Much has been written about the existence of aliens. The number of books on the subject is numerous. Claims of abductions and encounters of the third and fourth kind have reached such alarming proportions that every time one goes to bed an abduction seems imminent.
It won’t do to reject offhand the possible existence of alien life-forms in other parts of the universe. But it is a difficult proposition to accept that they have been visiting us and communicating with us. It may well be that they are here—but there is no adequate proof. It would thrill scientists no end to know that there were aliens visiting our planets, but the mere account of people who claim to have been abducted is not enough to convince. Most people who experience alien encounters are usually under hypnosis or in a hypnogogic hallucinogenic state.
Far too many instances of alien abduction are brought to light under hypnosis—when the conscious mind is repressed and the subconscious is free to babble without restraint. Very often the patient is “led” by the hypnotist, who is liable to plant false memories in the patient’s subconscious.
We can only speculate based on what we know, and as far as we can know for sure, life exists only in our solar system. That is a fact. To talk about life in other star systems is mere speculation. In our solar system, we have eight planets on which life could possibly exist. But life in its most basic and primitive form can also exist on large asteroids and on satellites of planets. It is not impossible for life to develop on satellites like Triton, Io, Miranda, and others. So, in our solar system we have eight planets, plus nearly fifty satellites or planetoids, plus probably a dozen very large asteroids. That leaves us with a total of around seventy bodies in our solar system on which life could possibly exist. Of these seventy, so far, we have evidence of life on only one—Earth. A fact that in itself is rather telling.
On this one precious planet, there is an explosion of life. Millions upon millions of species not only exist but thrive. Life has flourished on this planet for nearly 3.5 billion years. And, for all the millions of species that exist today, millions have gone extinct in the past. Of all the life-forms that have existed in aeons gone by—including birds, viruses, fungi, bacteria, reptiles, insects, fish, mammals, and plants—only one species has come close to communicating with potential alien life-forms. Only Homo sapiens, among all the billions of species, is capable of space travel. The next most intelligent mammal would probably be the dolphin or maybe the chimpanzee—both of which are marvellous creatures and tremendously intelligent compared to all the other species. But how many billions of years would it take for the dolphin or the chimpanzee to be capable of space travel, if ever? The ancestors of man have been around for millions of years. Ardipithecus ramidus, the oldest known hominid, existed four million years ago. In those four million years of man’s existence, we were on the verge of complete extinction several times. And even though we’ve been around for so long, it has been only in the last fifty years or so that we have been capable of space travel. It is astonishing that we haven’t annihilated ourselves so far with our nuclear weapons.
Why hasn’t proof of life been found on Mars even though it is so similar to Earth? Here on Earth we have microscopic organisms that can survive without water or without oxygen, in biting cold and searing heat. Why don’t these kinds of organisms exist on Mars? One obvious answer could be that the conditions required for life are so rigid and dependent on so many precise factors that life cannot evolve until all the factors required are finely balanced.
In the face of these factors, how likely is it that intelligent life-forms exist in our universe? It is fairly probable that life in some form or the other exists on other planets in the cosmos. Bacteria-like life may be be plentiful in our universe. But intelligent life-forms might be extremely rare. Take the example of Earth. If it weren’t for humans, Earth would still be a planet teeming with life—but without intelligent life capable of space travel.
Carbon-based life-forms could probably end up looking like some of the species we have on earth if the conditions on the host planet were similar to Earth’s. After all, hydrogen and oxygen will combine to form water anywhere in the universe. It is quite likely that other planets may have life-forms that are the equivalent of our trees. They may be life-forms that we won’t even recognise as being living. If aliens visited Earth, what would their first impression of trees be? Would they instantly realise they were living? That brings to mind the Star Trek episode in which Captain Kirk’s crew encounter a silicon-based life form and begin harvesting silicon crystals without realising they were the eggs of this life-form.
Even if there were intelligent life-forms out there, it would be highly unlikely that they are visiting us, given the vast interstellar distances involved. Proxima Centauri, the closest star to the Sun, is 4.3 light years away. That might sound close, but it is actually something like 23,000 billion miles away. Light travels at around 300,000 kilometres per second. Travelling at one million miles an hour, it would take more than 2,500 years to get there. To get there in fifty years would require travelling at over one billion miles an hour for the entire trip! And that’s just to the nearest star. So it is highly unlikely that intelligent life-forms will be able to cross such vast interstellar and intergalactic distances and survive the entire journey.
There have been many reports of abduction by creatures who are small and bald; grey or green in colour; have big craniums, small chins, large black slanted eyes, and pointed or no ears. How does one explain the number of such claims and their similarity? The most reasonable explanation for the accounts being so similar is that they are based on the same movies, the same stories, the same television programmes, and the same comic strips. In reality, aliens will look nothing like this. They will almost certainly not look mammalian. They would be as different from us as we are from starfish or manta rays or octopuses. What would really be interesting to know is whether alien life will also be DNA-based or will they have another type of replicating molecule that is fundamental to their existence.
It is also interesting to speculate how we might communicate with aliens. Movies like Star Wars and Star Trek paint a ludicrous picture of humans communicating with aliens with fluent ease. We can’t even communicate with dolphins, our fellow mammals, how will we communicate with creatures from another star system? The best bet is that we might make contact with aliens using radio waves and the language we will use to communicate with them will almost certainly be the language of Mathematics. Extremely complex information can be communicated using only numbers and we can be sure that any technology-based aliens will be excellent mathematicians.
Perhaps there exist in some obscure corner of our universe races of beings who are millions, perhaps billions of years ahead of us in, who have devised ways to cross the vast inter-stellar distances through either super-luminary spacecrafts or by creating warp drives or manipulating worm holes. Have such beings come all the way here to abduct people, rape, maim, and conduct horrifying experiments on them? They would be as far ahead of us in technology as we are from ants. Imagine showing someone in the 1950s an i-phone. You tell them you can use it to make calls, access the internet, watch movies, play music, scan satellite images of any city, play games, acquire street maps, make calculations, and type documents—all on a device that has no wires and fits in the palm of your hand. To someone living just 50 years ago such a gadget would seem almost miraculous. Just imagine the kind of technology a possible alien civilisation might have that is millions or billions of years ahead of us. While we create highways they might create cosmic wormholes. While we harness the power of the wind they might harness the power of supermassive black holes. While we generate electricity they might generate supernovas. While we exist corporally they might exist as pure energy. While we occupy the four dimensions of this world, they might occupy higher dimensions. The possibilities are endless.
The prospect of the existence of aliens is thrilling and frightening in equal measure. It is sobering to realise that there are more stars in our universe than there are grains of sand on all the beaches of our planet. To think that there is something interesting happening only on our grain of sand is to be guilty of extreme hubris.
But the big question is, are aliens already here? I think the answer is, in all likelihood, no. While in the past people claimed to have been visited by incubi, succubi, and assorted demons, today people claim to have been visited by aliens.
