Lonely Planets: The Natural Philosophy of Alien Life by David Grinspoon
(out of 5 stars)
Planetary scientist David Grinspoon presents a robust presentation centered on alien life in the universe. An interesting and popular subject, this book was somewhat underwhelming overall, though it had some interesting and enjoyable passages.
While the book presumes to be a "natural philosophy" of the subject, the actual philosophy in the book is largely contained in a few sections of a few chapters. Most of the book describes historical or scientific fundamentals necessary for understanding the alien discussion, including histories of planetary science, alien philosophy, and biology. Except for the history of alien philosophy, which was the best part of the book for me, the history and science sections were good but not great. And while it is necessary to understand these basics, Grinspoon takes several hundred pages to get to his "philosophy". By that time, the decent narrative felt overly-drawn out.
Still, the book is a decent read for anyone with an interest in this sort of subject matter. But don't expect too much if you are an experienced reader, Grinspoon doesn't cover a great deal of original ground here, and except for the history of alien theories, I've read much better treatments of the history and science matters. Additionally, SETI dominates much of the discussion in a way which I found a bit off-putting, though I honestly can't say why. I like Grinspoon and love his enthusiasm, but I came away from Lonely Planets with a sense that it needed to be condensed and reorganized significantly. Three stars.
