giant bricks, moonlings
and Martians long ago began to invade our culture and influence our thought,
and they now occupy increasing roles in our cinematic and literary
creations. Our extraterrestrials may no more exist than the gods of the
Greeks, but their effects are no less indisputable. Just as paranoia
destroys real lives, just as atheists admit the influence of belief in God,
so should we see the invasion of the extraterrestrials as long since under
way. This book has, in short, been written in the conviction that even if no
extraterrestrials exist, their influence on terrestrials has been immense.

The particular focus of tile present study is the debate that developed
between 1750 and about 1900 on one planet concerning the question whether or
not life exists on any other body in the universe. But this book…

In article on Sun, 10 Aug
2003, "James Oberg" wrote:


The best in-depth account of the antiquity of the ETI debate is Michael
Crowe's 'The Extraterrestrial Life Debate 1750-1900 -- The Idea of the
Plurality of Worlds from Kant to Lowell", University of Cambridge Press,
1986.

Ah, a teacher of mine at Notre Dame. And a good one.

It's more than 600 pages of the actual writings of astronomers and
philospophers, and illustrates that the idea was widely accepted for
centuries before ufo crackpots claimed to 'discover' it, and empty-minded
reality-challenged credulous eager-believers actually believed such claims.

To make the point more forcefully, don't overlook Prof. Crowe's pal,
Stephen Dick of the U.S. Naval Observatory.

As I've written before, "Dick and Crowe have a sort of historical
tag-team going on here; Dick did a book covering ancient times to 1750,
Crowe did his book, then Dick has recently published a book covering the
20th century debate." They've organized conferences on this sort of thing,
too.

Titles and Amazon coordinates:

Steven J. Dick, *Plurality of Worlds : The Origins of the Extraterrestrial
Life Debate from Democritus to Kant*
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0521243084/qid=1060649675/sr=1-6/ref=sr_1_6/002-8672528-3241616?v=glance&s=books.
It's out of print, but that's why God made libraries.

Michael Crowe, *The Extraterrestrial Life Debate 1750-1900*
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/048640675X/ref=pd_sim_books_1/002-8672528-3241616?v=glance&s=books.

Steven J. Dick, *The Biological Universe : The Twentieth-Century
Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science*
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/IS...owebA/002-4261
659-1921050

Steven J. Dick, *Life on Other Worlds : The 20th-Century
Extraterrestrial Life Debate* (This is a shorter, less scholarly book
that overlaps the material in *The Biological Universe*, if I'm not
mistaken.)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...d%3D980294048/
sr%3D1-8/ref%3Dsc%5Fb%5F8/002-8672528-3241616.

All four books were published by Cambridge University Press.

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