Alien Universe (34 page)

The Alien is likely to be carbon based and may well use oxygen in its respiration. It likely won’t be a traditional plant, although a photosynthetic animal is certainly possible.

But it will be a kindred spirit, thinking as well as a man, but different from a man. It will be a fellow traveler in this universe. It will be an ally and an enemy. It will be an opportunity to learn and to teach.

The distance between stars is large and it may be difficult to travel between them. Perhaps our first encounter with an Alien species will not be a landing on the White House lawn, but hidden in the hiss of a radio transmission. Perhaps the closest we will ever come to Aliens is to view them in their video signals. Somehow I find it hard to believe that if we ever discover that we have Alien neighbors that we won’t be drawn to visit them. So that wavering transmission from the depths of interstellar space might one day evolve into a visit to the neighbors.

Or we could be alone in the galaxy, or at least alone enough that encountering an Alien race is improbable in the next thousand years. The Drake equation with modern numbers in it suggests that there may not be many technologically advanced intelligent species out there. Somehow that would be a shame, a terrible waste of space, and yet a wonderful opportunity for humanity. As the planet hunters find Earth-like planets, humans would have places to go, new vistas to explore.

We won’t know the answer until we find an Alien. Until that happens,
mankind will continue to turn some of our best scientific minds to the question. But in the meantime, we will have to do what we have always done, which is to turn our gaze upward and dream. While we wait, maybe it’s best that we should take the advice from the classic movie
Thing from Another World
.

Watch the skies. Everywhere, keep looking. Watch the skies …

SUGGESTED READING

General

Steven J. Dick,
The Biological Universe: The Twentieth-Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science
, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1996.

Steven J. Dick,
Life on Other Worlds: The Twentieth-Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate
,

Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1998.

Early Aliens

Robert Crosley,
Imagining Mars: A Literary History
, Wesleyan, New York, 2011.

Michael J. Crowe,
The Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750–1900
, Dover, Cambridge, UK, 2011.

Michael J. Crowe,
The Extraterrestrial Life Debate, Antiquity to 1915: A Source Book
, University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, IN, 2008.

UFOs

George Adamski,
Pioneers of Space: A Trip to the Moon, Mars and Venus
, Leonard-Freefield, Los Angeles, 1949.

George Adamski,
Inside the Space Ships
, Abelard-Schuman, New York, 1955.

George Adamski, Leslie Desmond,
The Flying Saucers Have Landed
, Werner-Laurie, Newcastle, DE 1953.

Kenneth Arnold,
The Coming of the Flying Saucers
, privately published, 1952.

Charles Berlitz, William L. Moore,
The Roswell Incident
, Grosset & Dunlap, New York, 1980.

Susan Clancy,
Abducted: How People Came to Believe They Were Abducted by Aliens
, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 2007.

Jodi Dean,
Aliens in America: Conspiracy Cultures from Outerspace to Cyberspace
, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY, 1998.

Stanton T. Friedman, Kathleen Marden,
Captured: The Betty and Barney Hill UFO Experience
, New Page Books, Pompton Plains, NJ, 2007.

John Fuller,
The Interrupted Journey: Two Lost Hours “Aboard a Flying Saucer,”
Dial Press, New York, 1966.

John Moffitt,
Picturing Extraterrestrials: Alien Images in Modern Mass Culture
, Prometheus Press, Amherst, NY, 2003.

Curtis Peebles,
Watch the Skies!
, Berkeley, New York, 1995.

Carl Sagan,
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
, Ballantine Books, New York, 1997.

Dugald A. Steer,
Alienology
, Candlewick, Somerville, MA, 2010. For children, ages 8–12.

Erich von Däniken,
Chariots of the Gods
, Bantam Books, New York, 1972.

Fiction

Wayne Douglas Barlowe, Ian Summers, Beth Meacham,
Barlowe’s Guide to Extraterrestrials
, Workman Publishing, New York, 1987.

Patricia Monk,
Alien Theory: The Alien as Archetype in the Science Fiction Short Story
, Scarecrow Press, New York, 2006.

Life on Earth

Stephen Jay Gould,
Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History
, Norton, New York, 1989.

Angeles Gavira Guerrero, Peter Frances,
Prehistoric Life: The Definitive Visual History of Life on Earth
, Dorling Kindersley, New York, 2009.

Tim Haines, Paul Chambers,
The Complete Guide to Prehistoric Life
, Firefly Books, Ontario, Canada, 2006.

Simon Conway Morris,
The Crucible of Creation: The Burgess Shale and the Rise of Animals
, Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, 1998.

Biochemistry

Jeffrey Bennett, Seth Shostak,
Life in the Universe
, 2nd ed., Addison-Wesley, Boston, 2007.

Iain Gilmour, Mark A. Sephton,
An Introduction to Astrobiology
, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 2003.

National Research Council,
The Limits of Organic Life in Planetary Systems
,
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11919.html
Clifford Pickover,
The Science of Aliens
, Basic Books, New York, 1999.

Kevin W. Plaxco, Michael Gross,
Astrobiology: A Brief Introduction
, 2nd ed., Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2011.

