The Hunt for Planet B

For a buff the doccie is an excellent background to our search for life beyond the Earth. The Hubble Space Telescope opened the heavens for us in 1990, but the James Webb telescope will go back to the edges of the universe. It is mind boggling how far we as a species have progressed, but will we survive as a species to get the results that we are not alone? Right now we are in the middle of yet another mad man who invaded another country for no reason at all and the end result is unknown. Other species on other planets may have reached similar situations, hence we have not found any evidence of life yet up to 40 light years away.

Is there other life out there somewhere? Undoubtedly, but space is so large that our own galaxy alone is more than 120 000 light years across. Imagine that there is intelligent life say 2 000 light years away from us, it will then take 2 000 years to say hello and wait another 2 000 years for their reply. Our galaxy is one of billions of other galaxies and space is still expanding at a speed beyond the speed of light.

The James Webb Space Telescope will help in making other important discoveries and possibly even find life out there, but we will never be able to visit them in normal space-time. Who knows we may in years to come be able to create worm holes, but currently we are then thinking about science fiction.

A space documentary which goes full-on Climate Alarmist and pro-government spending / NASA legitimation. CNN better stick to what they are good in: Fake news, smear pieces, fluff pieces and one-sided political opinion.

A waste of time if you expect real new info on space exploration, instead they begin to explore characters of the scientists involved and push climate alarmist propaganda.

Alex Jones also gets mentioned and featured as evil climate change denier. What a joke!

Good Grief, let's hope that the James Webb Space Telescope is better at maintaining focus than this stinker of a documentary.

I saw this program listed in the on-line TV listing I use, and based on what I read, I thought it was going to be a documentary on the James Webb space telescope. Man, was I ever mislead.

A very, very tiny portion of it is in fact about the James Webb space telescope. But the even the portion that is actually about the James Webb gives you about three sentences worth of information about the James Webb. Less than they could have put into the promo for the program, if they had wanted to do that.

For the most part, this program is actually snippets of a whole slew of very, very uninteresting people discussing their thoughts about the origin of life and about the prospects for finding extraterrestrial life. This is what this stinker of a documentary is actually about, and it isn't even a half-decent documentary about the origin of earth life or the prospects for finding extraterrestrial life. It is a lousy, lousy documentary about the possible origins of life and the prospects for finding extraterrestrial life.

I find this terribly annoying. If CNN wants to produce documentaries, why don't they hire some people who have exhibited a smidgen of talent at producing documentaries? The people who made this piece of space junk didn't even have a clear sense of what sort of documentary they were trying to make. They ended up with something that is horrifically unfocused and horrifically bad, so bad that it should never have been broadcast. They tried to make it seem like something other than what it actually is, by drawing attention to the James Webb Space Telescope.

If you want to reduce the James Webb Space Telescope to a single idea, it would be the idea of seeing all the way to the edge of the known universe. It would not be about the search for exoplanets, and even if it were particularly about the search for exoplanets, it still would not be specifically about the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. I actually sat through this thing twice, and I do not recall even once hearing anyone talk about the capability to see to the edge of the known universe.

The people who produced and directed this piece of space junk should never again be allowed to produce another documentary, by anyone. And by the way, CNN, one way that you could make up for this wasted effort would be to make a broadcast-quality documentary on the James Webb Space Telescope. But I seriously doubt that CNN or anyone affiliated with CNN would have any idea how to go about doing that. Why is it that CNN consistently produces these really, really god-awful documentaries that are so outlandishly awful that hardly anyone can stand to sit through one of them?

It feels so good to have occasions, such as this, to be proud of my species. Those who wonder beyond the confines of our lives are certain to be the ones who can not only widen our knowledge of our place in the universe, but also the ones who perhaps will save us from extinction. I salute everyone who has a part in the making and launching of this telescope..

"Search for Planet B" is scientific, technological, human, geological and cosmic. I was absolutely overwhelmed by the genius of the director, how he told the story of the scientists -astrophysicist, biologist, astronomer, technologist - combining their knowledge, skills and technical expertise with their utterly human lives, loves, disappointments - and triumphs. I thrilled and cried (fell in love with Sara Seager), and, in the end, was inspired. This was like no other scientific documentary I've seen. I will try. To see it again and again.