Nota Bene
Dr. phil. Harald Zaun
Date/Place of birth: 21.03.1962 / Cologne
Citizenship: German
Degree: 07/93 Master of Arts Uninversity of Cologne
1986-1993 Master (History and Philosophy)
1984-1986 Extracurricular Studies at the University of Cologne; Lectures and seminars in: Astrophysics, Medicine, Geology, German and Sociology
Research stay at Harvard University Cambrigde (USA)
1993-1998 Doctorate supervisor Prof. Dr. H. Hömig (University of Cologne);
Topic: Paul von Hindenburg and Germany’s foreign policy between 1925 and 1934
Graduation: 06/98 (magna cum laude)
Print: DIE WELT, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Frankfurter Rundschau, Rheinischer Merkur, Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, Rhein-Zeitung, Stuttgarter Zeitung, Schwäbische Zeitung, Bücher-Magazin, Wiener Zeitung, FLUG REVUE, c’t, Technology Review, HAZ, WAZ u.n.v.a.
Online: Telepolis.de, FAZ.net, Wissenschaft.de (bdw), Wissenschaft-online.de (Spektrum der Wissenschaft), Spiegel Online, Astronomie.de u.a.
Cosmology, Astrophysics/Astronomy, Exo- and Astrobiology respectively, SETI, Astronautics, Robotics/AI, Science-Fiction, Geo-Sciences, History/Archeology, Philosophy and Science History.
WPK-Wissenschaftspressekonferenz / Deutsche Astrobiologische Gesellschaft / Kölner Sternwarte
My first non-fiction book, which I co-authored with my friend, Prof. Dr. Hans-Joachim Blome, and which was published by C.H.Beck-Verlag in 2004 and went into its 4th edition in 2018 in a revised, updated version, will be published by a renowned Turkish publishing house in Istanbul in 2022 – in Turkish, of course. We are delighted about this. We are pleased that our work will now also be published on a transcontinental level.
The similarity between my logo and “The Big Bang Theory“ , is a nice coincidence, however considering the popularity of this image not a big one. Having published a book about „Big Bang Theory“ (as well as various articles and the likes.), I am a fan of the US-Sitcom, but only since the end of September 2016. I’ve created this logo early July 2007, while the series’ first episode was not aired before the 24th September 2007! Bazinga! I was quicker!
Since 1998 I have been visiting the Frankfurt Book Fair every year, as it is a source of inspiration and fascination for me, although it might give you a feeling of being lost, as every author has surely discovered before. Oh dear! So many great authors, even top-bestseller-signs! So many distinguished books and hyper-intelligent protagonists of publishing hoses. What kind of place is this? All those TV-stars and writers will steal the show from myself! Am I out of place here?
Despite all these doubts I am really looking forward to going there every year, to be part of this beautiful book-show in the Main-metropolis. Even though I’ll remain just one among many authors…
“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence!“
This wisdom coming from Carl Sagan in 1979 is obligatory for me. Especially in view of the almost inflationary increasing pseudo-scientific and esoteric currents on the Internet, I will continue to criticize those protagonists who reinterpret scientific findings and theories and instrumentalize them for their abstruse concepts. They pretend seriousness and scientificness, lie and cheat sometimes also in the zodiac sign Pecunia. No, who claims strong, he should please present strong proofs! Who does not do this, I hold Occam’s Razor before eyes. It says: If all explanation options hold themselves in the balance, then often the simplest explanation (also statistically seen) is the correct one! It must not always have been aliens in the game …
What I like: playing jazz-rock guitar, sometimes chess, sometimes observing the stars, books, audio books, audio plays, concerts (primarily jazz, rock, baroque, classical), fitness training, Star Trek (TOS and TNG), SF à la Clarke and Asimov. Studying The Big Bang Theory: both the cosmological and US sitcom variants.
Homo sapiens, caught between macrocosm and microcosm, embedded in the stream of time, drifting in its flow, is at best able to recognize when looking at the nightly firmament that he is not alone in the universe with greatest probability. He knows that our creative universe cannot have been content with granting a short guest performance to only one species in space and time. The logic tells us that also extraterrestrial creatures are children of their sun all and all and carry the stardust in themselves which was released in innumerable supernova explosions into the cosmos. We are not alone because we cannot be alone in this universe – this is the premise of my work when I address exobiological issues. In doing so, I take for granted that in our Milky Way alone, a great many intelligent cultures have already experienced, or will experience, the velvety blackness of space and the sparkle of its oases of light with their own eyes or sensors. We may be separated from each other by space and time, but xenobiological curiosity, certainly not the worst human and certainly extraterrestrial virtue, unquestionably brings many cultures together on an interstellar scale. For me the formation of intelligent life is a cosmic imperative, the “First Contact” therefore only a question of time and patience. Thinking and writing about this, in contrast to most of the useless deeds we humans commit in the course of our lives, I do not consider a mere waste of time and money.