Voyager 1
So there was news recently that an astronomer picked up a repeating laser pulse pattern from space, as part of his work with SETI. At first glance, it sounds insignificant. But when you step back from the news a minute and think about it, what if it’s more than something natural, more than a glitch. What if it does mean there is someone, something else is out there?
Anyone that knows me understands my position on this issue. Only the arrogance of man keeps us believing that we are alone amongst the billions of stars, not just in our own galaxy, but in the billions of other galaxies. Small minds and antiquated notions would have you believe that life started here, will end here, and then there will be nothing. I tend to follow the principle that if we are alone and unique in the universe, it would be “an awful waste of space,” to quote the movie Contact.
It comes down to faith in things unseen, not in dogma, but in simple logic. We are here. We are in the far suburbs of our own galaxy. There are countless stars like our own, billions of years older. I dare anyone to look up at the night sky and hold on to the simple-minded notion that we are so special in a universe so vast and wonderful.
Far from being a UFO nut, I think there is even more stupidity in the thought that we are so interesting that any civilization would make their way out to the galactic countryside to visit Uncle Clem & the kids on this sod farm we call Earth. While we only understand rudimentary things about space travel, one thing we know for sure. Light is a bitch. Good luck traveling faster. Even our fastest spacecraft, Voyager 1, is barely out of the neighborhood of our Sun, a mere 10 Billion miles from here.
It launched September 1977. 32 years of flying, and it’s still close by.
It’s a hard thing to fathom. The farthest any man-made object has traveled from Earth, and it’s hardly anywhere. It might get to our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, long after the Earth is gone. That’s 26 trillion miles from here. Better pack a lunch.
So, what the bottom line?
If we end up finding out that there is indisputable evidence that the laser pulse is not natural, I hope that we can hold this up as a great moment in history, rather than devolve into the tripe and tribulation of arguing about whether they believe in God/Allah/Buddha/Shiva/Diety of the Month. Kinda not important, wouldn’t you think? Earthly notions foisted on some intelligence somewhere else trillions of miles away. Trust me, they don’t care. But if they have any sense at all, I hope that they look up a their sky and ponder how wonderful all of it is, and not just their own little corner of the universe.
Via io9.com
io9 – SETI Picks Up Regular Laser Pulse Emanating From Space – seti.
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