Cover Image: August 2002 Scientific American Magazine See Inside

Why ET Hasn't Called [Preview]

The lifetime of civilizations in the Drake equation for estimating extraterrestrial intelligences is greatly exaggerated

By Michael Shermer















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Michael Shermer

Image: BRAD HINES

The lifetime of civilizations in the Drake equation for estimating extraterrestrial intelligences is greatly exaggerated By Michael Shermer

In science there is arguably no more suppositional formula than that proposed in 1961 by radio astronomer Frank Drake for estimating the number of technological civilizations that reside in our galaxy: N = R fp ne fl fi fc L


This article was originally published with the title Why ET Hasn't Called.



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