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Outer Space is Stranger Than You Think

October 16, 2026 · 28 min

Show notes

Space looks spectacular in photographs. But what would you actually see if you were standing on another world? Astronomer Philip Plait takes us beyond the telescope in Under Alien Skies: A Sightseer's Guide to the Universe, imagining the view from worlds with twin suns, Saturn’s rings, and places where space and time get very strange. Then theoretical physicist Chandra Prescod-Weinstein widens the lens in The Disordered Cosmos: A Journey Into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred, exploring both the universe’s unseen ingredients and the human choices that shape who gets to study it. A journey through the cosmos—and a reminder that the night sky belongs to all of us.⁠⁠⁠⁠

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