  The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) is a research activity
that started in the late 1950s, predating the arrival of "Big History" and
"Astrobiology" by several decades. Many elements first developed as part of the
original SETI narrative are now incorporated in both of these emergent fields.
However, SETI still offers the widest possible perspective, since the topic
naturally leads us to consider not only the future development of our own
society but also the forward trajectories (and past histories) of many other
intelligent extraterrestrial forms. In this paper, I present a provocative view
of Big History, its rapid convergent focus on our own planet and society, its
oversimplified and incomplete view of events in cosmic history, and its limited
appreciation of how poorly we understand some aspects of the physical world.
Astrophysicists are also not spared - in particular those who wish to
understand the nature of the universe in "splendid isolation", only looking
outwards and upwards. SETI can help re-expand all of our horizons but the
discovery of extraterrestrial intelligence may also require its own
practitioners to abandon preconceptions of what constitutes intelligent,
sentient, thinking minds.