Erwin Schrodinger,
What Is Life?
, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1992.

SETI

Albert Harrison,
After Contact: The Human Response to Extraterrestrial Life
, Basic Books, New York, 2002.

Marc Kaufman,
First Contact: Scientific Breakthroughs in the Hunt for Life Beyond Earth
, Simon and Schuster, New York, 2011.

Seth Shostak,
Confessions of an Alien Hunter: A Scientist’s Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
, National Geographic, Washington, DC, 2009.

Seth Shostak,
Sharing the Universe: Perspectives on Extraterrestrial Life
, Berkeley Hills Books, New York, 1998.

H. Paul Shuch,
Searching for Extraterrestrial Intelligence: SETI Past, Present and Future
, Springer, Little Ferry, NJ, 2011.

Peter Ward, Donald Brownlee,
Rare Earth: Why Complex Life Is Uncommon in the Universe
, Springer, New York, 2003.

Steven Webb,
If the Universe Is Teeming with Aliens … Where Is Everybody? Fifty Solutions to Fermi’s Paradox and the Problem of Extraterrestrial Life
, Springer, New York, 2002.

INDEX

abduction,
42
–48,
91
,
93
.
See also
Hill, Betty, and Barney

Adamski, George,
37
–42,
93
,
100
,
160
,
183

alchemist,
140

alcohol,
151

Alien
(movie),
71
,
86
–87

Aliens: ancient,
48
–50

definition of,
2

intelligence,
118
,
142

medical tests of, on humans,
48
–50

non-serious,
97
–98

warriors,
100
.
See also individual Aliens and types of Aliens

aliens, possible characteristics of: blood,
120
–21

body symmetry,
117

cartilage,
118

cellulose,
112

color,
119

communication,
124

defense,
119

diet,
121

echo-location,
124

ectothermy/endothermy,
120

life span,
124
–25

limbs, number of,
117

locomotion,
119

lungs,
122

metabolism,
139

nervous system,
118
–19

reproduction,
122
–23

senses,
123
–24

sexual dimorphism,
123

size,
117
–18

skeleton,
118

social structure,
125

speed,
119
.
See also
temperature

Allen, Paul,
175

Allen Telescope Array,
175

ammonia,
148
–49

amphibians,
122

animals,
115
–16

Anomalocaris
,
107

Antoniadi, Eugene,
23

Archaea,
108
,
110
,
137
–38

Area
51
,
36

Aristotle,
11

Army Air Force,
30

Arnold, Kenneth,
29
–33,
51
,
75

Asgard (
Stargate
),
89
,
100

Atacama Desert,
153
–54

atom(s),
128
,
130
,
134
–35,
156

and constraints on life,
131
–34

nucleus,
135

atomic bond.
See
bond, atomic

Autobots,
101

bacteria,
108
,
110
,
137

balloon, high altitude,
33
–34

Barsoom (book series),
5
,
24
,
57
–62,
100

John Carter,
5
,
57
–62

John Carter
(movie),
60
–61

A Princess of Mars
,
57

Under the Moons of Mars
,
57
.
See also
Martian(s)

Battlefield Earth
(Hubbard),
101

bees,
116

Berra, Yogi,
105

Berserkers,
157

Betazoid,
82

big bang,
140

Big Ear, the,
169
–76

biochemistry,
138
,
157

bond, atomic,
132
–36,
143
–44,
153
,
155

covalent,
128
,
135
,
146
,
149

ionic,
146

polar,
149

Borg,
83
,
89
,
157

Bradbury, Ray,
126

Brazel, W. W.,
34

Brownlee, Donald,
162

Bruno, Giordano,
11

Bryant, Ernest,
42

Buckle, Eileen,
42

Buck Rogers
(comic strip),
62
–63

Bugs Bunny,
98

Burgess Shale,
107

Burroughs, Edgar Rice,
5
,
24
,
57
–62,
100
.
See also
Barsoom (book series); Tarzan

Bush, George W.,
51

Calvin and Hobbes
(Watterson),
159

Cambrian period,
107

Cameron, James,
60
,
109

Campbell, John W.,
52
,
61
,
58
,
101

Campbell, W. W.,
22

canals,
19
–24,
71
–72,
169

Captured: The Betty and Barney Hill UFO Experience
(Friedman and Marden),
44

carbohydrates,
131

carbon,
131
,
133
,
139
–45,
151
,
153
–57,
183

carbon chauvinist,
157

Cardassians,
83

carnivore,
121

carrot, super,
70

Chariots of the Gods
(von Däniken),
48
,
88

chemical abundances,
139
–45

chemistry,
131
,
140
,
144

acids,
147
,
151

alkalinity,
151

bases,
147

electrons,
135
–36,
139

energy,
115

gaseous state,
145

hydrocarbons,
149

hydrogen fluoride,
148
–49

hydroxide,
147

molecules,
128
,
135

noble gas,
131
–32,
142

polar molecule,
146
.
See also
atom(s); biochemistry; bond, atomic; chemical abundances; elements; methane; oxygen