Since ancient times, the sky has been a central space that, beyond offering fixed attributions of place, time and identity, has been used to negotiate the relationship between individual and cosmos and the interrelated fundamental questions of human existence and its values. Thus, an ethical approach to the skies offers crucial perspectives that are embedded in the context of interdisciplinary fields of research and cultural horizons. The aesthetic realization of these perspectives is of central importance alongside these areas of questioning, because both literary and scientific as well as religious texts use the sky as a projective space to develop literary-rhetorical power. 

The sky as a boundary between finiteness and infinity, between secularization and sacralization, but also as a screen for the projection of ethical questions - the interpretations of the skies in science, art and literature are manifold. The exchange between these different perspectives was the focus of the interdisciplinary and international conference organized by   Prof. Dr. Stephanie Waldow and  Prof. Dr. Bernd Oberdorfer and supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the Jakob-Fugger-Zentrum.  The conference was held between October 30^th and Nomber 2^nd  at the University of Augsburg.

The results of this conference were published in the interdisciplinary volume „Der Himmel als transkultureller ethischer Raum“ edited by Prof. Dr. Waldow, Prof. Dr. Oberdorfer and the Munich astrophysicist Prof. Dr. Harald Lesch. The book was published at the end of 2016 as the second volume in the series „Internationale Schriften des Jakob-Fugger-Zentrums“.