Is there anybody out there? That’s a question that has taken on new dimensions with the announcement from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) that it had discovered seven Earth-like worlds in a neighbouring solar system. Man won’t be venturing to these new planets in the TRAPPIST-1 system anytime soon as, given the limits of our current space-travel technology, the planets are at least 39 light years’ away and it will take thousands of years for a probe to reach there.
In the meantime, all we can do is look at these seven planets from afar and wonder if indeed they are capable of sustaining liquid water — what we determine now to be the key element of life as we know it.
These seven planets fall within the Goldilocks zone of TRAPPIST-1 — meaning they are not too hot, not too cold, and fall within the median where water is in its liquid form. The seven join the ranks of 3,449 other exoplanets that we have discovered beyond our own solar system since 2005. Most of these are either too hot or too cold for life as we know it to likely exist. Around 10 per cent of these exoplanets fall within Goldilocks zones, and these 355 — after Wednesday’s announcement — hold the best chances for Earth-like environments.
We humans are an inquisitive species, always willing to look beyond and wonder what’s out there, why, how, and what if. These are traits that have stood us well in our never-ending quest for knowledge, to research and experiment.
We humans, though, are locked into this blue planet for now on its annual trips around the Sun.
Yes, our ambitions and achievement have allowed us to set foot on the Moon, and we have every intention of colonising Mars within ten decades’ time. We have sent probes to the deepest regions of our solar system and beyond in our quest for answers. And we have built space telescopes to peer out of our Earthly window into the universe beyond.
For the seven billion of us, though, this planet faces many problems, most created or exacerbated by our interconnection, our communication and our ambitions. We fail to appreciate what we have in common, highlighting and deepening the divisions and faults that our diverse species is also burdened with. Looking to other worlds and the stars provides insight and satisfies our need to know more in our search for life. But we need to cherish life here.
