China’s Giant Telescope Stirs Talk of Life Beyond Cosmos

Is there anybody out there? Chinese scientists think there is, and may have detected alien life beyond the cosmos. Or did they?

China’s Sky Eye telescope—the biggest radio telescope in the world—appears to have gathered signs of potential “alien civilization,” according to Bloomberg, citing a report in Science and Technology Daily.

But the news from the China-backed science publication, which could answer the question, “Are we alone?”—was soon deleted, as were any mentions of the findings, Bloomberg noted. The reason was unclear.

According to the initial report, narrow-band electromagnetic signals the telescope detected were unique from anything gathered before, raising hopes. The report cited Zhang Tonjie, who leads an extraterrestrial civilization search team co-founded by Beijing Normal University. It is the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the University of California, Berkeley, according to Bloomberg.

Despite getting deleted, the initial report sent an electromagnetic wave of its own through the internet, piquing interest around the globe.

Searching for alien life with China’s telescope

Sky Eye has been searching for alien life for just under two years; in 2020, it collected a pair of mysterious signals, and it discovered another one this year.

Last year, researchers from the University of Sydney in Australia detected mysterious radio waves from space of a completely unknown origin. Researchers were puzzled over the nature of the energy that was being emanated, according to the report at the time. The radio waves were said to be coming from a region in the center of the Milky Way galaxy.

While intriguing today, the latest find from China would likely have been nothing new to the Ancient Greeks. That’s because the crux of Ancient Greek mythology is the belief that the Olympian gods placed every living being in the universe intentionally so that they may all play a role in the events that transpire in the world and the lessons learned from them.