Skip to content
Join our Newsletter

Imax film asks: Is there life out there?

What: The Search for Life in Space Where: Imax Victoria When: Opens Friday, runs through Christmas Tickets: imaxvictoria.com Note: Kaltenegger will appear tonight at 6 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.
xx-0921-Lookout.jpg
The summit of Mauna Kea, Hawaii, home to the world’s largest observatories, rises above the clouds and provides clear views of the night sky in this scene from The Search for Life in Space.

What: The Search for Life in Space

Where: Imax Victoria

When: Opens Friday, runs through Christmas

Tickets: imaxvictoria.com

Note: Kaltenegger will appear tonight at 6 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. screenings for a brief talk and question-and-answer session

 

 

At the point when scientists discover life on other planets, science fiction will become science fact and a new, bold chapter in human history will be written. “It will be profound,” says Lisa Kaltenegger, associate professor of astronomy and director of Cornell’s Carl Sagan Institute in Ithaca, New York.

“Think of something like the Copernican Revolution, when we found out that Earth was not the centre of the universe.”

The discussion isn’t new; astronomers have been searching solar systems for hundreds of years. But the possibility of life elsewhere definitely “creeped up on us,” Kaltenegger said.

“For the first time in human history, we have the tools to find life somewhere else — if it exists. Instead of it becoming a philosophical question, it’s becoming a scientific question because we can measure it.”

Kaltenegger, who stars in the new IMAX film The Search for Life in Space, says roughly three dozen planets fit the bill for habitation. Humans could be living on other planets long before Earth becomes uninhabitable 500 million years from now.

But while she is skeptical of some data — “Every time we hear of a new planet that is the right size and the right distance, where it is not too hot and not too cold, people always say that’s the best one,” she said — astronomers are nothing if not persistent.

“As long as they are in this habitable zone, it’s promising.”

The 32-minute documentary, narrated by Malcolm McDowell, begins its run at Imax Victoria this week with an appearance by Kaltenegger, who will speak tonight after screenings at 6 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Both screenings will be followed by a brief talk and question-and-answer session.

Australia’s December Media produced the film, the second in a trilogy to explore the nature and evolution of our universe.

Kaltenegger, a native of Salzburg, Austria, was the perfect on-camera choice for a film aimed at space exploration. In November, she spoke alongside physicist Stephen Hawking and Nobel Prize-winning astrophysicist Saul Perlmutter at a conference on science and sustainability at the Vatican City in Rome, one that featured Pope Francis in its audience.

Filming was an entirely new kind of adventure, she said. In the film, she crawls through lava caves and flies in a helicopter without doors. “I’m a scientist,” she said, laughing. “I work most of the time at the computer, so that was a great opportunity to not pass up. Looking through a telescope is nice, but not as exciting as you might think.”

Finding life in space rests on the arrival of a new NASA telescope, which Kaltenegger said is due next year. “By definition, the problem is that we have one example [to study] — our planet. There could be life, but we need the next telescope to really check for that.”

If the human race continues to live the way it does today, the expiry date of Earth remains in question, Kaltenegger said. “With climate change, it’s not a given we have half a billion years. We can speed that up. However, we’re starting to wake up to the consequences of our actions. This film will wake us up from the day-to-day things that capture our attention. Often, we don’t have the time to think about the bigger picture. The search for other planets gives you a chance to think about the overall importance.

“If we were to find life on another planet and then die ourselves, it would be too much.”

mdevlin@timescolonist.com