Jennifer Wiseman: Are we alone in the universe?

In this webinar conversation in the Questions of our Times series, Dr Jennifer Wiseman, a leading astronomer and astrophysicist who co-discovered a new comet when she was a student, and who serves as senior project scientist on the Hubble Space Telescope, gives her personal views on the search for extraterrestrial life, the place and purpose of humans in the universe, the excitement of scientific discovery, and the question, Are we alone in the universe?

Dr Jennifer Wiseman is an astrophysicist, author and speaker. She studied physics at MIT, co-discovering comet Wiseman-Skiff in 1987, and continued in astronomy with her doctoral research at Harvard. She has worked with several international observatories and is currently a senior astrophysicist at the Goddard Space Flight Center, where she serves as the senior project scientist for the Hubble Space Telescope.

Dr Wiseman studies the process of star and planet formation in our galaxy using radio, optical, and infrared telescopes. She is also interested in science policy and public science engagement, and directs the program of Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion (DoSER) for the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Dr Wiseman is a Fellow of the American Scientific Affiliation, a network of Christians in Science. She frequently gives public talks on the excitement of scientific discovery. She grew up on an Arkansas farm enjoying late night stargazing walks with her parents and pets.

She also supports and works with the following organisations:

The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion
BioLogos
Christians in Science

The host for Questions of Our Times is Major Nigel Bovey, former editor of the Salvation Army magazine The War Cry, and the author of several books. His latest book, Browsing the Bible is a guide for anyone who wants to get started (or who wants to keep on reading) the Bible. Find our review of the book here: A guide to browsing the Bible.