a multimedia assemblage of ideas related to the possibility of extraterrestrial life and what this could mean for the human race.
Our place in the universe.
-- an excerpt from Carl Sagan's Cosmos
ET as God
"I don't believe in any of Earth's monotheistic religions, but I do believe that one can construct an intriguing scientific definition of God, once you accept the fact that there are approximately 100 billion stars in our galaxy alone, that each star is a life-giving sun and that there are approximately 100 billion galaxies in just the visible universe. Given a planet in a stable orbit, not too hot and not too cold, and given a few billion years of chance chemical reactions created by the interaction of a sun's energy on the planet's chemicals, it's fairly certain that life in one form or another will eventually emerge. It's reasonable to assume that there must be, in fact, countless billions of such planets where biological life has arisen, and the odds of some proportion of such life developing intelligence are high. Now, the sun is by no means an old star, and its planets are mere children in cosmic age, so it seems likely that there are billions of planets in the universe not only where intelligent life is on a lower scale than man but other billions where it is approximately equal and others still where it is hundreds of thousands of millions of years in advance of us. When you think of the giant technological strides that man has made in a few millennia—less than a microsecond in the chronology of the universe—can you imagine the evolutionary development that much older life forms have taken? They may have progressed from biological species, which are fragile shells for the mind at best, into immortal machine entities—and then, over innumerable eons, they could emerge from the chrysalis of matter transformed into beings of pure energy and spirit. Their potentialities would be limitless and their intelligence ungraspable by humans."
2001: A Space Odyssey
Advanced Civilizations
In 2010 Arthur C. Clarke gives us a glimpse of the transformations that may occur in a highly advanced civilization (or whatever succeeds a civilization as its next stage). One species in that novel, beginning as flesh and blood, eventually learned to transfer their brains and then their thoughts into shiny new homes of metal and plastic. Then they learned "to store knowledge in the structure of space itself, and to preserve their thoughts for eternity in frozen lattices of light. They could become creatures of radiation, free at last from the tyranny of matter. Into pure energy, therefore, they presently transformed themselves... They could rove at will among the stars and sink like a subtle mist through the very interstices of space"
Pop Culture
Many pop culture portrayals of human contact with extraterrestrial intelligence are grim and violent. The first contact results in near-apocalyptic destruction. There are, of course, exceptions.
The Interdimensional Hypothesis
Jacques Vallee proposes the existence of a non-human consciousness, which may or may not possess a physical body or bodies, that exists either on or around the earth and is able to manipulate space, time and consciousness in ways that we presently do not understand. Vallee is confident that humans can ultimately understand the larger reality of the phenomenon, provided the problem is attacked with research of sufficient vigour.
In addition to Vallee, other researchers such as Salvador Freixedo, John Keel, Aime Michel and Jon-Erik Beckjord, believe the phenomenon represents an alien intelligence which can masquerade in various forms, including space visitors, religious apparitions, anomalous creatures, poltergeists, and psychic phenomena.
These "aliens", appear to practice deception on a vast scale and little, if anything, of who they say they are or even what they appear to be can be trusted. Historically, pre-industrial societies believed in the existence of "elementals" of various sorts, dragons, demons, elves, fairies, pixies, and various other little people and paranormal beings. These entities were invariably supernaturally powerful, often belligerent and prone to playing pranks, as well as abducting children, seducing and raping men and women, and taking people to places where time seemed to pass at a different speed than the normal world. The theory identifies these entities as the action of the supposed consciousness.
As nation states began to industrialise and people generally became less superstitious, a change seemed to occur in the way the phenomenon manifested itself, as people began perceiving technological objects (UFOs), possessing peculiar abilities (such as speed, maneuverability) which are analogous to the magic of elves and demons of previous eras; that is, possessing abilities which always seem to be beyond our grasp or which contradict our sensibilities whilst remaining relevant as society changes over time, and hence remembered, propagated and not forgotten.
DMT
Dr. Rick Strassman, a psychiatrist and researcher of clinical psychopharmacology supports a variant of this theory. During his research with DMT (dimethyltryptamine), more than 50% of his subjects had coherent, realistic encounters with sentient beings who interacted intelligently. Further, many of these beings looked and behaved very much like those creatures described by so-called UFO abductees.
Strassman hypothesizes that DMT may allow us to access other dimensions by tuning our brain to a different reality, thus allowing us to see the Interdimensional entities that Vallee hypothesizes.
"So even though I'm no expert on quantum physics or any of the more far-out psychedelic views of cosmology, I did learn a little bit of this phenomena that is known as dark matter, which is non-visible matter that neither generates light nor reflects light, but still makes up 95% or more of the mass of the universe. It seemed to me that if it makes up that much mass of the universe, it could very well be inhabited, and it would just be a question of changing the receiving characteristics of consciousness through chemical changes that occurred with DMT to be able to perceive things that were normally not perceivable. And there are plenty of examples of that in everyday reality - I mean, with a microscope we can see tiny things we couldn't see normally - with a telescope we can see things very far away we can't see normally, with ultraviolet sensors we can see things that we can't normally see - so the only difference, maybe from a philosophical point of view, is that the change in our receiving powers are not tied in with a machine - they're more in our subjective/receptive consciousness rather than with a piece of metal and electricity and glass and things that can magnify or somehow change the things that we're capable of seeing.
So it's a bit of a stretch, but I don't think it's completely that crazy. The main thing that prevents further movement along the model that I'm talking about is just the verifiability between two people - like can two people see the same thing at the same time - like if you have two people looking through the same microscope at the same time, they can pretty much see and describe the same thing - but is it possible for two people to take DMT at the same time, or not even at the same time, and be able to see the exact same thing?"
Project Blue Book
"From 1947 until 17 December 1969, the United States Air Force actively investigated reports and sightings of unidentified flying objects - UFOs, under a program called Project Blue Book. Project Blue Book investigated 12,618 UFO sightings and 701 of those sightings remained unidentified. Many UFO researchers feel that the investigations of the UFO sightings were unprofessional and unscientific. The program used poor research methods and researchers were too eager to label a mysterious sighting as "identified" phenomena. Individual researchers and UFO organisations believe that members of Project Blue Book were pressured to "identify" UFO sightings to calm the public hysteria about UFOs. This theory has been supported by the recent release of CIA documents pertaining to UFOs. They also suggest that any report that was initially perceived as unexplainable or would cause public concern was never included in Project Blue Book. They allege that these reports were passed on to a higher authority that never reported the results to the public. Project Blue Book, it seems, was just a low level collection and disinformation program created under Project Sign (of December 1947) which evolved into Project Grudge (of December 1948) to cover up the true investigation into the alien presence on Earth." From "United States Air Force Project Blue Book", Above Top Secret Website
Jesse, this is so fantastic! Is there a conclusion forthcoming? Or, more precisely, rather than a "conclusion" (case closed on ET and transhumanity? Nah), maybe give us (your readers) a reason why we should care so deeply about humanity's relationship to ET. Maybe go in to your pop culture section and perform some of the interpretations that you have been known for on this wiki (cf Propoganda debates) and then skuttle that language down here for a closing salvo?
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