Historical June 1999 article. Dates, prices, services and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
Each year it becomes increasingly clear that we are not alone. No, I’m not announcing that there are suburbs or that people actually live west of Hanley Avenue; for better or worse, mostly worse, we’ve known that for years. Why someone would actually choose to live OUT THERE is a topic for future columns. Rather, dear reader, in saying we are not alone I am referring to the increasingly clear reality that life-forms exist on other places than our planet. Yes, this question is still subject to debate but it’s a bit like questioning whether we’ll wind up with a new taxpayer-financed downtown baseball stadium within the next ten years. Like, duh, does anyone really not know this?
It was only a few hundred years ago, a mere hiccup in the continuum of time, when we — we as in the royal we, humankind, mankind, man, woman, us — discovered that, gosh, the rest of the solar system doesn’t revolve around the Earth.
In retrospect, it’s easy to see how our egocentrism stems from our geocentrism. Anyway, the protests of Popes and poets aside, it was soon clear that we were just a part of a solar system in which we revolved around the sun.
From there the steps were logical and easy, again relatively speaking. Thanks to the invention of the telescope, we learned that there were many, many other stars and that we need to cover our windows. How many stars? Carl Sagan pointed out that there are more stars-in the universe than grains of sand on the North American continent. That’s like a lot.
The comparison stunned me because I could never figure out how he managed to count all that sand. Once I tried counting the sand that was lodged in my shoes after running by the ocean and gave up. And if even an itsy-bitsy percentage of those stars have planets and an even teensier percentage of those stars have life forms, that represents millions of planets with something alive.
The inevitability of this gets more and more obvious.
This became even clearer recently with the discovery of actual planets on a nearby star.
We know for pretty sure that our solar system is but one of many. Sooner or later we will hear from them. What they are, whether they breathe or walk, and how they look is open to question. Wiser heads than mine have said that if evolution began again on the Earth, under the exact same conditions, the end product — us — would look very different than we do today. So speculating on the form of these life forms is a bit like predicting what will wind up in the space where Talayna’s Restaurant used to be. It’s a crap-shoot.
But they’re there. How we will hear from them is almost as interesting as what we will hear from them.
First, of course, my geocentric bias is that sooner or later, we will hear from them.
I mean, how could they not want to contact us? (On the other hand, how often do I stop whilst driving through suburbia or even strike up a conversation with the ever-friendly customer relations agent at the county 7-11? Maybe this is an assumption that should be questioned!) For the purposes of this line of semi-reasoning, however, let’s assume that they will want to get in touch with us.
But how?
This column will explore the how; future pithy pieces will pursue the what. How? Surely they won’t call us on the telephone. Can you imagine the long-distance charge? And Shirley, they won’t send something through the U.S. mail.
If they are smart enough to be contacting us, they’ll know better than to depend on the mail. (Here’s a troubling thought: if they sent us a letter, it could have been mailed decades ago and they’re wondering why we’ve not replied. Yikes, it’s been misdelivered! Instead of it getting to the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue in D.C., probably someone at the White House Retreat Center in South County got it, misread the signature, and wondered why a letter writer named Alan misspelled his name as Alien, and what are these funny words anyway? Alas.) Ok, so phone and mail are ruled out.
They (it?) will want to make an impact and given the status of leadership in the world today, may decide to bypass chain of command and go directly to the people. What about skywriting?
A lost art, to be sure, but one which could have a cool effect. Think of it: There, above us against the blue sky, in giant letters a mile long, we see the white clouds spelling PEOPLE OF EARTH, HELLO. WELCOME FROM AFAR. WE’D LIKE TO TALK TO YOU ABOUT METROLINK ROUTES! Oops, that last part of the message just slipped in. Anyway, skywriting has potential: relatively inexpensive, lots of visibility, good windshield appeal.
But somehow it seems a bit antiquated, like crop-dusting. Besides, whatever language they chose to use would have to be written backwards by them so we could read it and that would be tough to do. So probably not. E-mail? Given the plethora of junk e-mail 1 get daily, it doesn’t require much techno savvy to get e-mail addresses, so that’s a distinct possibility.
But a wise alien life form may not want to be associated with Bill Gates, so I don’t think so. Going to where people congregate to spread the word holds some potential but unless they advertise 40% off at the shopping mall, they’d be ignored. Going through the pulpits, having the various priests, ministers, and rabbis spread the word have some logic, I grant you, but [don’t think it would work.
After all, a lot of religion is still coming to grips with Darwin, so getting the clergy to introduce green men or wide-eyed ghosties would be too great of a stretch.
All the easy possibilities are eliminated so there’s only one route left. What is pervasive, designed for communication, and appeals to the lowest common denominator? Of course, the television.
They could easily take over every regular, cable, and satellite signal so that all the televisions in the world were simultaneous broadcasting their message. Whether you’re watching Oprah, E.R., a parliamentary update, the local Chile vs. Argentina soccer game, Dallas with Chinese subtitles, a repeat of Seinfeld, or Der Ally McBeal, you’re glued. By coming through the tube, they have a captive audience of billions.
After all, except for sleeping, at any given moment, more people are watching t.v. world-wide than doing anything else. (How’s that for a depressing thought?) Don’t go grabbing for your t.v. guide, because it won’t be listed there. Heck, it may not even be during ratings week.
But some day, probably sooner than you think, all of the television screens in the world will emit a funny hum and go Zap. Existing programs will be interrupted and sets that were off will automatically be turned on, waking the third of the world that was asleep with a t.v.
In their bedroom.
The initial image will be striking, something so different and bizarre, that it rivets our attention.
We won’t be able to look away.
We will know that what Is on the screen is not of our world.
Then the message will begin.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, June 1999.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1999_06.pdf, printed page(s) 16, 15; PDF page(s) 16, 15.
