Until a few years ago, any talk of alien life was considered cranky, the preserve of science-fiction enthusiasts and anoraks. Today it is the subject of serious debate, a concept that has seeped into the public imagination. At bookmakers you can get odds of less than 20-1 that NASA will announce contact with an extraterrestrial civilisation before the end of the millennium. In LIFE OUT THERE, acclaimed science writer Michael White considers all aspects of the search for intelligent aliens, from the real meaning of the Martian meteorite which came to public attention in 1996 to what contact with extraterrestrial life would mean for our institutions, our religious beliefs and our self-image as a species. Along the way, he explores a plethora of questions at the heart of the matter, for example: what is 'life'? Is the evolution of animal life and the development of civilisations a very rare thing, or common to most worlds with a suitable environment? What would aliens look like? How would they travel interstellar distances? Is there a thriving intergalactic club out there, from which we are currently excluded? Michael White offers solutions to many of these mysteries.