Jill Tarter

Are we alone in the universe? It’s one of humanity’s oldest questions, and one that, until relatively recently, was subject more to faith and speculation than the scientific method. But that is changing, and as Jill Tarter likes to point out, we live in the first generation of humans with access to technology that could answer the question. Tarter holds the Bernard M. Oliver Chair at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California and is responsible for the leadership and planning of the institute. Tarter was also the director of Project Phoenix, a massive nine year systematic survey, that beginning in 1995 scanned hundreds of nearby stars with the hope of intercepting extraterrestrial radio messages. Tarter and Project Phoenix were the real-life models of Carl Sagan’s 1997 book “Contact.”