Stephen Hawking - Aliens

Well most of the idea behind searching for other life, in my eyes, is that if we find other life elsewhere, we find other places which can support life. I definitely think our focus should be on figuring out how we can get at least some of us off of this ball of dirt.

Interesting. I've never thought about looking for aliens from a utilitarian standpoint before. But if the rationale in looking for aliens is a search for hospitable planets, why spend money on something we've had absolutely no success at so far rather than learning how to terraform a planet, which we might be able to do in small, incremental steps, where each step has some sort of tangible result.

You're right though, past that there isn't really any value in finding other life, unless it is advanced enough that we can learn from it in some way. But honestly, I think the same could be said about any sort of space exploration, and a lot of science and research in general.

I think theoretical scientific research, even the research that is not eventually productive, can make a legitimate claim for public money and support. Since science by its nature investigates the unknown, we don't have the foresight to know which fields will be productive and which won't. I think we have to invest across all fields that are considered viable. Something useful will invariably turn up after a while. Seeing as we've had absolutely no success in finding aliens, I don't think the SETI program can make those same claims.

That said, I am, and probably always will be, a SETI supporter.