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On the plurality of inhabited worlds: a brief history of extraterrestrialism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 October 2006

Mark Brake
Mark Brake
Affiliation:
Centre for Astronomy and Science Education, University of Glamorgan, 4 Forest Grove, Trefforest, Wales, UK e-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper delineates the cultural evolution of the ancient idea of a plurality of inhabited worlds, and traces its development through to contemporary extraterrestrialism, with its foundation in the physical determinism of cosmology, and its attendant myths of alien contact drawn from examples of British film and fiction. We shall see that, in the evolving debate of the existence of extraterrestrial life and intelligence, science and science fiction have benefited from an increasingly symbiotic relationship. Modern extraterrestrialism has influenced both the scientific searches for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), and become one of the most pervasive cultural myths of the 20th century. Not only has pluralism found a voice in fiction through the alien, but fiction has also inspired science to broach questions in the real world.

Keywords

Communicationeducationculture
Type
Research Article
Information
International Journal of Astrobiology , Volume 5 , Issue 2 , April 2006 , pp. 99 - 107
Copyright
2006 Cambridge University Press

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