Nima Nayebi (Hastings): The Geosynchronous Orbit and the Outer Limits of Westphalian Sovereignty. Would-be space explorers, scientists, and a couple of crackpots gather at DARPA’s 100-Year Starship Symposium to try to get interstellar travel unstuck. A review of Psychology of Space Exploration: Contemporary Research in Historical Perspective. George Michael on extraterrestrial aliens: Friends, foes, or just curious? A review of The Myth and Mystery of UFOs by Thomas Bullard. Search for alien life should include exotic possibilities: For most researchers' money, an Earth-like planet is the best bet for finding alien life — but looking in such an exclusive range might give them only half the story. A review of The Doomsday Lobby: Hype and Panic from Sputniks, Martians, and Marauding Meteors by James T. Bennett. The search for alien life is on: New missions and discoveries on Earth, within our solar system and beyond are bringing us closer than ever to finding alien life on other planets. Marcus Chown wonders if there is life beneath Europa's icy surface. Scientists are hot on the trail of exoplanets suitable for life. The good folks at the Planetary Habitability Laboratory (PHL) of the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo have put together the Habitable Exoplanets Catalog (HEC). A colony of worms that lived and reproduced happily on the International Space Station is helping scientists determine how humans might also survive and reproduce in space. From TED, Phil Plait on how to defend Earth from asteroids. Do intelligent aliens exist in the universe? Michael Shermer helps deconstruct the question of extraterrestrial intelligence. There's got to be life out there, the atheistic view goes, none of it God-caused, of course. A look at the 6 most mind-blowing things ever discovered in space.
