Internal Dialogue

A little over a year ago I wrote a blog entitled “Why I Believe” which detailed my belief in the existence of extraterrestrials. Reading back, I see someone who’s incredibly enthusiastic about believing in something that he cannot prove. Someone who does not believe in government conspiracies or wacky UFO-stories, but does believe in something that in all probability will never be confirmed in his lifetime.

This belief has not faded, and it probably never will. I’m not religious. But I can’t deny that over the years I’ve made certain assumptions about the world and universe we live in, and that these assumptions defy logic. I have faith in certain things that to me seem like the truth. That there’s no denying its validity, even though I have no way of proving them. So in a way, maybe I’ve created my own religion by believing in things that to others might not seem so straight forward.

One of these beliefs is that I wholeheartedly believe that we are not alone. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that my favorite movie is Contact (based on the novel by Carl Sagan). Even though its story clearly contains elements of science fiction, I admire the way he portrayed the implications such a discovery might have on our society.

Before I continue I must point out that I do not believe in UFO sightings and government conspiracies to cover up already established contact with an alien race. What I do believe in, is that we are not alone. There is no doubt in my mind that that other intelligent species have evolved in our universe.

Now, my last two sentences already produce too many questions. What should we consider intelligent life? If that’s true, where are they? How can you be a man of science if you believe in something you simply cannot prove? Why is it so hard to believe that life is extremely rare and we’re probably the exception rather than the rule?

I have no answers to these questions. Well, I do, but they’re not really very convincing. Even if I explain all the details, it still comes down to me believing in something that will probably never be proven or confirmed. I don’t necessarily believe that there are many civilizations out there. I just know that we are not alone, but I don’t think the universe is swarming with life. Life is pretty rare, and I guess we should count ourselves lucky that on our planet, all the circumstances were right. And even while the circumstances were right, it took four billion years for evolution to produce us human beings. So no, considering what I know, I don’t expect there to be as much life out there as Star Trek would have me believe. But I don’t think it’s so ridiculous to believe there’s not a single civilization out there besides us. I know this sounds a lot like faith, and like I wrote in the second paragraph: maybe it is. But I didn’t write this to have someone tell me I’m being illogical or downright naive, because I already know. This belief undermines everything else I know to be true, and I know it.

I won’t repeat (or even link to) what I said in the blog I mentioned. It was basically me convincing myself that I still believed, while throwing around some interesting facts about the size of the universe and the recent discoveries of exoplants. Thinking about it now, mentioning those facts probably didn’t help my case. I can throw around all the facts I want, but it still boils down to me believing in something that’s not yet proven.

But why? Why believe this? I don’t know. For years I’ve been interested in extraterrestrial life. Sure, there was the X-Files, but I obviously knew this was entertainment and far from the truth. However, having recently watched the entire series again, my interest in the subject was renewed. Against all my beliefs I even did some research on UFO claims and the infamous Roswell crash of 1947. I still think it’s all bogus, but it did make me wonder. What if, and this is pure speculation because I don’t think this will ever happen, some alien craft did crash or some alien race did try to make contact? What would happen? Would someone really benefit from keeping it a secret? In today’s world, would it even be possible to hide such a thing?

Judging by the amount of stories and movies made about the subject of first contact, it’s clear I’m not alone in asking these questions. There are even many firm believers like myself, especially those running the SETI program and all those participating in the SETI@Home project. I admire their spirits, it’s been clear to me for some time now that we’re really not going to establish contact using that method. Although as a believer I must admit there is a tiny chance they will succeed, it’s really not worth it. Years ago I read a book about the subject of extraterrestrial life. It touched the subjects of life, our existence, the possiblity of extraterrestrial life, our need and ability to venture out into space and the possiblity of establishing contact using a method like SETI. After reading the book, it was fairly obvious to me that SETI is not the way. Considering the size and age of the universe alone makes it impossibly hard to ‘find’ a signal now.

No, I don’t think there’s any way we’re going to find definite proof of the existence of extraterrestrial life any time soon. And I highly doubt humanity will live long enough to get the opportunity to find out. And even if we do, the universe is so unimaginably big that there’s no guarantee we’re going to run into them. No, for me, this comes down to a belief that there must be something else out there. We can’t be alone; the universe is too big. If it can happen here, it can, will and has happened somewhere else.

“…but I guess I’d say if it is just us… seems like an awful waste of space.”