Why nuclear reactions on an exoplanet won't imply alien life

Why nuclear reactions on an exoplanet won't imply alien life

If you were hunting for alien intelligence, looking for a surefire signature from across the Universe of their activity, you’d have a few options. You could look for an intelligent radio broadcast, like the type humans began emitting in the 20th century. You could look for examples of planet-wide modifications, like human civilization displays when you view Earth at a high-enough resolution. You could look for artificial illumination at night, …

The James Webb Space Telescope has just made a historic first by capturing direct images of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of an exoplanet. This discovery opens a...