Just Quotes by Seth Shostak

16 Just quotes by Seth Shostak

Seth Shostak’s reflections on “just” weave his astronomical curiosity into everyday moments. He invites readers to consider the larger picture while staying grounded in the simple choices that shape our lives.

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Sure, our three-pound brains might be inadequate to understand the universe. But perhaps they're just good enough to build something that can.

Seth Shostak

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The space elevator's not just another competitive technology, promoted by people who simply like the idea of diminishing the luster of the…

Seth Shostak

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We're not just any star stuff, most of which is humdrum hydrogen and listless helium. Our bodies include fancier ingredients like carbon,…

Seth Shostak

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If gravity were somewhat stronger or weaker, stars wouldn't exist, and neither would you. And the same can be said of other…

Seth Shostak

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In the 19th century, if you had a basement lab, you could make major scientific discoveries in your own home. Right? Because…

Seth Shostak

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Sure, nobody will make a fortune if we figure out why the Big Bang happened. But just about everyone would like to…

Seth Shostak

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It's the default premise in science: If you observe something in nature only once, you assume that what you've seen is typical.…

Seth Shostak

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Just knowing that there's somebody else out there - that what's happened on this planet has also happened in many other places…

Seth Shostak

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The cosmos is three times as old as Earth. During most of creation's 14 billion year history, our solar system wasn't around.…

Seth Shostak

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'Dating Game' wasn't social commentary, political analysis, Shakespearean-level drama or even blunt-force comedy. It was just the televised equivalent of meeting someone…

Seth Shostak

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When I graduated high school, nearly a half-million people subscribed to 'Popular Electronics' magazine. Soldering up some radio or hi-fi amplifier on…

Seth Shostak

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Most of the things at the zoo don't look like us. We're one design that works. Our chimp pals sort of look…

Seth Shostak

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The mission of NASA's Kepler telescope is to lift the scales from our eyes and reveal to us just how typical our…

Seth Shostak

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Humans have existed only for the last 0.001 percent of cosmic time. All of which says that - unless the Homo sapiens…

Seth Shostak

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I think there's a lot of intelligence out there, but that's just my guess. Question is: Are they peaceable or hostile? You…

Seth Shostak

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When I was a kid, which was just after Edison invented moving pictures, there were films that involved aliens coming to Earth…

Seth Shostak

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Studying Sol's interior by looking for analogous patterns on its incandescent face is known as helioseismology, an active - if largely unpronounceable - research…

Seth Shostak

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Some pundits have proposed that the aliens have come here to breed with us. Apparently, too much bike riding or something similar has rendered…

Seth Shostak

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As far as I can tell, the only unambiguous consequence of the claimed invasion of Earth by beings from another star system has been…

Seth Shostak

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Look, science is hard, it has a reputation of being hard, and the facts are, it is hard, and that's the result of 400…

Seth Shostak

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Give consideration to the fact that alien astronomers could have scrutinized Earth for more than 4 billion years without detecting any radio signals, despite…

Seth Shostak

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In a movie, it's often important to have aliens whose gestures and facial expressions can be 'read' by humans. And in the days before…

Seth Shostak

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Sure, nobody will make a fortune if we figure out why the Big Bang happened. But just about everyone would like to know.

Seth Shostak

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If you could drive straight down, into a tunnel bored through the crust of the planet, you'd hit this molten mess in about an…

Seth Shostak

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While I have always thought that the motivation for looking for E.T. was both self-evident and patently worthy, it's possible that I'm a victim…

Seth Shostak

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I studied Latin in high school, and I was reading stuff from Cicero. And that signal took a few thousand years to get to…

Seth Shostak

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About the only things that are unique to Earth are our biota and our culture. If aliens ever come here, they'd most likely be…

Seth Shostak

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This plucky NASA telescope is able to find planets en masse. If you compare planet hunting to prospecting for gold, then Kepler is equivalent…

Seth Shostak

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The most attractive habitats for synthetic sentience might be the vicinities of exceptional sources of energy - for example black holes, or even the…

Seth Shostak

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Buying insurance is no one's idea of fun. And it's especially easy to berate something as funky-sounding as writing checks to defend our neighborhoods…

Seth Shostak

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Plate tectonics is not all havoc and destruction. The slow movement of continents and ocean floors recycles carbon dioxide dissolved in the oceans back…

Seth Shostak

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