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May 2010_june_july_2009.qxd 31/05/2010 6:15 PM Page 24 24 If Aliens Call, They Better Wear Armour If aliens call, they better would have. Would there be social unrest, even just light it with a match. It catches on fire and then the heat from the fire expands the lantern. panic? What would governments do? How wear armour would the world's leaders react? Would the When it gets really full, you let it go and it floats news be regarded with fear or wonderment? up into the air, and they're about 99 percent Bryan Patterson From: Sunday Herald Sun And, in the longer term, what would it mean for biodegradable, too. It looked really beautiful," IN 1911, a chunk of rock reportedly fell from our society, our sense of identity, our science, Gough said. the sky and killed a dog in the little town of technology and religions? "It was a beautiful night. The wind was Nakhla in Egypt. This was the first known Davies said our first instinct could be just perfect to carry them over the top of the fatality caused by a cosmic object. hostile. "Humans have fought each other for hills," Gough said. millennia over tiny differences in race, religion Meanwhile, the Schuylkill County Scientists later revealed the rock was not or culture," he wrote. "Imagine how most Communications Center received several calls a common meteorite, but a piece of Mars. people would react to beings that were truly Tuesday about unidentified flying objects above As British biologist J.B.S. Haldane said, alien? My personal message to E.T. is to keep Pottsville, according to center director Scott "the universe is not only queerer than we well clear and defend yourself, before stepping Krater. suppose, but queerer than we can suppose". into the hornet's nest of our militaristic society." The lanterns were launched about 8:15 Interestingly, the story of the unlucky The moral and religious status of aliens p.m. By 8:45 p.m., the group of about 30 people pooch was followed by a spate of UFO is an old topic in science fiction and Hollywood there were greeted by Pottsville police, sightings. movies. If they exist, are they like us? according to Yotsko. The number of claimed extraterrestrial The Vatican's chief astronomer said that "All of a sudden I saw cops coming and encounters and claims of alien abductions have there was no contradiction in believing in God wondered, 'Wow, what's going on?' " Yotsko exploded since. and the possibility of "terrestrial brothers". said. The best-educated generation in history The Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, the Jesuit Her daughter said, "It's probably is fascinated by the subject. director of the Vatican Observatory, said the because of these things." The desire to have contact with vastness of the universe meant it was possible "They just looked around to make sure something from beyond seems to be part of our there could be other forms of life outside Earth, everything was all right and then they left," psyche, even for those without religious faith. even intelligent ones. Yotsko said. World-renowned astrophysicist Stephen In an interview, Funes said that such a Hawking said this week he believed aliens notion "doesn't contradict our faith" because BIZARRE NEWS existed but that it would be a fatal mistake to aliens would still be God's creatures and contact them. rejecting such a notion would be putting limits - The first McDonald's restaurant opened for "I imagine they might exist in massive on God's universality. business in 1952 in Edinburgh, Scotland, and ships, having used up all the resources from Most of us experience a sense of featured the McHaggis sandwich. their home planet," Hawking said. mystical astonishment when we stare up at the - The typewriter was invented by Hungarian "Such advanced aliens would perhaps vast sky and stars on a clear night. immigrant Qwert Yuiop, who left his become nomads, looking to conquer and The believer sees the same heavens as "signature" on the keyboard. colonise whatever planets they can reach. the atheist, but interprets them quite differently: - The volume of water that the Giant Sequoia "If aliens ever visit us, the outcome To a believer, if there is intelligent life tree consumes in a 24-hour period contains could be much as when Christopher Columbus on other planets, God created it all. It is an enough suspended minerals to pave 17.3 feet of first landed in America, which didn't turn out interesting possibility that God and E.T. exist. a 4-lane concrete freeway. very well for the native Americans." - Because printed materials are being replaced About 20 per cent of people polled in a Drama club claims by CD-ROMs, microfiche and the Internet, recent global survey said they believed aliens responsibility for UFO libraries that previously sank into their existed. foundations under the weight of their books are According to the survey, which included sightings in Pottsville now in danger of collapsing in extremely high 23,000 adults from 22 countries across the winds. globe, more than 40 per cent of people from BY STEPHEN J. PYTAK - In 1843, a Parisian street mime got stuck in his India and China reckoned aliens walked among imaginary box and consequently died of us disguised as humans. About 23 per cent of The flying objects in the skies above starvation. Australians agreed. Pottsville on Tuesday night have been - Until 1978, Camel cigarettes contained minute People from Belgium, Sweden and the identified. particles of real camels. Netherlands were least likely to believe in this Barbara Gough, Ashland, the club - University of Virginia researchers released a theory, although many believed aliens exist adviser for the Theater Arts Group at Nativity study promoting the practice of nose picking, "somewhere out there". BVM High School in Pottsville, said they were claiming that the health benefits of keeping Those in countries that are over- "Thai Wish" lanterns launched by the group. nasal passages free from infectious blockages populated were more likely to believe aliens "On Tuesday night, after the cast of 'The far outweigh the negative social connotations. lived in disguise than those living in a sparsely Pajama Game' cleaned up the stage, we decided - If you put a bee in a film canister for two populated place. to start a new tradition. We wanted to have a hours, it will go blind and leave behind its The poll also revealed more men than really nice send-off for our senior drama weight in honey. [Seems like somebody forgot women believed in disguised aliens. students. I had the underclassmen each choose a about the Conservation of Matter law.] Cosmologist Carl Sagan once said of senior. I told them to write a wish for that senior. - Due to the angle at which the optic nerve UFO sightings: "The reliable cases are Once it got dark, we all went outside and each enters the brain, staring at a blue surface during uninteresting and the interesting cases are pair of students got a Thai Wish lantern," Gough sex greatly increases the intensity of orgasms. unreliable." said. - In WWII the US military planned to airdrop But on April 1 this year, a newspaper in Tammy Yotsko, Pottsville, was there over France propaganda in the form of Playboy Jordan sent residents streaming in to the streets with her daughter, Shelby, a sophomore. magazine, with coded messages hidden in the with a spoof story about the landing of 3m Gough said she ordered the lanterns models' turn-ons and turn-offs. The plan was aliens in flying saucers. The mayor of Jafr sent online. scrapped because of a staple shortage due to police to search for the aliens and was preparing "Each underclassman told their wish to rationing of metal. to evacuate his town, about 290km from the senior and then launched their lantern," - Although difficult, it's possible to start a fire by Amman, the capital, until told it was all a prank. Gough said. rapidly rubbing together two Cool Ranch Physicist and cosmologist Paul Davies, She said the lanterns were made of paper Doritos. in his new book, The Eerie Silence: Renewing and that each was about 3 feet high. Our Search for Alien Intelligence, wondered "The paper is on a circular frame. In the BIZARRE BUT TRUE! what effect large-scale contact with space aliens center of the frame is some kind of a fuel. You