A spacecraft just blasted off from Cape Canaveral on quite an intriguing mission. I watched it slice through the night sky from my front yard, a mere 60 miles from the launch pad.
This spacecraft is on a three-year assignment to scrutinize some 150,000 stars in our galaxy, hunting for evidence of Earth-like planets around those stars. In the most extensive mission of its kind, the Kepler craft (named after 17th century German astronomer Johannes Kepler) may determine whether planets like ours are common in the universe – or so rare that we're essentially all by our lonesome out here.
To nurture life, planets can't be too hot or too cold, and they must contain liquid (not frozen) water on their surfaces. So far, we know of no planets other than Earth with these characteristics. But with billions of stars in our own galaxy and countless galaxies, how can there not be other worlds with the right conditions to sustain life? Guitar Dad suspects there are plenty of other inhabited planets, probably even hosting creatures a bit like us. We'll never meet them, though, because the last time I checked it takes hundreds or thousands of light years to get anywhere in deep space.
Anyhow, I raise my glass to the Kepler mission. May the search for extraterrestrial life yield profound results. For more information about the mission, click here.
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