| LONELY PLANETS: The Natural Philosophy of Alien Life David Grinspoon New York: HarperCollins, 2003 |
Rating: 5.0 High |
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| ISBN 0-06-018540-6 | 440pp. | HC/BWI | $25.95 | |
| Page 56: | "A sentient Venusian sulfur slug might have a different perspective, but solar system history is written by the survivors." |
| This statement seems to be a non sequitur. If the bright Venusian brimstone beastie lives and has a perspective, is it not a survivor? |
| Page 61: | "Anyway, after a decade-long malaise, having kicked the monkey of Cold War aggression off our backs, we've now demonstrated that, hot or cold, we don't need war to explore." |
| Fuzzy reference: I would say, "we don't need war, hot or cold, to drive exploration." (Yes, even despite the fact that my wording destroys the joy.) |
| Page 62: | "Ever since Bruno and Fontenelle, most thinkers have concluded that our universe contains copious extrasolar planets." |
| Wording: S/B "copious numbers of extrasolar planets". |
| Page 62: | "The first definitive detection of an extrasolar planet was made around a star called 51 Peg." |
| First mention should give full name: S/B "51 Pegasi". |
| Page 127: | "Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, the Jesuit paleontologist/philosopher described it in 1955 as the beginning of a new age, the 'psychozoic era'." |
| Missing comma: S/B "paleontologist/philosopher, described it". |
| Page 129: | "I believe, as Tielhard argued, that mankind is not just another species..." |
| Spelling: S/B "Teilhard". (Elsewhere, it is spelled correctly.) |
| Page 129: | "We've found bacteria thriving in acid so strong that it would dissolve your skin instantly, and creatures soaking contentedly in superheated thermal springs above two hundred degrees." |
| Scientist Grinspoon left off the units: S/B "Two hundred degrees Fahrenheit". (Yes, this is a nitpick; open water on Earth at 200° Celsius would be steam, while at 200° on the other temperature scales — Rankine or Kelvin — it would be frozen rock-hard.) |
| Page 155: | "A steady stream of newly minted Ph.D.s are being churned out..." |
| Number error: S/B "stream...is". |
| Page 180: | "You'd think after sending thirty-nine spacecraft to Mars (and counting)..." |
| Word order: S/B "thirty-nine spacecraft (and counting) to Mars". |
| Page 195: | "Galileo carried the first digital camera ever flown in space..." |
| Throughout the book, the proper name "Galileo" (when it refers to the spacecraft, not the man) is italicized. Except right here. |
| Page 210: | "Just five days after Mayor's announcement, Marcy and Butler went to the Lick Observatory, in the mountains east of San Jose, to observe 51 Peg." |
| Incomplete location: S/B "San Jose, CA". Those who don't already know where Lick Observatory lies could go astray when looking up "San Jose". After all, the capital city of Costa Rica also bears that name. [1] |
| Page 234: | "Popular works, no matter how innovative, creative, or substantial they might be, are suspect in the academy." |
| Capitalization: Probably S/B "the Academy", meaning the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Sagan's popular works are cited by some authors as a factor in his rejection by the AAAS. Dr. Grinspoon should have used the organization's full name. |
| Page 234: | "At times, Sagan took a fair amount of slack from his colleagues..." |
| Typo: S/B "flack" or "flak". |
| Pages 238-9: | "Exobiology had always survived on the fringes of planetary society." |
| Related-phrase slip: S/B "planetary science". |
| Page 266: | "Throughout the continuum as we know it..." |
| This is a stretch. I am the first to admit that my memory is flawed and imperfect. Yet, I'm fairly sure that this quote from Theodore Sturgeon that leads off Chapter 17 omits a word: S/B "the continuum Tin". |
| Page 277: | "I've been talking about the search-for-life signs on worlds orbiting other stars." |
| Remove the hyphens: S/B "search for life". |
| Page 304: | "I kept opening my eyes, half expecting to see a large, black, humming obelisk in my bedroom." |
| Definition: S/B "monolith", since Dr. Grinspoon is referring to the film 2001: A Space Odyssey. True, an obelisk is (usually) a monolith, but by definition it tapers toward the top, and is capped by a pyramid. The black monolith in 2001 was shown as a pure rectangular prism. |
| Pages 314-5: | "Not because life, left to its own devices would not evolve technoids again." |
| Missing comma: S/B "devices, would". |
| Page 320: | "...and the exquisite outer tendrils of the solar corona is briefly visible to starstruck watchers on Earth." |
| Number error: S/B "tendrils...are". |
| Page 391: | "When we debate how long it will take for intelligence to arrive on some random planet..." |
| Word choice: Considering Dr. Grinspoon's view that interstellar travel is likely to occur, this word probably S/B "arise". |
| Pages 392-3: | "A spherical shell of radio signals is expanding outward from Earth, its diameter increasing at twice the speed of light." |
| This is misleading in the same way as the following claim: That if you have a humongous pair of scissors, and you push the blades together at the speed of light, the point where the blades cross moves faster than light-speed. |
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