A Quote by John M. Grunsfeld

When I grew up as a kid, we didn't know there were any other planets outside of our own solar system. It was widely speculated that planet formation was an incredibly rare event and that it's possible that other planets just don't exist in our galaxy, and it's just this special situation where we happen to have planets around our sun.

John M. Grunsfeld

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Any Around Event Exist Formation Galaxy Grew Grew Up Happen Incredibly Just Kid Know Other Our Outside Own Planet Planets Possible Rare Situation Solar Solar System Special Sun System Up Were Widely

Quote Author

John M. Grunsfeld
American - Astronaut
Born: October 10, 1958

There's no doubt that the search for planets is motivated by the search for life. Humans are interested in whether or not life evolves on other planets. We'd especially like to find communicating, technological life, and we look around our own solar system, and we see that of all the planets, there's only one that's inhabited.

Debra Fischer

We're just learning that a lot of planets are small planets, and we didn't know that before, fact is, in planetary science, objects such as Pluto and the other dwarf planets in the Kuiper Belt are considered planets and called planets in everyday discourse in scientific meetings.

Alan Stern

Venus and Mars are our next of kin: they are the two most Earth-like planets that we know about. They're the only two other very Earth-like planets in our solar system, meaning they orbit close to the sun; they have rocky surfaces and thin atmospheres.

David Grinspoon

Estimates are that at least 70 per cent of all stars are accompanied by planets, and since the latter can occur in systems rather than as individuals (think of our own solar system), the number of planets in the Milky Way galaxy is of order one trillion.

Seth Shostak

Before 1995, the only planets we knew about were the planets in our solar system.

Debra Fischer

The planets and moons of our solar system are blatantly visible because they reflect sunlight. Without the nearby Sun, these planets would be cryptic and dark on the sky.

Seth Shostak

We know there are billions of stars and planets literally out there, and the universe is getting bigger. We know from our fancy telescopes that just in the last two years more than 20 planets have been identified outside our solar system that seem to be far enough away from their suns - - and dense enough - - that they might be able to support some form of life. So it makes it increasing less likely that we're alone. But if we were visited someday, I wouldn't be surprised.

William J. Clinton

The world, when you look at it, it just can't be random. I mean, it's so different than the vast emptiness that is everything else, and even all the other planets we've seen, at least in our solar system, none of them even remotely resemble the precious life-giving nature of our own planet.

Chris Hadfield

We search for life on others planets and in other regions of our galaxy. Meanwhile we destroy and ignore the other life on this planet.

Anthony D. Williams

We're living in the anthropocene age and now human beings will be the shapers of our future, that totally control the overall functions of not just our planet, but our relationship with other planets.

Vandana Shiva

No matter how you measure it, whether you measure the amount of mass or you measure the number of bodies, most of our solar system exists out beyond the orbits of the asteroids. So we could not have claimed to know our own solar system until Voyager had toured the giant planets.

Carolyn Porco

Just as our solar system has a certain idiosyncratic assortment of planets and moons, different from any neighboring system yet categorically equivalent, so each distinct period of human history might have special qualities and individuals, characteristics and events, yet still be essentially akin beneath the surface to all the others.

Paul Di Filippo

When Hubble was launched, it became clear very shortly thereafter that there was a problem with the optics.The mirror was not quite the right shape. And the one program that I had really been looking forward to doing with Hubble was studying outer planets in our solar system, the planets Uranus and Neptune.

Heidi Hammel

Because Alpha Centauri is so close, it is our first stop outside our solar system. There's almost certain to be small, rocky planets around Alpha Centauri A and B.

Debra Fischer

The stars associated with the solar system, such as the planets and asteroids (and it should be remembered that the term star in Biblical usage applies to any heavenly body other than the sun and moon) would be particularly likely to be involved, in the view of the heavy concentration of angels, both bad and evil, around the planet Earth.