Resolution criteria

No extraterrestrial life has yet been scientifically or conclusively detected. This market resolves YES if, before April 1, 2026, credible scientific evidence of extraterrestrial life is publicly announced and widely accepted by the scientific community.

Acceptable evidence includes:

• Definitive proof such as a radio signal containing the first million decimals of pi, or a black monolith on the Moon

• Multiple converging lines of evidence to confirm true biosignatures and rule out false positives from exoplanet atmospheres or other sources

The market resolves NO if no such proof is announced by April 1, 2026. Claims about K2-18 b remain compelling but inconclusive, and similar inconclusive biosignature detections do not qualify. Speculation, government disclosures without scientific evidence, or UAP sightings without confirmed extraterrestrial origin do not count.

Background

Recent observations from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope point to potential alien life on K2-18b, a distant exoplanet 124 light years from Earth, with researchers finding strong evidence of dimethyl sulfide (DMS) in the planet's atmosphere. However, the Webb findings fell short of offering conclusive proof of life on the exoplanet, though it did not rule out the possibility that advancements in detection capabilities might help to confirm such a discovery in the future.

86.60% of astrobiologists agreed basic extraterrestrial life likely exists, 67.40% agreed regarding complex life, and 58.20% agreed that intelligent life likely exists somewhere in the Universe.

Considerations

The search for extraterrestrial life is constrained by an inability to independently detect and attribute multiple lines of evidence, with much data coming from light years away via one instrument and without any in situ samples. Each time biosignatures are found, biologists confront the ambiguous distinction between life and non-life, and the difficulty of extrapolating characteristics of life on Earth to alien environments—a problem called finding "life as we don't know it".

This description was generated by AI.