"Drake, like most of his scientific method-going colleagues at SETI, is not to be confused with the UFO buffs who watch X-Files and flock to places like Roswell, N.M., looking for bright lights."
This article's got every limp "debunking" cliche in the book: UFO "buffs" -- no mention of serious scientists interested in the phenomenon such as Bernard Haisch or Jacques Vallee -- the obligatory reference to the nominally alien-related fiction TV series "The X-Files," a vague allusion to Roswell, and a scoffing dismissal of "bright lights."
But there's a bigger mistake that makes me especially impatient with this piece of regurgitated fluff: The hack who wrote this (I hesitate to call him a "writer") naively assumes "SETI" is an institution. While there is in fact a SETI Institute, the term "SETI" simply refers to the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. As such, SETI is best characterized as a pursuit.
The search for extraterrestrial intelligence, excavated from its electromagnetic pretensions and correctly defined, can apply to a number of "scientific method-going" inquiries, such as planetary SETI (the search for intelligently designed features on planetary surfaces).
And Drake may choose not to "believe" in UFOs, but I could personally care less. "UFO" is an innocuous enough abbreviation. And like it or not, the UFO phenomenon, whatever it ultimately represents, has produced vastly more evidence in favor of nonhuman, potentially extraterrestrial, intelligence than decades of radio-SETI searches.
Don't misunderstand; I think radio-SETI is worth doing. But I find it infinitely depressing that our self-proclaimed alien "experts" tend to be among the most intellectually constipated members of the so-called scientific community. Drake's SETI isn't science; it's politically driven fact-management.
(Catch me at one of my upcoming book signings. I'll be happy to elaborate.)
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