The combustible sedimentary rock, better known as coal, was not only crucial to the onset of advanced technology here on Earth, but it should also be key to the development of advanced E.T.s residing on any given exoearth. Or so say the authors of a new paper just published in the International Journal of Astrobiology.
The authors argue that we needed large amounts of shallow, energy-dense coal to enable the technology necessary to first forge steel. Steel drill bits were crucial for extracting deep-seated reserves of fossil fuel which provided the technology necessary to develop the kind of 20th century technology required to build radio telescopes capable of communicating over interstellar distances. And as the authors of this new paper assert, the same will be true for advanced alien civilizations.
For the past seven decades, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) has focused on highly advanced civilizations that could communicate over interstellar distances via the radio or optical spectrums.
Without access to coal, our own civilization would never have been able to harness deep deposits of oil and gas and in turn generate enough heat and electricity to melt steel. This enabled the development of radio telescopes that today dot our own planet which can send and receive messages across interstellar space.
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