Imagine tomorrow, and an alien craft crashed down on Earth. It’s a drone. There are no life forms in it.
But it’s undoubtedly extraterrestrial in origin. So we are confronted with the knowledge that we’re not alone, that we might be watched, and that we have no way to make further contact.
How does that change our human society and culture?
John Brennan, C.I.A. director, stated in an interesting interview with the economist Tyler Cowen that “some of the phenomena we’re going to be seeing continues to be unexplained and might be some phenomenon that is the result of something that we don’t yet understand and that could involve some activity that some might say constitutes a different form of life.”
So, Governments would be seen as having withheld a profound truth from the public, whether or not they did. We live in a true age of conspiracy theories.
There would be immense power and money in shaping the story humanity told itself.
If we were to assume that the contact was intimidating, military budgets would swell all over the world.
A more peaceful interpretation might orient humanity toward space travel or at least interstellar communication.
Maybe An awful lot of people would basically shrug, and it’d be in the news for three days, not more.
A lot of people would be very keen on continuing with their lives and systems no matter what. There is thick literature on how evidence of alien life would shake the world’s religions.
Most people might believe and have always believed that we share both the Earth and the cosmos with other beings — gods, angels, spirits, ghosts, and ancestors.
The whole of human civilization is a testimonial to the fact that we can really believe we are not alone and still obsess over our daily concerns.
Maybe the Russians and Chinese would never believe us, and frankly, large numbers of Americans would be much more likely to think that Russia or China was behind it.
And maybe A more cohesive perception of ourselves as a human species, and our planet as one ecosystem, might lead us to take more care with what we already have and the conscious life we already know.
Don’t you agree? What are your thoughts?