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Blue Dot: State of the Drake Equation in 2024: The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (Part Two)

In the conclusion of Blue Dot's two-part look at the state of the Drake Equation in 2024, Host Dave Schlom is once again joined by special co-host Bill Diamond, President and CEO of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California.

The Drake Equation was written by radio astronomer Frank Drake in 1961 as a way to organize the very first scientific conference on SETI, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. Dave and Bill are joined by SETI Institute astronomer Laurance Doyle to examine the possibilities of the emergence of intelligence on another world and then SETI Institute Post Doctoral Fellow and radio astronomer Sophia Shake discusses the penultimate term in the equation, the emergence of technological civilizations.

In the finale, Dave and Bill discuss the most ominous term in the equation, L, the lifetime of those civilizations, which of course, has implications for our own!

Dave Schlom is the longtime host and creator of Blue Dot. From surfing to Voyager in interstellar space, rock guitar to orcas in our imperiled oceans, the topics on Blue Dot are as varied as the host’s interests and connections -- which are pretty limitless! An internationally respected space history journalist, Dave is also deeply fascinated by all aspects of the grand workings of nature’s awesome machinery on scales ranging from galactic to subatomic. And topics take in all aspects of the arts and sciences.
Matt Fidler is a producer and sound designer with over 15 years’ experience producing nationally distributed public radio programs. He has worked for shows such as Freakonomics Radio, Selected Shorts, Studio 360, The New Yorker Radio Hour and The Takeaway. In 2017, Matt launched the language podcast Very Bad Words, hitting the #28 spot in the iTunes podcast charts.