One week from today, February 12, an international community of scholars and humanists from 18 countries across Africa, Asia, Europe, the Americas, and Oceana will celebrate the 195^th birthday of Charles Darwin. "Darwin Day" began its life in 1995, the brainchild of Robert Stephens and fellow humanist, Arthur Jackson who have watched their celebration evolve into "an International Celebration of Science and Humanity as well as a year-round educational website."

The short term goal of the organizers is to increase awareness of Darwin Day and "build excitement" between now and 2009, the 200^th anniversary of Darwins birth, which program officials hope will be marked by global celebrations of Darwins legacy, while "promoting understanding of science and critical inquiry within our global community." A brief look at this years line up of events reveals the remarkable diversity of ideas that fall within the scope of Darwins key insight about change over time and natural selection. Lecture titles include: "The Evolution of Evolution," "Design Without Design," "Forensic Astronomy," and "Patterns of Warfare among Mississippian Native Americans." The event topics range from the husbandry of healthy zoo animals to rainforest diversity.

In Darwins autobiography he states, "Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws." Discovering these "fixed laws" that govern the origin, nature and distribution of life is the core mission of the SETI Institute, and exploring change over time is the powerful theme that unifies all of our work, from laboratory to classroom. The work of our scientists working on the NASA Astrobiology Institute research team focuses on the co-evolution of life and its planetary context, in projects that range from studies of life's emergence on early Earth to the habitability of planets orbiting relatively cool M-stars. This project will directly impact the Institute's search for evidence of life that, like us, is sufficiently complex to reflect upon its own origins.

The evolution of complexity and intelligence is a challenging research area, but one that can be probed scientifically, and Institute research seeks to tease important insights out of both the fossil record and animal communication systems. Darwin would no doubt be fascinated!

In preparing to write this article, we used a popular search engine to see how many Internet hits wed get with on Charles Darwin and came up with a about 1.42 million. This is about on par with Albert Einstein (1.56) and "Aristotle" (1.23) -- but less than half that of "Britney Spears," whose name yielded a whopping 3.3 million matches. Scientifically, we know that the information gleaned from this brief exercise is of limited value. But to an education professional keenly aware of the critical role science plays in our lives, the numbers are not surprising.

Our Education Department staff members have marked next Thursday on their calendars. For those of us who have devoted considerable talent and time to Voyages Through Time, our innovative integrated science curriculum based on the premise that "Everything Changes Over Time," Darwins birthday is an occasion to celebrate and to reflect upon the advance of human knowledge and out role in it.

We live in a very special time. We are the first generation with the scientific tools necessary to explore a world that has grown beyond the confines of Earths atmosphere. We seek evidence of lifes origin at ocean bottom hot spots, in the rocks and soils of Mars, and in the interstellar chemistry of our galaxy. We also seek evidence of intelligence by searching for signals from technology that transmits from distant planets.

What might be found can best be understood from a basis of self-knowledge. Where did we come from? Where are we going? What else is out there, and how did it evolve? What will we become? Big questions to ponder on the birthday of a man who helped us shape them.