O observatório astrónómico Kepler foi, ou vai ser lançado para o espaço. Há algumas semanas atrás o blogue Centauri Dreams nesta sua nota: Kepler and the Odds, explicava a importância do que estava em causa:
"We just looked at Alan Boss’ remarkable statement that there could be 100 billion trillion Earth-like planets in the visible universe. It’s startling to think that a mission to be launched within weeks could so quickly give us a chance to size up the idea. The thinking is that dozens of planets like ours in the habitable zone should be visible to Kepler if such worlds are common, but if it comes up short, with few or none, we’re going to quickly re-evaluate how unusual a world we live on. A null result would be striking indeed. William Borucki, who is science principal investigator on the mission, has this to say: “Finding that most stars have Earths implies that the conditions that support the development of life could be common throughout our galaxy. Finding few or no Earths indicates that we might be alone.”
Sobre o Kepler, e a problemática mais geral da possibilidade de detectarmos vida (inteligente) extraterrestre, ver também estas ligações:
PS: Sobre esta questão ver, neste blogue, as notas sob a epígrafe ET
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