Are the world's religions ready for ET?

In 1930, Albert Einstein was asked for his opinion about the possibility of life elsewhere in the universe. "Other beings, perhaps, but not men," he answered. Then he was asked whether science and religion conflict. "Not really, though it depends, of course, on your religious views."

Over the past 10 years, astronomers' new ability to detect planets orbiting other stars has taken this question out of the realm of philosophy, as it was for Einstein, and transformed it into something that scientists might soon be able to answer.

Realization that the nature of the debate about life on other worlds is about to fundamentally change led Vanderbilt Professor of Astronomy David Weintraub to begin thinking seriously about the question of how people will react to the discovery of life on other planets. He realized, as Einstein had observed, that people's reactions will be heavily influenced by their religious beliefs. So he decided to find out what the world's major religions have to say about the matter. The result is a book titled "Religions and Extraterrestrial Life" (Springer International Publishing) published this month.