| September 22: Class logistics and scope of astrobiology |
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Are we alone? Is life common or rare in the universe? Is the Earth really special? Sampling and survivor biases in science. Illusions of Providence, Good Fortune, and Miracles. Limitations from the weak anthropic principle. What limits the progress of science? Imagination versus technology. What do will know well and poorly? |
Reading:
WB (Web Book): Prologue
RE (Rare Earth): Preface
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| September 24: Measuring the distance to the stars |
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Overview of human history. Personal and impersonal views of nature. Need to generalize from observations. Giordano Bruno, Life and death. The Sun as a star and the Earth as a planet. Many habitable worlds. Astrobiological issues raised by Bruno that are valid today. Hand out candles for night part of measuring distance to star. |
Reading:
WB: Read Chapter 1 to get at basic issues
RE: Read Introduction, Dead Zones and Rare Earth factors
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| September 29: Insignificant of the Earth in the universe |
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We will do the day part of a laboratory exercise to measure the distance to the nearby stars without a telescope. We will assume (correctly) that the Sun is a star. Our equipment would have been available in ancient Athens. Candles, pinhole cameras, and measuring sticks. You should do night part on your own by start of class. We will meet in the classroom and go outside. We will also see how bright sunlight is on the other planets. We will do this next time if it is too cloudy. |
Reading:
RE: Chapter 1
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| October 1: Astronomy and worldview |
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Sky as source of useful information. Clock, months, and seasons. Planets. Penchant to winnow out more clues: astrology. Ancient scientific astronomy and geometry. Size of the Earth and Moon and distance to nearby stars. Galileo and the demise of geocentric astronomy. Worldviews: cozy universe with large Sun circulating small Earth. Validity of common experience. Need to quantify. |
Reading:
WB: Begin Chapter 2
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| October 6: Vastness of space and lack of insight as limit on science |
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Disk angles of planets and stars. Measuring distance of nearby stars without a telescope. Results of our observations. Lunar occultations. Transits and the size of the solar system. Working outward with standard candles. |
Reading:
WB: Finish chapter 2
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| October 8: The new physics and the new math |
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Limitations of Greek mathematics. Need to quantify arguments: return to Galileo and rotation of Earth. Phenomenology: Kepler's laws. Calculus for the nonmathematical. Predictive theories from Kepler to general relativity. Good hypotheses explain unexpected data. Halley's comet. Simplicity in science. |
Reading:
WB: Chapter 3
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| October 13: To be announced |
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Reading:
WB: Chapter 4
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| October 15: Science and imagination and Life |
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Magical thinking suppresses imagination. Religious worldview of orderly universe. Science and pseudoscience. Structural problems with classical science. Modern penchant for measuring. Science, mysticism, scholasticism, and blind empiricism. Small effect of secrecy on progress in astrobiology science 1600. Defining life and chemistry. DNA. |
Reading:
WB: Chapter 4
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| October 22: To be announced |
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Reading:
WB: Begin chapter 5
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| October 27: Enough time for life? |
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William Paley and young Earth. Relative time from geological relationships. Fossil time scale and geological maps. Fit organisms and the illusion of design. Evolution by natural selection. Practical implications to finding coal. Accumulation rates and absolute time. Time needed for evolution and natural selection. Cooling time of Earth. Radioactivity: time scale and heat source. Expanding universe and cosmic time. |
Reading:
WB: Finish chapter 5
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| October 29: Life history of stars |
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Georges LeMaître and expanding universe: religious worldview as starting point in science. Proper motion. Main sequence star. Limits of intuition. Fate of massive stars. History and fate of our sun. Making planets. Finding extrasolar planets. |
Reading:
WB: Chapter 6
RE: Chapters 2 and 3
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| November 3: Air, Earth, Fire, and water |
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Finding air. Chemistry as a new science. Atoms and the retention of planetary atmospheres. Temperature within the Earth's atmosphere. Greenhouse effect. Moon. Mars, and Venus. Fate of the Earth. Marginally habitable regions on Mars. Dune? |
Reading:
WB: Chapter 7
RE: Chapter 9:
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| November 5: Life on an active planet |
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Fit organisms and the illusion of design. Evolution by natural selection. Will cover readings and lectures to November 2. I will give takehome essay for midterm at about this time. We will look at acorns if weather and trees are good. |
Reading:
WB: Chapter 8
RE: Chapter 9:
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| November 10: Evolution of large and microbial organisms |
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Will cover readings and lectures to November 2. I will give takehome essay for midterm at about this time. Genes and DNA. Tree of life. Problem with origin. Evolution makes it hard to export details of terrestrial life to other planets. We will look at acorns if weather and trees are good. |
Reading:
WB: Chapter 9
RE: Chapters 4
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| November 14: Ground zero! |
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Asteroid impacts and life. Extinction of dinosaurs. Sterilization of planets by huge impacts. Exchange of life between planets. Where to hide? Hints of impacts in genome of modern life. Mars versus Earth. |
Reading:
WB: Chapter 10
RE: Chapter 8
Section 3 |
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| November 11: Mid-term |
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| November 17: Ground zero! |
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Worldview against catastrophe in Geology; example of overreaction. Asteroid impacts and life. Extinction of dinosaurs. Sterilization of planets by huge impacts. Current skeptics. Exchange of life between planets. Where to hide? Hints of impacts in genome of modern life. Mars versus Earth. |
Reading:
WB: Chapters 11 and 12
RE: Chapters 5, 6, 7, and 10
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| November 19: Life in weird places |
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Life in the dark on Europa and Mars. Ceres as a starting point for life. Life on Venus. Life around red dwarf and red giant stars |
Reading:
WB: Chapters 11 and 12
RE: Chapters 5, 6, 7, and 10
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| November 24: No class. |
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Reading:
Finish Web Book and Rare Earth
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| November 22: Thanksgiving |
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No class. Check cooking time table for your turkey if you are curious about the cooling of planetary interiors. Reading: |
Reading:
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| December 1: Mother Earth and Intelligent life in the Universe |
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The gaia hypothesis of the Earth as an organism. Weak form is just weak anthropic principle. Biological consortia and evolution. A real example with a methane greenhouse. How we evolved. Control genes are the difficult step that occurred only once. Giant one-celled organisms. How do we stay here? Asteroid impacts. The runaway greenhouse. Finding ET. |
Reading:
WB:
RE:
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| December 3: Return to How did science function in practice? |
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Technology versus imagination, a review of the term. When was high tech really needed? Scientific progress and astrobiology on a planet with deep-sea octopi. |
Reading:
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| December: Final exam |
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There will be a free form group of questions. Students will also turn in short essay. |
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