SETI in the Real World: Post-Detection and More

There have been some major new developments in the SETI “Post-Detection” landscape since the last PSETI in 2023. NASA Astrobiology’s new directions may now include technosignatures, and concurrently Astrobio HQ has been taking up the question of communication about discoveries to a significant degree, e.g. in the current NASA-DARES Decadal exercise and the virtual workshop Communicating Discoveries in the Search for Life in the Universe in Feb/Mar 2024, which included multiple technosignatures researchers and for which a major workshop report is expected imminently. Similar recent international workshops have included the Kavli-IAU Symposium IAUS387 (Toward) Discovery of Life Beyond Earth and its Impact in Durham UK in April 2024 (proceedings out soon), and the Lorentz Centre (Leiden) workshop Breaking News: We found extraterrestrial life! in Sept 2024. Meanwhile, the International Academy of Astronautics SETI Committee has been undertaking a revision of the ‘Post-Detection Protocols’ (Oliver et al 2023; Tennen et al 2024), with a new draft recently provided to the community for feedback. In 2024 the International Institute for Space Law started the IISL SETI & the Law working group, and the SETI Post-Detection Hub at St Andrews founded in late 2022 is growing and active. Simultaneously, technosignatures science is also constantly evolving and transforming. And, of course, the world is changing around us. Challenges for science communication are greater than ever. In short, there is a great deal to discuss at the intersection of SETI and the real world, and this session aims to stimulate and accelerate some crucial conversations. Our session’s components include briefing talks, creative participatory group exercises, and collective brainstorming. The session will be geared to an interdisciplinary audience of scientists, researchers, and communicators of all levels, and aims to foster inclusive discussion. We begin on Monday with some very brief context from Kathryn Denning concerning the update on the IAA SETI Post-Detection Protocols revision which is presently underway. In this breakout session we aim to look beyond the current “Declaration of Principles Concerning the Conduct of the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence” and onwards to the next steps for the community, which include a range of “Best Practices” guidelines which need to be created. With this goal in mind, we then begin to focus this session on one particular category of technosignature discovery, and begin a journey which will take us through Monday and then resume on Wednesday. After the introduction, on Monday we proceed with a whirlwind review of some crucial aspects of space law by Les Tennen. Next, guided by George Profitiliotis, participants will rapidly brainstorm about relevant best practices or policies – a subject we’ll return to later, on Wednesday. Then, we move on to the main exercise for Monday, run by Andreas Schwarz and Jordan Bimm, experts in science and risk communication. What are the practical challenges of risk communication? Participants will explore through an interactive exercise based upon a hypothetical technosignature detection scenario. [We emphasize that this is hypothetical and imaginative: resemblances to any current lively debate are coincidental, and our scenario is not intended to be literally realistic.] Risk communication—the real-time exchange of information and advice between experts, officials, and people facing potential hazards—is essential for responsibly managing public responses to uncertain scientific findings, including technosignature detection claims. This session walks researchers who search for life beyond Earth through some challenges and complexities of crafting and sharing this type of messaging with non-expert audiences. Participants will learn and apply key approaches and best practices from the field of risk communication research, including strategies for addressing ambiguity and uncertainty. On Wednesday, we move into a different interactive exercise led by George Profitiliotis, using an approach from Experiential Futures, a subfield of Futures Studies. We build on and extend Monday’s discovery scenario, to creatively explore what “best practices” guidelines should be considered for this type of situation. The fictional scene for our exercise is this: In the year 2030, the world is undergoing radical changes. Owing to unexpected developments starting in 2026, a renewal of SETI science has led to the transformation of PSETI from a purely scholarly symposium to a science-society convention of international interest, where SETI scientists and researchers from all over the world give much-anticipated updates, announce breaking news, and engage in dialogue with citizens, policymakers, industrial, non-profit, and media actors, as well as scientists from other academic disciplines. Our imaginary “PSETI Con 2030” science and society session will immerse participants in an interdisciplinary and interactive panel discussion taking place in a strange future and focusing on a captivating event whose reverberations are still echoing through narratives that traverse the globe of 2030. Our panelists include Anamaria Berea, Lucian Walkowicz, Brian McConnell, and Chelsea Haramia, all of whom will share brief reports from their future vantage point, with host Rebecca Charbonneau. Berea’s report will focus on real data from a very familiar 2020s case study, presenting an analysis of the rapid evolution of narratives on social media about a purported discovery of life beyond Earth, and the dissemination and proliferation of fake news. Session participants will play roles as audience members and actively engage in the conversation. We then return to our real world and to the present day of 20 Aug 2025 just in time for coffee, and close the session by asking again: what Best Practices might be needed? What should we build together?