Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100

expecting a huge starship carrying aliens from outer space. More than likely, the probe will be fully automatic, part organic and part electronic, and will not contain any space aliens at all.
    And when we do eventually meet the aliens from space, we may be surprised, because they might have long ago altered their biology using robotics, nanotechnology, and biotechnology.
    Another possibility is that they have self-destructed. As we mentioned, the transition from Type 0 to Type I is the most dangerous one, since we still have all the savagery, fundamentalism, racism, and so on of the past. It is possible that one day, when we visit the stars, we may find evidence of Type 0 civilizations that failed to make the transition to Type I (for example, their atmospheres may be too hot, or too radioactive, to support life).
    SETI (SEARCH FOR EXTRATERRESTRIAL INTELLIGENCE)
    At the present time, the people of the world are certainly not conscious of the march toward a Type I planetary civilization. There is no collective self-awareness that this historic transition is taking place. If you take a poll, some people might be vaguely aware of the process of globalization, but beyond that there is no conscious awareness that we are headed to a specific destination.
    All this might suddenly change if we find evidence of intelligent life in outer space. Then, we would immediately be aware of our technological level in relation to this alien civilization. Scientists in particular would be intensely interested in which types of technologies this alien civilization has mastered.
    Although one cannot know for sure, probably within this century we will detect an advanced civilization in space, given the rapid advances in our technology.
    Two trends have made this possible. First is the launching of satellites specifically designed to find small, rocky extrasolar planets, the COROT and Kepler satellites. The Kepler is expected to identify up to 600 small, earthlike planets in space. Once these planets have been identified, the next step is to focus our search for intelligent emissions from these planets.
    In 2001, Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen began donating funds, now more than $30 million, to jump-start the stalled SETI program. This will vastly increase the number of radio telescopes at the Hat Creek installation, located north of San Francisco. The Allen Telescope Array, when fully operational, will have 350 radio telescopes, making it the most advanced radio telescope facility in the world. While in the past astronomers have scanned little more than 1,000 stars in their search for intelligent life, the new Allen Array will increase that number by a factor of 1,000, to a million stars.
    Although scientists have been searching vainly for signals from advanced civilizations for almost fifty years, only recently have these two developments given a much-needed boost to the SETI program. Many astronomers believe that there was simply too little effort and too few resources devoted to this project. With this influx of new resources and new data, the SETI program is becoming a serious scientific project.
    It is conceivable that we may, within this century, detect signals from an intelligent civilization in space. (Seth Shostak, the director of the SETI Institute in the Bay Area, told me that within twenty years, he expects to make contact with such a civilization. That may be too optimistic, but it is safe to say that within this century it would be strange if we did not detect signals from another civilization in space.)
    If signals are found from an advanced civilization, it could be one of the most significant milestones in human history. Hollywood movies love to describe the chaos this event might unleash, with prophets telling us that the end is near, with crazy religious cults going into overtime, etc.
    The reality, however, is more mundane. There will be no need for immediate panic, since this civilization may not even know that we are eavesdropping on their conversations. And if they did, direct conversations between them and us would be difficult, given their enormous distancefrom us. First, it may take months to years to fully decode the message, and then to rank this civilization’s technology, to see if it fits the Kardashev classification. Second, direct communication with them will probably be unlikely, since the distance to this civilization will be many light-years away, too far for any direct contact. So we will be able