Page 19 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - February 2023 Edition

UFO Mania Is Out Of Control 19

UFO Mania Is Out of

Control.

Please Stop.

Sorry to disappoint you, this
science writer says, but there’s

zero evidence of aliens.

Continued from Page 18

We need more people thinking inside the
box. Science is a candle in the dark, to
use a phrase Carl Sagan chose for a book
he wrote shortly before his untimely
death in 1996. There are millions of backfire, that it’s not only a nifty email me at The Post because that’s a

Americans who have been lied to about evolutionary adaptation in the short run great story.
the pandemic, lied to about the vaccines, but something that’s durable. The aliens
lied to about the motivations and give us hope. In fact, in many UFO A couple of decades ago I posed the “are
credibility of the nation’s scientists and narratives that’s why they’re here, to help we alone” question to Stephen Jay Gould,
the mainstream media. So they think they us along and save us from ourselves. the Harvard paleontologist and
shouldn’t get vaccinated. They subscribe They’re a little bit like angels. prodigious author of popular science
to outside-the-box claims that are outside books. Gould had long thought through
the box for precisely one reason: The What’s more anthropocentric is to the question of the evolution of the
claims are not true. Please, people: Get in assume that human beings are so human species in the grand context of life

the box! fascinating that aliens want to visit us and on Earth over the course of 4 billion
study us. The aliens seem a bit obsessed years. Gould argued quite vociferously
UFO skepticism can sometimes be with us. These are not tourist trips. Some that if we were to start the whole
mistaken for anthropocentrism, a kind of UFO narratives imagine that we have biosphere over again from scratch, with
biological arrogance. The issue of something the aliens are missing. Like: primitive forms, and rerun the process,
whether a UFO sighting involves an feelings. When you’re doomed to life as the likelihood of human beings appearing
actual alien spaceship can turn, with an intelligent reptilian from Rigel you again would be infinitesimal. The real
head-snapping speed, into a will go a long way to get some warm- question, though, is not whether humans
philosophical debate, with an accusation and-fuzzy human DNA. would arise a second time if we started
at its core. The believer says to the from scratch, but whether an intelligent
skeptic, “So you think in all the universe, Another common theme is that we species would.

among billions and billions of galaxies, humans were, in fact, engineered by the
each with billions and billions of stars aliens. We are their prized creation. In (Continued On Page 20)
and untold numbers of planets, we this scenario, we’re not just a highly
humans are the only form of intelligent successful (so far) species of primate. DEBUNKED: Planet Nine
life?” We’re super special! That’s straight out of Will Kill Us.
the Book of Genesis.
An adjunct to this is the assertion that,
In April 2016, the New York Post tweeted
among intelligent beings in the universe, Question: Why would the human-
(opens in new tab), "A newly discovered
humans are likely relatively primitive, obsessed aliens come all this way in big, planet could destroy Earth as soon as this

since we’ve only been around for, what, hulking, too-easily-spotted spaceships to month." The newspaper was referring to
100,000 years or so, and the Old Ones out monitor us when they could surely do it Planet Nine, a theoretical planet at the edge
there may be billions of years ahead of remotely or through miniature probes? If of the solar system. An accompanying
us. we learned nothing else during this video (opens in new tab) also claimed that
pandemic, it’s that you can still do your the new planet would be throwing all sorts
It would actually be reassuring, at a deep job from home. of asteroids and comets at Earth, which
would supposedly end up pummeling our
existential level, to know that interstellar planet. Although the planet's existence has
space travel is possible. That it’s Let’s cut to the key question: Are we
not been confirmed, astronomers are
something we might do someday. Alien alone? The plaintive tone of that question actively looking for it to explain motions of
visitors by their mere existence would tells you how much we want the answer some objects in the icy Kuiper Belt, a vast
imply that we can overcome our worst to be “no.” Unfortunately, there’s only region of icy objects beyond Neptune. If the

instincts (war, hatred, pollution, Twitter) one solid, incontrovertible answer: “We planet is actually found, the planet will pose
and survive. It would be nice to know that don’t know.” No one knows. It is among no threat to us, according to the California
the kind of intelligence humans possess, the biggest unknowns in science. If Institute of Technology's Mike Brown (who
is one of the original backers of the Planet
and which gives rise to technological anyone knows what the answer is,
Nine theory).
civilizations like ours, won’t always whether positive or negative, please