My only hope is that every other alien civilization isn't doing exactly what we are doing because then everybody would be listening, nobody would be receiving, and we would collectively conclude that there is no other intelligent life in the universe.

One of the most significant events in our distant past is still perhaps the greatest mystery: the origins of life itself.

WhenIWasYourAge: It took a week to learn whether your photos came out okay.

So what is true for life itself is no less true for the universe: knowing where you came from is no less important than knowing where you are going.

All information is good, even when it is bad.

If you find life on Europa [Jupiter's moon], like, what would you call it? Would it be, like, Europeans?

The caricature of science is that we hold tight to the theories we have, and shun challenges to them. That's just not true. In fact, we hold our highest rewards for those scientists who can prove others wrong. And by the way, they are famous in their own lifetimes. We don't wait until they're dead.