The Biological Universe: The Twentieth Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science [Hardcover]

Steven J. Dick (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0521343267 | ISBN-13: 978-0521343268 | Publication Date: June 13, 1996 | Edition: 1st

Throughout the twentieth century, from the furor over Percival Lowell's claim of canals on Mars to the sophisticated Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, otherworldly life has often intrigued and occasionally consumed science and the public. The Biological Universe provides a rich and colorful history of the attempts during the twentieth century to answer questions such as whether "biological law" reigns throughout the universe and whether there are other histories, religions, and philosophies outside those on Earth. Covering a broad range of topics, including the search for life in the solar system, the origins of life, UFOs, and aliens in science fiction, Steven J. Dick shows how the concept of extraterrestrial intelligence is a world view of its own, a "biophysical cosmology" that seeks confirmation no less than physical views of the universe. This book will fascinate astronomers, historians of science, biochemists, and science fiction readers.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

As biological scientists learn more about how terrestrial life was formed, they increasingly turn to the stars to ask whether life might have evolved elsewhere. Thus far, despite a recent flurry of interest in Mars, they have found no solid evidence, but they keep looking. This scholarly book, written by a historian at the U.S. Naval Observatory, examines the long development of that quest, along with some of the philosophical questions that have emerged from it. Steven J. Dick notes that our observational abilities are both limited and biased, and that the search for extraterrestrial intelligence forces us to examine some of our own assumptions about what constitutes life in the first place.

Review

"The Biological Universe is a wonderful and excellent read, containing a wealth of carefully researched material, and I wholeheartedly recommend it to the SETI enthusiast-- both amatuer and professional alike." Julian A. Hiscox

"The best book on extraterrestrial life that I have ever read." Patrick Moore, New Scientist

"The book is well documented and offers a wealth of leads to a variety of literature, much of it otherwise difficult to find....Few other areas of science have such fine, reliable, convenient, and literate accounts of their history." Joseph N. Tatarewicz, Science

"...every reader should be grateful for a book that succeeds in enriching our knowledge of the historical and factual background needed for any serious discussion of these 'big questions.'" Stephen G. Brush, Nature

"Dick has produced the most thorough and thought-provoking book on this subject in years." Ben Bova, Mercury

"Dick's excellent book The Biological Universe, takes the reader through the historical and present debates over extraterrestrial life." Times Chronicle, Glenside News

"Dick has done and admirable job of openeing up fresh territory....Dick's pioneering history nicely rounds out Cambridge University Press's trilogy on the extraterrestrial life debate." Karl Hufbauer, Isis

"...rigorously informative...." Publishers Weekly

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 596 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press; 1st edition (June 13, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521343267
• ISBN-13: 978-0521343268
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,622,017 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding book on extraterrestrial intelligence, June 13, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Biological Universe: The Twentieth Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science (Hardcover)

This book was incredibly good; in fact, surprisingly good. It's got all the trappings of an academic book--numerous footnotes, a university press publisher--but the writing style is lively and engaging. The author goes through developments in the field of ETI during the twentieth century--life on Mars, UFOs, SETI, extrasolar planets, etc--presenting the different sides of the various controversies. This may be the best book ever written on the subject. Readers should also check out Ken Croswell's book PLANET QUEST, about the discovery of extrasolar planets, a likely prerequisite for extraterrestrial intelligence.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very good history, very good science, August 8, 2001

By 

[e-mail] - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Biological Universe: The Twentieth Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science (Hardcover)

Steven J. Dick is an historian with a broad academic background both in the humanities and in the sciences. The present book of nearly 600 pages will establish his reputation even more. Its sub-title, "the Twentieth Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science" reveals what is the book's focus, and also gives a hint of its broad philosophical scope. For though Dick's main theme is the astronomers' efforts to find out whether there is life on other heavenly bodies than our own earth, he is careful to relate it to the astronomical world-picture of the time. He sets forth in sufficient detail the arguments used to support or reject the idea of extra-terrestrial life. His presentation is clear and informative, with a minimum of technical jargon. Readers of this book will get a good grasp of the development of astronomical practice and theory after Copernicus and Newton, both in the scientific community and among the general public.

Of course the main meat of the book is the tremendous rise of interest in matters of outer space. On the unsophisticated popular level, this means mainly "little green men from Mars", fanciful accounts of Star Wars, eked lout by UFOs -- Flying Saucers. Dick's perspective includes these: he notes that many future scientists, including Carl Sagan and several future Nobel laureates, devoured science fiction of this kind in their early teens. As a serious historian, Dick tries to account for how popular culture and the scientific elite influenced each other. Positively, since public interest made it possible to raise money for building ever more sophisticated and expensive astronomical instruments and space probes, including the Hubble space telescope. Negatively, since the sensationalism of the popular press, radio and television (including Orson Welles's extraordinary radio broadcast in 1938, "War of the Worlds", and later TV dramas about space adventures such as "Star Trek", tended to hurt the reputation of scientists who participated in space projects. Dick consistently takes the view that scientific research cannot progress without the trial and error of creative hypotheses: the very essence of hypothesis testing.

True, we still do not have any proof of life or conscious intelligence on other planets than the earth, nor around other stars in our own galaxy, the Milky Way, nor in the billions upon billions of galaxies around us. But thanks to the adventurous research projects of the latter half of the 20th century, with radio telescopes and the Hubble space telescope, and also the landings on the Moon , Mars and Venus, and finally the grand, Government-supported project of SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence), where Carl Sagan was an important actor, we now know much more than we did around 1900. The quest will go on, strengthened by the arguments elaborated in the lively 20th century debates.

To complement Dick's historian's perspective, I strongly recommend "Our Cosmic Origin" by A. Delsemme, a prominent astronomer specializing on comets. His history starts with the BIg Bang, some fifteen billion years ago.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A sweeping history of a new worldview, November 21, 1999

By 

Allen Tough (Toronto, ON Canada) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Biological Universe: The Twentieth Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science (Hardcover)

In recent years, science has given us a new worldview. The universe now seems much friendlier to life than it was in the old cosmology of lifeless rocks and stars. Steven Dick captures this new worldview in THE BIOLOGICAL UNIVERSE. It is easy to understand, breathtaking in its broad sweep of decades of debate and progress, and highly relevant for understanding today's science.