The odds are going up

Due to the immense distances of galactic and intergalactic space, even if there are 100 planets in the Milky Way with intelligent beings living on them, we likely will never know.  But what we are learning via the advances of astronomy is that there are likely a lot of places that somethings could live, which up until a few years ago was a matter of conjecture and debate.  Now it turns out that it's very likely there are numbers of planets that Carl Sagan would have been really comfortable with.

Tens of billions of habitable worlds in Milky Way

So it appears the odds of someone like this living out there have gone up.