Public Talk / Dana Burton - On the Edges of Evidence: Opening up Scientific Formation through Astrobiology

Astrobiology is a science that strives to understand the origin, distribution, evolution, and future of life in the universe. Dana Burton’s talk will explore aspects of the scientific formation of astrobiology at NASA by interrogating the science’s evidentiary capacity and what it can claim to know despite profound uncertainty. Burton traces the speculative dimensions of astrobiology to understand what this science is materializing in the present, and for the futures and worlds that it is making possible. Burton’s research sits at the intersection of anthropology of outer space, science and technology studies, history of the American space sector, and multispecies scholarship. Her fieldwork follows scientists, documents, microbes, and machines across Earth and beyond.