Name: Light of the Stars: Alien Worlds and the Fate of the Earth
Price: 573.00 ZAR
Availability: InStock
Author: Adam Frank
ISBN: 9780393609011

portada Light of the Stars: Alien Worlds and the Fate of the Earth

Light of the Stars: Alien Worlds and the Fate of the Earth

Type

Physical Book

Author

Adam Frank

Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company

Language

English

Pages

272

Format

Hardcover

ISBN13

9780393609011

Synopsis "Light of the Stars: Alien Worlds and the Fate of the Earth "

Astrophysicist and NPR commentator on what the latest research on the existence and trajectories of alien civilizations may teach us about our own.Light of the Stars tells the story of humanity’s coming of age as we awaken to the possibilities of life on other worlds and their sudden relevance to our fate on Earth. Astrophysicist Adam Frank traces the question of alien life and intelligence from the ancient Greeks to the leading thinkers of our own time, and shows how we as a civilization can only hope to survive climate change if we recognize what science has recently discovered: that we are just one of ten billion trillion planets in the Universe, and it’s highly likely that many of those planets hosted technologically advanced alien civilizations. What’s more, each of those civilizations must have faced the same challenge of civilization-driven climate change.Written with great clarity and conviction, Light of the Stars builds on the inspiring work of pioneering scientists such as Frank Drake and Carl Sagan, whose work at the dawn of the space age began building the new science of astrobiology; Jack James, the Texas-born engineer who drove NASA’s first planetary missions to success; Vladimir Vernadsky, the Russian geochemist who first envisioned the Earth’s biosphere; and James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis, who invented Gaia theory. Frank recounts the perilous journey NASA undertook across millions of miles of deep space to get its probes to Venus and Mars, yielding our first view of the cosmic laws of planets and climate that changed our understanding of our place in the universe.Thrilling science at the grandest of scales, Light of the Stars explores what may be the largest question of all: What can the likely presence of life on other worlds tell us about our own fate? 20 illustrations

Adam Frank

(Author)

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Adam Frank es un físico, astrónomo y escritor estadounidense reconocido por sus investigaciones en astrofísica computacional, evolución estelar y astrobiología. Nació en 1962 en Nueva Jersey y obtuvo su licenciatura en Física en la Universidad de Colorado y su doctorado en la Universidad de Washington en 1992. Posteriormente realizó investigaciones posdoctorales en Leiden University y la Universidad de Minnesota antes de integrarse a la Universidad de Rochester, donde se convirtió en profesor de Astrofísica.

Su trabajo científico se ha enfocado en la formación y muerte de las estrellas, la dinámica de fluidos astrofísicos y la búsqueda de vida extraterrestre. Fue cofundador de uno de los primeros programas de la NASA dedicados al estudio de “tecnofirmas”, es decir, señales de civilizaciones avanzadas fuera de la Tierra. También desarrolló el código computacional AstroBEAR para simulaciones astronómicas complejas.

Además de su carrera científica, Frank es un importante divulgador de la ciencia. Ha colaborado con NPR, CNN, The New York Times y Scientific American, abordando temas como el cambio climático, la inteligencia extraterrestre y la relación entre ciencia y cultura. Fue asesor científico de la película Doctor Strange de Marvel y autor de libros como Light of the Stars, The Little Book of Aliens y The Constant Fire.

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