Abstract
Intelligibility of the universe is a question where humanists, especially philosophers can interact with astrobiologists. We have seen in Part 3 of the Book of Life that one aspect of intelligibility can be achieved by searching for the distribution of life in the Solar System, even before Kepler, CoROT and other instruments can provide definite answers. In this final chapter we discuss intelligibility in the domain of philosophers to attempt to pose proper questions in the science of astrobiology. Once we accept that a definite answer to the distribution of life in the universe intrinsically a question that even with the best instruments cannot be answered completely at present. We must wait until cosmology progresses further.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Supplementary Reading
Callender, C. and Huggett, N. (2001) Physics Meets Philosophy at the Planck Scale, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Flew, A. ed. (1979) A dictionary of philosophy. Pan Books, London.
Hinneells, J.R. (ed.) (1984) The Penguin dictionary of Religions. Penguin Books, London.
Livingstone, E.A. (ed.) (1977) The Concise Oxford dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford University Press, London.
Rovatti, P.A. (ed.), (1990) Dizionario Bompiani dei Filosofi Contemporanei. Bompiani, Milan.
References
Aretxaga-Burgos, R. and Chela-Flores, J. (2011) Cultural Implications of the Search and Eventual Discovery of a Second Genesis. In: Origins: Genesis, Evolution and Diversity of Life (2nd Edition), J. Seckbach and R. Gordon (eds.). Cellular Origin and Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology, Springer, Dordrecht, The Netherlands. Submitted by invitation.
Butterfield, J. and Isham, C. (2001) Spacetime and the philosophical challenge of quantum gravity. In: Callender, C. and Huggett, N. (eds.) (2001) Physics Meets Philosophy at the Planck Scale, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 33-89.
Chela-Flores, J. (2007) Fitness of the cosmos for the origin and evolution of life: From biochemical fine-tuning to the Anthropic Principle, in Fitness of the Cosmos for Life: Biochemistry and Fine-Tuning, J. D. Barrow, S. Conway Morris, S. J. Freeland and C. L. Harper, (eds.), Cambridge University Press, 151-166.
Chela-Flores, J. (2009). A Second Genesis: Stepping stones towards the intelligibility of nature. World Scientific Publishers, Singapore, 248 pp.
Dyson, F. (2004) The world on a string. Review of the book of Brian Green The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time and the Texture of Reality. The New York Review of Books, 13 May.
Dyson, F. (2010) Lo scienziato come ribelle. Biblioteca delle Scienze, Milano. The chapter concerned refers to a book review appearing in (Dyson, 2004).
Feferman, S. (1998) In the Light of Logic. Oxford University Press, UK.
Feferman, S. (2004) The New York Review of Books, 15 July.
Flew, A. (ed.) (1979) A dictionary of philosophy, Pan Books, London, pp. 300-301.
Henderson, L. J. (1913) The Fitness of the Environment An Enquiry into the Biological Significance of the Properties of Matter, Peter Smith, Gloucester, Mass., 1970, p. 312.
Riess, A. G., Filippenko, A. V., Challis, P., Clocchiattia, A., Diercks, A., Garnavich,P.M., Gilliland, R. L., Hogan, C. J., Jha, S., Kirshner, R. P., Leibundgut, B., Phillips, M. M., Reiss, D., Schmidt, B. P., Schommer, R. A., Smith, R. C., Spyromilio, J., Stubbs,C., Suntzeff, N. B. and Tonry, J. (1998) Observational Evidence from Supernovae for an Accelerating Universe and a Cosmological Constant. Astronomical J. 116, 1009–38.
Russell, R.J. (2001) Life in the universe: Philosophical and Theological Issues, in Chela-Flores, J., Owen, T. and Raulin, F., The First Steps of Life in the Universe. Proceedings of the Sixth Trieste Conference on Chemical Evolution. Trieste, Italy, 18-22 September. Kluwer Academic Publishers: Dordrecht, The Netherlands.
Snow, C. P. (1993) The Two Cultures, Cambridge University Press.
Wilson, E. O. (1998) Consilience The Unity of knowledge, Alfred A. Knopf, New York.
Witten, E. (2010) Beautiful Minds. A video series of contemporary science edited by G. Oddifreddi. Milan. Volume 20.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Chela-Flores, J. (2011). An intelligible universe with the science of astrobiology. In: The Science of Astrobiology. Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology, vol 20. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1627-8_16
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1627-8_16
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-1626-1
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-1627-8
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences (R0)