The Eerie Silence: are we alone in the universe?

In 1911 the little town of Nakhla in Egypt was the scene of one of the most remarkable events in historym when a chunk of rock fell from the sky and killed a dog. This is the only known canine fatality caused by a cosmic object. Improbably though this encounter was already, its truly extraordinary nature was revealed only decades later when scientists found that the culprit was not a common-or-garden meteorite, but a piece of the planet Mars.

The way life manages information involves a logical structure that differs fundamentally from mere complex chemistry. Therefore chemistry alone will not explain life's origin, any more than a study of silicon, copper and plastic will explain how a computer can execute a program.

It is hard to resist the impression that the present structure of the universe, apparently so sensitive to minor alterations in numbers, has been rather carefully thought out...The seemingly miraculous concurrence of these numerical values must remain the most compelling evidence for cosmic design.

The secret of life does not lie in its chemical basis . . . Life succeeds precisely because it evades chemical imperatives.

Should we find a second form of life right here on our doorstep, we could be confident that life is a truly cosmic phenomenon. If so, there may well be sentient beings somewhere in the galaxy wondering, as do we, if they are not alone in the universe.

Is there anything science should not try to explain? Science is knowledge and knowledge is power - power to do good or evil. Sometimes ignorance is bliss.