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| Image Source: Carl Sagan Contact |
Topics: Commentary, Existentialism, First Contact, Sectarianism, SETI
"Man fears time, but time fears only the pyramids." Arab Proverb
Before the movie of the same name by the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation, there was an episode using the same name - "First Contact." The implications were that the particular alien species had a lot invested in their traditions and customs; the introduction of another humanoid species outside of itself would profoundly change their self-concept, similar to early man thinking Earth being the center of the universe, and the scientific, Heliocentric corrections of Copernicus and Galileo being heresy. I alluded to this in the post Terms of Indifference, and it was definitely brought to fore in the movie Contact based on a novel by Carl Sagan, which originally started life as a stalled screenplay. We don't have to go warp drive or travel to other worlds to see this species sectarianism. Just the transition from our current Type 0 Kardashev Scale (or, Carl Sagan gave us 0.7) to a Type 1 civilization is daily fraught with regressive forces determined to look backwards fearing natural forward motion, science and knowledge. That would thus bring an end to their respective hegemony, as they would no longer have unquestionable basis to their authority over others. It is incredulous the pull of ignorance on species survival. The irony is they typically rail about this online (often, in all CAPS) with a platform created by science in many cases, in 140 characters or less. It may be why the stars are silent: Type 1 may be a hard gap to leap and Type 2 a rarity; sadly, intelligence maybe its own Entropy.
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