Climate and the Potential for Life on Other Planets

Understanding planetary habitability is key to understanding how and why life developed on Earth as well as whether life is present on planets that orbit different stars (exoplanets). Whether a planet could be habitable is determined primarily by the planet's climate. This lecture will address insights we've gained from studying Earth's climate and how those have been used to make predictions about which exoplanets might be habitable, and how astronomical observations indicate the possibility of new climatic regimes not found on modern Earth. Finally, the lecture will cover some questions about the future of humanity and the Fermi paradox.