Jill explains how she experienced two occasions in which tests came back hinting the possibility of extraterrestrial life, however both times they returned negative. I was surprised and intrigued on the methods of detecting extraterrestrial life. One of those times, she used a telescope to detect a sort of engineered signal(not elaborated on in the section). My question would be "As an astronomer, how believable was it when you heard that there was a chance you had found extraterrestrial life." https://www.labxchange.org/library/items/lb:HarvardX:68789c56:lx_simulation:1
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I actually had very similar thoughts on this subject. I wonder why the first explanation for the observed difference in signals is the presence of extraterrestrial life. Additionally, considering these false positives as well as the exponential uncertainty, I wonder what compels these researchers to continue the search for extraterrestrial life.
I also thought this segment was quite interesting! I assume she must have found it believable, given that she has given her whole life over to this pursuit, but you're right it does seem a bit far fetched. Your post has made me want to ask her how she understands "success" or even "progress" in her work, given that the alien life has yet to be discovered and might not be discovered in her lifetime.