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Book review – Life in the Cosmos: From Biosignatures to Technosignatures

8-minute read

Are we alone in the universe? For the moment, this question remains unanswered, though there are many ways to tackle it. Just how many was something I did not appreciate until I sunk my teeth into Harvard University Press’s new flagship astronomy title Life in the Cosmos. Written by astrobiologist Manasvi Lingam and theoretical physicist Abraham “Avi” Loeb, this is a book of truly colossal proportions, clocking in at over 1000 pages. It boldly goes where few academic books have gone before by seriously and open-mindedly considering the possibility of extraterrestrial technological intelligence on par with, or far beyond humans. I found myself gravitating towards this book on account of more than just its size.

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Book review – Outposts on the Frontier: A Fifty-Year History of Space Stations

7-minute read

The recent 50th anniversary of the first moon landing was a reminder of how far we have come, but also how far we still have to go. Since humanity’s last visit in 1972, there have been plenty of ambitious plans to return one day or to even land people on Mars. For now, to paraphrase Carl Sagan, they are places that we can visit, yes. But settle? Not yet. How about closer to home though? With Outposts on the Frontier, freelance space historian Jay Chladek takes the reader on a factual fifty-year history of space stations.

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