Are we alone in the universe? While the search for life beyond Earth has so far turned up empty, the infamous question continues to haunt humanity’s exploration of the vast cosmos. Now, NASA’s leadership has revealed that the pursuit of finding aliens is also inherent in the agency’s missions.
During a recent interview with CNN, NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said that the prospects of alien existence “goes to the heart” of many things at NASA. “Our job here is to go out and try and unlock the secrets of the universe. And one of those questions is, are we alone?” Isaacman said on Sunday. “So, I would say that is inherent in every one of our scientific endeavors, our exploration endeavors, even building the moon base on the south pole of the moon.”
Anybody out there?
NASA’s missions to explore the cosmos help search for habitable worlds and signs of life beyond Earth, along with expanding our knowledge of the universe and enabling human exploration of space. The agency has sent five rovers and four landers to the surface of Mars in search of signs of ancient microbial life on the Red Planet. NASA also launched its Europa Clipper mission in 2024 to study Jupiter’s Moon Europa, which scientists believe harbors ingredients for life.
NASA officials have previously spoken of the possibility of extraterrestrial life amid scientific uncertainty while highlighting the agency’s role in collecting evidence for the search of alien life. In 2023, then NASA Administrator Bill Nelson announced that he was appointing a committee of scientists to address “so many suspicions about aliens.”
However, Isaacman’s recent statement more explicitly ties the possibility of alien existence to NASA’s ongoing scientific exploration. In the interview with CNN, the administrator explained that the agency would one day “incorporate telescopes that will help us continue this great search,” such as the Nancy Grace Roman Telescope, which is set to launch by 2027.
Isaacman himself has gone to space twice, commanding private missions in 2021 and 2024. Although he says he hasn’t seen any aliens himself, the NASA chief still believes they are out there.
“I’ve been to space twice, I didn’t encounter any aliens up there yet. I have not seen anything to suggest that we’ve been visited by any intelligent life forms out there,” Isaacman said during the interview. “But when you think about it—we got 2 trillion galaxies out there, who knows how many star systems within each of it. I would say the odds that we will find something at some point to suggest that we are not alone are pretty high.”
The search continues
In recent years, the topic of aliens has undergone a shift, moving from the fringes of science fiction and conspiracy theories to more mainstream scientific and government discourse. In 2021, the Pentagon released a report on unidentified aerial phenomena, followed by congressional hearings to investigate sightings. Due to advancements in technology, the scientific search for signs of extraterrestrial life has also taken a major leap.
Isaacman’s recent remarks follow an earlier statement from former President Barack Obama in which he said that aliens are real. “They’re real but I haven’t seen them,” Obama said during a podcast interview in February. “They’re not being kept in Area 51. There’s no underground facility unless there’s this enormous conspiracy and they hid it from the president of the United States.”
With no evidence for life on other planets yet, NASA continues the search by looking for signs of microbial life within our solar system and probing exoplanets for biosignatures.
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