There's something inspiring about outer space. The idea that everyone and everything that I will ever know or see makes up a very small slice of life on Earth is profound enough. But to consider the tiny place that Earth occupies in our solar system, let alone the universe, is mind boggling. Space is vast. Every one of the stars in the sky is another sun, possibly circled by its own set of planets. Planets that might be inhabited by forms of life that we can't even begin to understand.
Seeking out these extrasolar planets is a difficult, time-consuming task, and the potential payoff is muted. Yet still, we search. It's that blind, hopeful exploration that is so appealing to me. Space travel carries powerful undertones of unification - venturing out into the dark unknown not under the flag of any one nation, but as humans.
Astronomers recently managed to photograph four of these planets for the first time, which is very, very cool. That leaves us no closer to zipping around, visiting distant places Star Trek-style, but it's still pretty exciting.
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