Trying to find ET and our place in the universe

Toddlers, I know from experience, believe themselves to be very, very special — the center, in fact, of the entire universe. With maturity, however, most of us learn that we are not quite as special as we thought. Other people are important, too.

It’s similar with Earthlings in general. As humans have learned about the size of the cosmos (and our not-so-central place in it), we have grappled with weighing our specialness against the possible existence of alien beings on other worlds.