Nasa's Search For Extraterrestrials

Are we alone? That is the question many scientists and civilians have pondered since the beginning of civilization. Beginning in 1959 on a small scale, scientists have worked day and night to answer that very question through experimentation and research. In the years since, the search for extraterrestrials has fallen under various names and has been taken control of by several organizations and people. In 1982, Carl Sagan, an American astronomer, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, and author wrote a letter directed to the Science community suggesting the idea of searching for evidence of other life forms amongst us in the universe. This letter was signed not only by Carl Sagan, but also by seventy-two other scientists who agreed
Carl Sagan’s letter in 1982 was not the first attempt at getting the government to fund a program with the intention to discover other life forms in the universe. In 1979, NASA requested funding from the government themselves, but senate and house of congress chose to reject the proposal at that time because they found it to be unnecessary research. However; in 1982 when Carl Sagan’s request was approved, the United States government with help from NASA provided approximately two million dollars annually to the search, thus the SETI program was born. Along with the program, the SETI Institute located in Mountain View, California was founded in 1984 by Thomas Pierson. This institution was and still is a nonprofit institution and works off of private donors throughout the world. This low level funding continued until Columbus Day of 1992, when the program began a ten year, one hundred-million-dollar fund plan through the Bush Administration. When the long term funding program began, it was decided that SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) was no longer an appropriate name for the program. Because of this decision, the program was re named to High Resolution Microwave Survey (HRMS). However; when Bill Clinton went into office in 1993, the United States Government began to reevaluate the budget and decided that the ten year, one hundred-million-dollar plan was too much money to risk. Because of this inquisition, the government completely shut down the SETI program. Other factors that led to the sudden drop of the program from the federal budget include the public and enemy view of the project, NASA’s lack of ability to protect and support the program due to a tough year in 1993, and as stated in, “Searching for good science: The cancellation of NASA’s SETI Program”,