To be clear, plenty of alien life has been found by the 27th century, but nothing that appears to meet our standards of sapience.
There is one planet that has complex organisms that are considered "pre-sapient", or very close (in evolutionary terms) to achieving sapience. However, they weren't discovered until the planet had already been colonised. While the continent containing the pre-spaients has been declared a protected habitat, there's strong pressure from the scientific community to extend that classification to the entire planet, shutting down the now thriving colony and erasing any trace of it. It's an ongoing debate. |
