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38 Momentum was building within the scientific community. The Astronomy Survey Committee of the National Academy of Sciences took a visionary stance in 1972, stating that “our civilization is within reach of one of the greatest steps in its evolution: knowledge of the existence, nature, and activities of independent civilizations in space.” In a Saganesque phrase, the report suggested that “at this instant, through this very document, are perhaps passing radio waves bearing the conversations of distant creatures—conversations that we could record if we pointed a telescope in the right direction and tuned to the proper frequency.” Sagan and others reached out to the general public through interviews, television appearances, and works like Sagan’s 1973 book The Cosmic Connection.”* The pro-search lobby mixed idealistic hopes for an epochal discovery with the salesmanship necessary to get support for an actual program. As their optimistic vision of contact spread through the inter- ested public, expectations began to soar. A series of workshops on interstellar communication chaired by Morrison reported in 1977 that, within the previous two or three decades, we had entered a new communicative epoch. A signal sent from an existing radio dish on Earth could be detected with ease across the galaxy by a similar dish—if it were pointed in the right direction at the right time and were tuned to the right frequency. The report concluded that the present “climate of belief” made it timely to search for extraterrestrials. A signifi- cant program with substantial potential secondary benefits could be under- taken with only modest resources; large systems of great capability could be built if needed. Such a search was intrinsically an international endeavor in which the United States could take a lead. This report coined the term SETI—the Search for Extraterrestrial Intel- ligence—distinguishing that effort from communication with such intelli- gence (CETI). As we will see, that distinction remains an issue within today’s debate. Jill Tarter and Stanford’s Christopher Chyba commented later that, instead of calling this search SETI, it might be better to call it SET-T, a search for extraterrestrial technologies.” NASA established a small SETI program office at Ames in 1976, headed by Billingham. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena formed its own office the next year. Jill Tarter, the first astronomer to devote her career to SETI, became an increasingly important player in the scientific prepara- tions for a search program. Senator Proxmire set back the project in 1978 by giving it his Golden Fleece Award (an example of the government wasting the taxpayer’s money). Proxmire later retreated from active opposition, at least partly because of a conversation with Sagan. That skilled science popularizer included contact with alien civilizations in his highly successful 1980 televi- sion series and book Cosmos.” Searching for Intelligence