This plucky NASA telescope is able to find planets en masse. If you compare planet hunting to prospecting for gold, then Kepler… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
I got interested in astronomy at the age of 8 because I was looking at an atlas of the planets in my… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
Clearly, enriching the cosmos with heavy elements takes a while. So there's inevitably an interval between the sterile aftermath of the Big… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
The stars look the same from night to night. Nebulae and galaxies are dully immutable, maintaining the same overall appearance for thousands… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
Data from orbiting telescopes like NASA's Kepler Mission hint that the tally of habitable planets in our galaxy is many billion. If… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
Planets that don't currently sport plate tectonics, such as Venus and Mars, are scarcely habitable. Tectonics might be a requirement of any… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
Estimates are that at least 70 per cent of all stars are accompanied by planets, and since the latter can occur in… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
There is a point of view among astronomical researchers that is generally referred to as the Principle of Mediocrity. ... If the… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
The split between religion and science is relatively new. Isaac Newton, who first worked out the laws by which gravity held the… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
Diminutive worlds are more likely to be rocky, and lapped by oceans and atmospheres. In the vernacular of 'Star Trek,' these would… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
Scientists - who prefer explanations subject to laboratory tests - figure that everything we see today was as inevitable as wrinkles, once… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
The math is dead simple: it seems that the frequency of planets able to support life is roughly one percent. In other… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
The bottom line is that finding orphan planets - small, faint, and located who-knows-where - is not for the faint of heart.… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
Recent results from astronomers who study the occasional gravitational lensing of unknown worlds by intervening stars suggest that orphan planets could be… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
It bears mentioning that the Milky Way is only one of 150 billion galaxies visible to our telescopes - and each of… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
In the four years since its launch, Kepler has chalked up 122 new and confirmed planets. It's also caught the scent of… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
The planets and moons of our solar system are blatantly visible because they reflect sunlight. Without the nearby Sun, these planets would… — Seth Shostak Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
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 Copy Share
