Are We Alone

733 Words3 Pages
On Life, or the lack thereof Why this fascination with the existence of life elsewhere? Why the universal curiosity towards the stars, of intelligences and space-faring civilizations and countless other fantastic visions of possibilities that lie beyond our realm of understanding? In a world racked by the scourges of war, famine, and debt and seething with the barely contained hatred humanity has for itself, what is the point of spending our wealth on complicated, most likely fruitless quests for these phantasms? Why do we even seek to attract their attention, perhaps communicate with these minds so alien? In the face of well-reasoned warnings of our complete destruction? One might say that this is a natural outgrowth of curiosity and intellect,…show more content…
A more succinct explanation behind the motives of the search cannot be found. Civilizations of eons past built temples and cathedrals to become closer to Heaven. So does today’s highly technical civilization build scientific cathedrals of steel and aluminum and cryogenic feed horns, searching the lifeless void for the faintest whispers of the not-quite-gods that we imagine, somewhere, must be out there. This is all simply looking for friends. You are asking me now, reader, why? With all the humans on Earth today, and all the technology to keep us together! Clearly even the loner must be satisfied with existence of humanity, in all its richness and mass, at least on an intellectual level! No. The terrible secret is that no one is satisfied, else such a drive would not…show more content…
That is the comforting lie. Lovers betray and marriages fail and children become alienated creatures you barely recognized. Friends drift out of one’s life, to be replaced by the new. Death swallows up those loyal remainders. A person exists and dies knowing only themselves. The hearts of others are locked boxes, forever hidden from scrutiny. Our quest for intelligence elsewhere is seeking the impossible. So much of the human experience can be attributed to the dual nature of mankind, our simultaneous revulsion towards ourselves and the powerful need to exalt “humanity.” The problem with humanity, of course, is that is does not exist in humans. Our ideas of how we should behave do not reflect the actuality of our existence. Indeed, our ideas of perfect society even violate the fundamental laws of the universe. We are trapped forever in this bipolar state of wanting the impossible. This is why we search the sky. We want to find others who are like us, yes, intelligent. But also so unlike us, better, more perfected. Without the terrible contradictions that drive us mad. We want to find a better mankind, so we can learn to be like them. Otherwise, we are alone with the madness of being human. But. The Question still stands: Are we
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