My parents gave me a small telescope, then I built my own, and one thing led to another. So thats how I ended up going from being a hobby astronomer to a professional astronomer.

Deep and elegant explanations relate to natural or social phenomena and the observer often has no place in them.

When we discover New Earth - a planet we could call home - the question of the plurality of worlds will come front and center, reminding us yet again that we are not the center of the universe.

Life and the universe compare to each other like a child and a parent, parent and offspring.

In science, it is rare that a transformational change occurs during our lifetimes.

It feels great to discover a planet, just like any discovery in science, except that it has more of the feel of exploration - you can go back and look at it. However, I can never visit.

We do care about planets like the Earth because by now we understood that life as a chemical system really needs a smaller planet with water and with rocks and with a lot of complex chemistry to originate, to emerge, to survive.