The Living Cosmos: Our Search for Life in the Universe Author: Chris Impey Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 978-0-521-17384-1 Price: £15.99 (Pb) 393pp
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A science without a subject matter is how critics often look upon astrobiology, but that’s doing a huge disservice to this burgeoning science. Extremophiles on Earth, the search for the origin of life on our planet, the exploration of potential habitats on Mars and the ocean moons of the gas giants, the discovery of potentially habitable exoplanets and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence all fall underneath its umbrella. Chris Impey has a lot to talk about then in this revised edition of his book.

For the most part, it’s good stuff. It takes a little while to get into, with the first chapter an unnecessary stroll through the history of our scientific and astronomical awakening, from the Greeks through to Copernicus and modern science. This is all fine, but what we really want to read about are the possibilities for alien life, and the first chapter just gets in the way.

When the astrobiology finally comes, Impey lays it on thick and fast but never in a manner that cannot be appreciated by the layman. The intricacies of life and evolution are all spelled out in clear, concise fashion; it’s quite exciting actually. It’s also startling to think that, despite this being an updated edition, it is already out of date in some places thanks to recent exoplanet discoveries, such is the pace of our progress. This doesn’t harm the discussion of astrobiology, however.

The book ends with a chapter asking if we are alone, which begins with intelligent looks at the Drake Equation, the Fermi Paradox and SETI, but then takes a left turn into more whimsical discussions of the simulation hypothesis, the doomsday argument and an odd undercurrent that seems to imply that technological progress could eventually be to the detriment of our species, which concludes the book on a slightly anti-climactic note.

A true popular science book, if its pages don’t fire your imagination, nothing will.

Keith Cooper