“Life in the Universe and the Breakthrough Initiatives”
Los Angeles Chapter meeting on November 20
Who are we? A mature civilization, like a mature individual, must ask itself this question. Is humanity defined by its divisions, its problems, its passing needs and trends? Or do we have a shared face, turned outward to the Universe? In 1990, Voyager 1 swiveled its camera and captured the ‘Pale Blue Dot’ – an image of Earth from six billion kilometers away. It was a mirror held up to our planet – home of water, life, and minds. A reminder that we share something precious and rare. But how rare, exactly? The only life? The only minds?
Please join us in Los Angeles on Friday, November 20, 2015, 7:30am – 9:00am PDT (networking at 7:00am), when Simon “Pete” Worden, (Brig. Gen., USAF, Ret., PhD), Chairman of the Breakthrough Prize Foundation and former Director of NASA’s Ames Research Center will brief us on the Breakthrough Initiatives, launched by Yuri Milner and Stephen Hawking on July 20, 2015.
The first initiative is ‘Breakthrough Listen’ and represents the largest ever scientific research program aimed at finding evidence of civilizations beyond Earth. The scope and power of the search are on an unprecedented scale: The program includes a survey of the 1,000,000 closest stars to Earth. It scans the center of our galaxy and the entire galactic plane. Beyond the Milky Way, it listens for messages from the 100 closest galaxies to ours. Listen combines these instruments with innovative software and data analysis techniques. Breakthrough Listen will span 10 years and commit a total of $100,000,000.
The second initiative is ‘Breakthrough Message’. If we or others succeed in discovering another civilization, what – if anything – should we say to them? The initiative aims to encourage debate about how and what to communicate with possible intelligent beings beyond earth. It takes the form of an international competition to create messages that could be read by an advanced civilization. The message must be in digital format, and should be representative of humanity and planet Earth.
The meeting is free for A&D Forum members and $40 for non-members ($30 Early Bird until November 13). For more information and to register to attend the meeting in person or for free via the web, go to https://adflanov15.eventbrite.com.
Information about joining The A&D Forum is at https://aerospacedefenseforum.org.
The Los Angeles chapter of The Aerospace & Defense Forum was founded by Frontier Associates and the 62 Mile Club, and is sponsored by Moss Adams, Sheppard Mullin, CohnReznick, Jeffer, Mangels, Butler & Mitchell, and UK Trade & Investment.
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