For almost 50 years, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) research program was pursued under the hypothesis of the universality of the physical laxs in the cosmos. The authors call attention to some epistemological issues that make it necessary to seek other aesthetic, spiritual and ethical "cognitive universals". They propose the participation of a braoder community of scholars from natural, social, artistic and hmanistic disciplines to explore all the possible "universal cognitive maps" that evenutally might favor the detection of extraterrestrial intelligent life.