If we discover evidence of a strange life, do we realize it? Life on other planets can be very different from what we are used to so that we do not know any biological signature that it produces.
Recent years have seen a change in our theories about whether an important signature can be considered and which planets may be habitable, and further transitions should occur. But the best thing we can really do is to interpret the data with our best current theory, not with the idea of a future that we have not yet done.
This is a major problem for those involved in the search for supernatural life. As Scott Gowdy of the NASA Advisory Board said: “There is one thing I am absolutely certain about, as I have spent more than 20 years in this field of exoplanets … expecting the unexpected.”
These often reflect a degree of luck from the researchers involved.
Many results are telling us that it is very difficult to expect the unexpected. “We often remember what we don’t expect to see,” says cognitive psychologist Daniel Simmons, famous for his work on unintended blindness. His experiences showed how people might miss a gorilla beating their chest before their eyes. Similar experiences also show how blind we are to non-standard playing cards like four black hearts. In the first case, we miss the gorillas if our attention is busy enough. Finally, we miss the discrepancy because we have strong prior expectations.
Watching the next video shows how you can remember an unusual thing like a gorilla if you divert your attention.
There are also many relevant examples in the history of science. Philosophers describe this type of phenomenon as “the weight of observational theory”. What we observe sometimes depends in large part on our basic principles, concepts, beliefs, and past expectations. More generally, what we consider important can be biased in this way.
For example, when scientists first found evidence of low amounts of ozone in the atmosphere above Antarctica, they initially dismissed it as poor data. Scientists previously rejected it, with no prior theoretical reason for anticipating the hole. Fortunately, he thought of double verification, and it turns out.
Could something similar happen in search of supernatural life? Scientists studying planets in other solar systems (exoplanet) are overwhelmed by an abundance of potential observational targets that compete for their attention. In the last ten years, scientists have identified more than 3,650 planets – more than once a day. And with missions such as NASA’s TES Exoplanet Predator, this trend will continue.
Each planet outside the new solar system is rich in physical and chemical complexity. It is very easy to imagine a situation in which scientists do not verify a goal that is marked as “lacking importance”, but whose great significance will be identified in close analysis or using a non-standard theoretical approach .
However, we should not eliminate the principle of persistence in observation. In the Müller – Lyer illusion, the line ending in arrowheads appears shorter on the outside than the long line on the same footing with arrowheads. However, when we also know with certainty that the two lines are the same, our perception is not affected and confusion persists. Similarly, a sharp scholar may notice in his data that his theory tells him that he should not see it. And if a world sees something important, it will soon be known to every scientist in this field.
History also shows that scientists are able to notice sudden phenomena, even biased scientists who have a pet theory do not fit these phenomena. 19th-century physicist David Brewster mistakenly believed that light contained a straight line of particles. But this had no effect on his observations of many phenomena related to light, such as refraction in bodies under pressure. Sometimes observation is not theoretically charged with theory, at least in a way that does not seriously affect scientific discovery.
We should be open
Certainly, scientists cannot follow up with observations. Scientific observation needs to be directed in one way or another. But at the same time, if we “cannot predict what is expected,” we cannot allow the theory to strongly influence what we observe and what is important. We need to encourage exploration of events in the style of Brewster from the past and similar scholars and be open.
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