Achievement

Our Program held a ten-week long seminar series on "Ethical Issues in Astrobiology", required of all our students. After three weeks of introduction by faculty (including one expert from NASA) to the principles of environmental ethics as generally constituted, students were challenged to develop stances and make presentations based on application of these principles to specific situations. (These presentations are all available on our Website.) Examples of topics included: how should alien intelligent species be treated if/when they are found?; how pristine should Mars be kept from earthly contamination?; are the huge costs of space missions justifiable in today’s world?; is it ethical to try to synthesize new life forms in the lab?