The Habitable Zone

They discovered a tiny planet, three in fact, circling a yellow star some 210 light years away in the constellation Lyra. The planet is very close to its sun, hurling around the planet in a mad cap dash. Its sister's do the same.

The planet is nowhere near the habitable zone one scientist is quoted as saying, which leaves one to wonder about this habitable zone. Very generally it that zone where we think life can exist; its roughly the distance earth is from our own sun taking into account the planet's position to the parent star and the size, age and heat of that star. The temperature allows the planet to have water, atmosphere, etc. And therefore it can or may have life much akin to our own planet.

This concept seems very, very shortsighted; it assumes we have already discovered all there is about life and how it thrives; but also that planet ecology/climatology is not adaptable. Its the same short sighted approach that, looking backwards, makes us think that the Romans lived a primitive life. Just looking at the ocean deeps, life takes on many different forms.

By calling this the "habitable" zone we set ourselves up for a very limited view of what to look for; and we should be looking for everything.

Image by Nat Hallinan, see his site here.