Extra-terrestrials

"Two possibilities exist: Either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying." -Arthur C. Clarke

The fact that life spontaneously formed on Earth approximately 3.7 billion years ago is gobsmacking, to say the least. Scientists still struggle to understand how life came to be. This, might I add, is a black-hole in knowledge that religion conveniently utilises to serve up a ‘God-of-the-gaps’ to society. But I digress.

Despite the incredibly small chance of life forming (and it is, indeed, incredibly small. Hooray for being here!), there is an equally incredibly large number of potentially-life-hosting planets out there in our big, scary universe. What I’m trying to say is, there is probably life outside Earth.

WHOAH.

When you stop and think about that, it’s pretty freaky stuff.

In fact, there are probably multiple sentient alien races out there.  Perhaps they have fought one another in a war of attrition, and wiped themselves out in the process. Or perhaps they have developed an intelligent society, with a body of science and technology that far surpasses anything we have ever seen before.

Can you IMAGINE?!

Being extremely curious beings, we humans have made several attempts to “contact” life outside Earth, using strange communication methods that I don’t fully understand, projecting some kind of message out into ‘space’.

There is something tragic about knowing that unless something extraordinary happens, you and I will probably never meet these beings in our lifetimes.

But at the same time, do we really want to meet these aliens? As a species, we have controlled, eaten, exploited or made extinct almost every other species on the planet. If there is another intelligent life-form out there, we will probably either control them, or they will control us.

Or, as Arthur C. Clarke so eloquently put it: “I'm sure the universe is full of intelligent life. It's just been too intelligent to come here.”

It is tragic that our desperate quest for power and vengeance so often leaves us worse off; an eye for an eye does indeed leave the whole world blind. Humanities thirst for command over one another, and over other beings, is a blight on our species.

I can just imagine an alien race looking down on Earth, studying us from afar, and concluding that our inability to have foresight and compassion will ultimately be the end of us.

We kill each other, destroy the only planet we have, and subject other animals to our furious desire for control. Humanity’s obsession with ‘leaving a mark on the world’ has literally left the Earth scarred. Currently, the (probably harmless) threats of nuclear attack from North Korea put the whole Earth – and all life on Earth – at risk.

So maybe we do actually NEED an alien race to come here and go all ‘iRobot’ on us, forcing us to change our ways for our own good! Or maybe that’s a bit extreme. Maybe we humans ain’t so bad after all.

I mean, look at all the great things we have collectively achieved! We created the Beatles! (Before you laugh, on a recent google search of the top human achievements, one website had ‘The Beatles’ at #2. Putting a man on the moon only came in at #4.)

Sure, we have our flaws, but we humans are, by definition, only human. Upon looking at what we have created, achieved and developed, it is easy for us to think that we are gods, however we are really no more intelligent that the humans that existed 6,000 years ago. We all have the same Earthly needs, fears and desires as those pre-historic humans. We also have the same flaws.

Therefore, while we may not be evolving much (although flipping through the Darwin awards, it’s clear we still have some kind of ‘natural’ selection) I can only hope that humanity will eventually have the collective foresight to realise that we are mutually dependent. We depend on not only each other, but also other species and our environment.

After all, when the last tree is cut, the last fish killed, and the last river poisoned, then we will all realise that we can’t eat money.

And maybe then, the aliens will want to hang out with us. 

the reckless philosopher