Guest:  Dr. Charles Cockell;  Topics:  We mainly talked about Dr. Cockell's book, Taxi from Another Planet: Conversations with Drivers about Life in the Universe, plus extraterrestrial life from different perspectives.  Additional topics included UFOs, UAPs, Mars sample return, & lots more.

We welcomed Dr. Charles Cockell to the program for a discussion about his new book, "Taxi from Another Planet: Conversations with Drivers about Life in the Universe"  This book contains 18 essays from his discussions with taxi drivers throughout the UK and the U.S. extraterrestrial life.  During our discussion, he talked about many of his discussions with the taxi drivers, why he chose to do this with taxi drivers, plus he tallied up their opinions on multiple related topics, like UFOs, sightings, ET experiences, the UAP incidents talked about of late and more.  Later in the program, the topics expanded to broader ET and life in the universe questions, Mars sample returns and would it be safe to bring Mars samples back to Earth.  Don't miss what our guest said in response to that question plus what he said about bring such samples to the ISS or the Moon.

An additional topic focused on planetary protection and going to Mars with humans, space settlement, the need for finding out the gravity RX, what liquid water on Mars might mean for life on Mars and more.  Our guest made several comparisons of some of our topics to things on Earth such as Covid, Ebola, lab security and more. Don't miss out on hearing his ideas and thoughts on these questions.  Before ending, our guest was asked about possible feedback from his peers on his taxi driver research, then a listener asked him about his ideas on Freedom Engineering which focuses on redundancy and liberty in space.  Regarding liberty, he was primarily interested in assuring liberty in space but once again, terrestrial examples, including UK and US examples, were cited to make clear points about needing liberty in space as we develop it.  He talked about how easy it was to have tyrannical leadership develop in space.  He even mentioned a few examples of it happening and taking hold here on Earth.

Please post your comments/questions for Dr. Cockell on our blog for this show.  You can reach our guest through me or his faculty page at the University of Edinburgh where he is a popular professor.