In order to be a special creation of divine will one must, presumably, be somewhat special. Or singular. Or else one has to tweak one’s cosmological philosophy if one learns that on other worlds are other beings of considerable intellect and of no historic connection to us. The Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences is asking itself whether it needs to ask itself about such ramifications. At a meeting in Rome it is starting simple: what’re the odds that intelligent life elsewhere will come to our attention?

The meeting could be a temptation to caricature the Pope’s crowd as fusty medievalists waving dusty tomes and sceptres and orbs. Most reporters rose above that.

At the Times in the UK, which put up the satirical illus above right, its staffer and blogger Hannah Devlin writes that while the convocation is focussed on astrobiology itself, theological implications are “spilling over outside the conference.” The question, as she puts it, is: “..whether aliens get saved.” For all the slightly snide verbiage, the piece finds sources who say that because Catholic theology doesn’t say much about it either way (despite that unfortunate burning at the stake of Giordano Bruno in part for proclaiming a plurality of worlds), the church’s magisterium would survive.

The AP‘s Ariel David filed it from Vatican City with a solid, staid rundown on topics of the five day meeting. The most she gets one of the meeting’s top dogs – the Jesuit Priest who directs the Vatican Observatory – to say about conceivably uncomfortable discoveries is that alien life could raise “many philosophical and theological implications.” But the man’s an astronomer, and his focus is, it appears, on the data first. And, the piece is generous (and correct) in pointing out, the papacy has come a long way since Bruno’s time. It endorses as good science the Big Bang and an ancient universe, and it recognizes the seminal importance of Charles Darwin’s work.

A special nod to the Washington Post’s Marc Kaufman who, under the hed  When E.T. phones the pope, filed it from Rome last weekend and had the story ahead of the main crowd. Several other accounts essentially rewrite what Kaufman reported. It’s solid with this insightful line: Discovery of aliens may not fundamentally challenge church dogma, “but it may conflict with the stories we tell about who and what we are.” He contrasts Eastern and Christian religions, throws in NASA and its Astrobiology Institute, a tincture of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, and cooks up a tasty feature on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence or anything else alive out there. He quotes cosmologist Paul Davies to great effect – including his observation of a potentially difficult conflict between the notion of Jesus as God incarnate in human form sent to save us, not  animals or “little green men on other planets.”

Other stories:

• Guardian (UK) Riazat Butt: Vatican ponders extraterrestrials ;
• AFP: Vatican searches for extra-terrestrial life ;
• Register (UK) Joe Fay: Catholic priests, scientists head to Rome to ponder alien life ; The story picks info straight off Kaufman’s article in the Washington Post and, graciously, says that’s where it got it.
• Telegraph – Tom Chivers : The Vatican joins the search for alien life ; Another one that leans heavily on Kaufman’s reporting, with credit.

Oldie but Goodie: A year and a half ago Newsweek‘s Sharon Begley at her LabNotes blog sifted the issues and conversations that spawned this week’s meeting. Even then, she reported, ponderings on theology and aliens was old news in Catholicism’s inner circles.  And, she stoutly defends the Vatican’s stance on many pillars of scientific views of the universe.

Meanwhile, elsewhere on the deliberately and truly silly side of religion (supposedly Mayan style), science, cosmology, our precarious place in the universe, and Hollywood: The Tracker admits he wants to see this movie just for the full scene of an ocean rising and washing across the Himalayas.

• Winston-Salem Journal – Laura Giovanelli: Maya Message: World won’t end in 2012, but it may be destroyed by environmental neglect ;
• National Geographic – Brian Handwerk : 2012 Prophecies Sparking Real Fears, Suicide Warnings ; A few days ago he also had 2012: Six End0of-the-World Myths Debunked ;
• One of many month-old debunking articles, a good one from the Heart of La La Land: LATimes – John Johnson Jr. : Scientists try to calm ’2012′ hysteria;
• Honolulu Star Bulletin – Burl Burlingame: Doomsday denied ; Great adjective in here: correctomundo.
• Credulity prize to ChristianNewsWire – Donna Anderson : 2012 Doomsday? Best Selling Bible Scholar Reveals “The Ancient’s Deepest Secrets” ; A guide, of sorts, to the multiplicity of divinations and other horse manure (Tracker’s, not the writer’s opinion) behind the movie and behind its great apocalyptic special effects. Sort of fascinating, really.
• NASA (blog) Ask an Astrobiologist – David Morrison : Nibiru and Doomsday 2012: Questions and Answers ;
• … could go on.

- Charlie Petit

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