Tuesday 28 June 2011

Looking for Life Among the Stars

Apologies for my absence of late, but I was in my native Ukraine conducting a lecture tour regarding archaeoastronomy for undergraduates – it is a fascinating field of study, and the more interest we can arouse in the subject, the greater our understanding shall grow.

Something that struck me, however, was the interest in aligning ancient achievements with the interference of extraterrestrials. Had Erich von Däniken not written his fanciful Chariots of the Gods, I wonder if so many people would express an interest in denigrating our ancestors?

It is not hard to look for life beyond our world, nor is it hard to imagine that it does indeed exist – myself, I believe that the universe is large enough and magnificent enough to hide lifeforms in a multitude of places, and that it is reasonably probable that we are not alone among the ‘intelligent’ and ‘advanced’ species of the universe. What is difficult to imagine, however, is the reason why we must seek to assign a higher intelligence to achievements of our own people?

Like the myths of Atlantis, it seems that mankind is perpetually in pursuit of some lost wisdom, granted to us in ancient days by those from beyond our own star. This pursuit is equalled only by the same beliefs that the cataclysm of the end-times is upon us. Following these twin beliefs – perched between a wondrous, forgotten past, and a terrifying oblivion – one must wonder if this is the state of all life in the universe.