Usually, when it come to alien talk, the discussion seem to revolve around how to find them. What we put far less thought into, however, is how to hid from them. Perhaps aliens aren’t the cute, bulbous humanoid creatures we think they are. It’s possible they could be a race of war hungry, resource sucking beasts that would wipe us out in an instant. If that’s the case, we should be looking for ways to hide Earth from aliens.
FINDING LIFE THROUGH TRANSITING PLANETS
There’s been a lot of recent talk about finding Earth-like planets. The way astronomers go about these discoveries is hardly limited to staring through a telescope. The trick is transiting planets. These are planets that pass in front of their host star in a way that makes them visible to us on Earth. The moment the planet goes in front of the star creates a flicker of light. We use that information to find more about the distant worlds and if they may or may not be carrying life. Scientists believe that our home is a transiting planet visible from places far away. If that is the case, then perhaps aliens can see us just as easily as we can see them.
HIDING EARTH FROM ALIENS
Some scientist thinks the best chance we have at finding aliens is hoping they are using our method of planetary detection so we can use certain techniques to draw their attention to us. On the other hand, there are ways to protect Earth from any kind of detection. In that case, we turn to lasers as a friend. Using laser light, we’ll be able to mask the flicker caused by our own transit. Just ten continuous hours of shining a laser once a year would kill the transit signal visible from afar. Another method is cloaking our atmospheric conditions. For example, a laser with a power of 160 kW can cloak something like oxygen, making Earth appeared to be void of life.
The question that now remains is do we want aliens to find us? Well, that debate is raging on amongst scientists. There is a chance that finding intelligent life could bring about hostile encounters. That chance isn’t very big but it is a possibility none the less. For now, we will continue playing our game of planetary hide and seek until someone decides what to do.
