"La vida en el universo": The Oxford templeton visiting fellowship to Peru about SETI and bioastronomy

"La vida en el universo: su origen, su naturaleza, su sentido" ("Life in the universe: its origin, its nature its meaning") is a Peruvian project about SETI and Bioastronomy which has been awarded one of the six Oxford Templeton Visiting Fellowships to Latin America offered by the Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion at the Oxford University and the John Templeton Foundation for the year 2017. The project, which was both research, teaching and dissemination, has been proposed by two Universities of Lima, the UCSS (Universidad Católica Sedes Sapientiae) and the UNIFÉ (Universidad Femenina del Sagrado Corazón), and has been developed by the Visiting Fellow (i.e. Dr. Paolo Musso) from 20 February to 30 April 2017 in the Peruvian cities of Lima and Atalaya. The main topics to be investigated were: a) the relationships between the conditions required for the origin of life and the conditions required for the origin of universe; b) the philosophical and religious implications of the possible existence of life in other parts of the universe; c) the problem of the universality of reason, with a special focus on intercultural communication. The main activities of the project were: 1) a course of specialization for professors and students about the search for life in the universe; 2) a seminar about the origin of the universe and the origin of life; 3) a research work on interculturality to be developed in the UCSS Amazonian seat of Atalaya (called UCSS Nopoki); 4) an international congress about all the topics of the project with the participation of distinguished experts of SETI and Bioastronomy, who were to be put in touch with the local researchers in these fields. The present paper will account for the main outcomes of the projects and the future perspectives.