Posthuman Blues

Astronomer Predicts Alien Contact By 2025

"Still, Shostak says there is 'no possibility' of us and aliens coming face to face 'a la' 'Mars Attacks' in the near future."

(And hey, even if there is, we already know that Slim Whitman will save us.)

"That's because 'it's so difficult to travel between the stars' in a short amount of time, Shostak says, and no matter what kind of technology we or the aliens ever possess, you still 'can't beat the laws of physics.'"

Seth, you poor bastard. Define "short." Because it seems to me the term is nothing if not relative. Could it (gasp!) be that aliens potentially billions of years more advanced than us might not be as cowed by "long" space voyages as we are right now? And might they not colonize as they explore, expanding throughout the galaxy at an exponential rate?

Seth appears possessed by the kindergarten image of "spaceships" as little more than Apollo-era rockets -- in which case his pessimism is justified. But advanced star-faring aliens, given that they exist, are going to use craft of an altogether different order by virtue of sheer necessity -- craft that may be entire worlds unto themselves. None of this requires "beating the laws of physics," or even cheating them (a "wormhole" is one possible "cheat" -- theoretically viable, but still dismayingly exotic). But Seth rigorously ignores any scenario that infringes on shop-worn SETI dogma.

For all of his proclamations of imminent radio contact, Seth's "cosmic" outlook is so boorishly anthropomorphic is makes me want to gag.