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Sh Hi oe EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT Fe f" NATIONAL AERONAUTICS and SPACE COUNCIL WASHINGTON wR 1 a é on July 18, 1963 —. ( J MEMORANDUM FOR y Mr. Robert F. Packard WN Office of International Scientific Affairs Department of State Washington ee er ae { SUBJECT: Thoughts on the a Alien Race Question — — 5 iO During recent discussions the question has occasionally, though 4 rarely, arisen that perhaps we should consider the policy question of what to do if an alien intelligence is discovered in space. Some discussion of this occurred, as you will recall, during deliberations on BNSP TaskI. This memo contains some miscellaneous thoughts on the question. The consensus of scientific view says, with quite good reasons, that the possibility of running across an alien intelligent race in our solar system 7S negligible. This is due primarily to the presumed unsuit- of conditions upon other planets to support life as we know it. The flying Saucer advocates claim, of course, that the scientific aS viewpoint iS nonsense, and that there is overwhelming evidence of a such beings. In my own mind, I find it difficult to side with the flying a saucer advocates, but the almost total impossibility envisioned by most scientists also is disturbing. Therefore, I present the problem in current perspective, as I see it. Up until a few decades ago it seemed very improbable that intelligent life existed anywhere outside of the solar system. The chief reasons for this were a combination of scientific theory, scientific knowledge, and religious belief. The most widely accepted scientific theory as to the formation of the solar planetary system held that it was a re- sult of the near collision of two stars. Since such a precise near- -miss INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AFFAI RS L 4