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Aliens Are Coming The Extraordinary Science Behind Our Search for Life in the Universe

by Ben Miller
Aliens Are Coming The Extraordinary Science Behind Our Search for Life in the Universe

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  • Synopses & Reviews

ISBN13: 9781615193653
ISBN10: 1615193650



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Synopses & Reviews

Synopsis

Actor and bestselling science writer Ben Miller takes readers to the cutting edge of one of the greatest questions of all: Is there life beyond Earth?

For millennia, we have looked up at the stars and wondered whether we are alone in the universe, but in the last few years--as our probes begin to escape the solar system, and our telescopes reveal thousands of Earthlike planets--scientists have taken huge leaps toward an answer. "Forget science fiction," author Ben Miller writes. "We are living through one of the most extraordinary revolutions in the history of science: the emergent belief of a generation of physicists, biologists, and chemists that we are not alone."

The Aliens Are Coming is a refreshingly clear, hugely entertaining guide to the search for alien life. Miller looks everywhere for insight, from the Big Bang's sea of energy that somehow became living matter, to the equations that tell us Earth is not so rare, to the clues bacteria hold to how life started. And he makes the case that our growing understanding of life itself will help us predict whether it exists elsewhere, what it might look like, and when we might find it.

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Average customer rating 4 (1 comments)

`
Tonstant Weader , September 16, 2016 (view all comments by Tonstant Weader)
This is an insouciant, enjoyable and downright funny science book. You can’t help but enjoy this book. It cracks me up at times, for example, when talking about dark matter, he wrote, “Whatever dark matter is, it’s definitely the boss of you.” Yup. Much of The Aliens Are Coming may be surprising in its focus on life on Earth, but it’s what we know about life here that informs our ideas of life out there. We used to think there were far more narrow limits for the kinds of environments in which we can find life. Now, having found life at the deep bottom of the sea and in the deadly heat of Yellowstone, we know there are forms of weird life, of extremophiles, that can take the heat or the lack of light. Because of what we know about evolution on Earth, we can make some assumptions about evolution elsewhere. Because we know about gravity, chemistry, biology, language and so on, we can make solid guesses about what kind of planets we need to look for to find life. I liked The Aliens Are Coming a lot. It’s smart, witty and fun. It does not oversimplify or talk down to readers. It does start with the assumption that readers are new to much of the science and walks through the assumptions researchers are making so readers understand that SETI, for example, is not some weirdos waiting for E.T. but serious science searching for signals that may reveal there is someone somewhere out there. And like us, they may be listening. I received an e-galley from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Product Details

ISBN:
9781615193653
Binding:
Trade Paperback
Publication date:
11/01/2016
Publisher:
Experiment
Pages:
304
Height:
.88IN
Width:
5.50IN
Illustration:
Yes
Author:
Ben Miller

Ships free on qualified orders.
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$11.50
List Price:$15.95
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1Hawthorne

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