Menu
The Contact Paradox: Challenging Our Assumptions in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
Next in the queue
58
/100
I Index Overall Rating
Readers
51/100Critics
65/100Scholars
Author:
Keith Cooper
Publisher:
Bloomsbury Sigma
Date:
January 21, 2020
The editor of the NASA-sponsored Astrobiology Magazine tackles some of the myths and assumptions that underlie SETIâthe Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligenceâtracing how far SETI has come since its modest beginnings, where it is going, and who we are in the cosmic context of things.
What The Reviewers Say
There’s so much to unpack here, but Cooper makes it all easy to digest, even as he’s blowing your mind with the sheer immensity of the universe and the incredible distances and challenges involved in locating, let alone communicating with, an alien species. The Contact Paradox is the best of scientific writing: it’s engaging, informative, full of wonder, heartbreakingly honest, and presents all sides fairly. Everything you need to know on the subject is right here..
The Contact Paradox is a fascinating look at the history of SETI and the possibilities inherent to extraterrestrial contact. What Cooper does that is so engaging is address multiple aspects of the issue.
... [a] fantastic entry in the Bloomsbury Sigma series of science-related titles.
The great virtue of Cooper’s discussion is that it gives readers a picture of living science. Too often, science is presented as fixed, solved, completed. Cooper shows us scientists disagreeing, presenting and supporting alternative theories, and gives clear discussions of the differing views, letting the science live.
