DONNIE JOHNSTON: "3I/Atlas, Come in 3I/Atlas"
It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a fundamental threat to everything we know? Maybe, maybe not. The fun with unknown objects is letting the imagination run wild.
By Donnie Johnston
COLUMNIST
The discovery of 3I/Atlas is presenting some profound questions for humanity.
First, for those who have never heard of 3I/Atlas, let me explain that this space traveler, which has invaded our solar system from who knows where, is about the size of Manhattan, elongated and possibly several miles in diameter.
Since its discovery back in July, this object has been under intense scrutiny by scientists around the world, it being only the third interstellar space object (hence, 3I, I for interstellar) known to have passed through our solar system.
At first it was believed to be nothing more than a comet, but upon further study, 3I/Atlas has not displayed the characteristics (no tail, for example) of such a space anomaly.
There have also been reports from scientists that this object, which originated somewhere far beyond the Kuiper Belt and the outer reaches of our solar system, has been doing things that oppose the theory that it is a natural phenomenon, like emit radio signals and slow down, change course and then use some internal power source to gain speed again.
And its outer shell seems to be constructed of a nickel alloy that humans use in spaceships.
In the past few weeks there has been so much written about 3I/Atlas that it is hard to tell what is truth and what is fantasy, it still being so distant that even the best telescopes can’t determine its exact size, structure or composition.
One report indicates that the inside may be compartmentalized, with rooms and corridors, almost like an apartment building flying through space. If so, is it inhabited, and if it is who (what) are the inhabitants and what is the purpose of their visit to our solar system?
For the sake of argument, let’s assume that 3I/Atlas is a mothership loaded with beings from another solar system or even another galaxy. How do we react if this transport heads to Earth, lands and some strange looking being emerges and utters that corny Hollywood line, “Take me to your leader!”
Do we view the visitors with fear and call out the military, or do we extend our hand in friendship?
Right here we must make one assumption: these creatures are smarter than we are. Humans can’t get a traveler to Mars, our nearest neighbor. These creatures may have come from light years away. And, as in the movie, “The Day the Earth Stood Still”, they may have the means to destroy us at will, so it might be prudent not to get too aggressive.
Then we ask, “Who are you, where are you from and what kind of spaceship got you here?” But in the back of our minds there will remain the one question whose answer we might not want to hear: “What do you want?”
Why would we not want to ask that question? Because that’s what the Indians asked when European explorers first appeared at their door. The answer was land, precious metals, and conquest. Remember that white explorers were also far more technologically advanced than the Indians and had better weapons. Look what happened to an entire civilization. The same could happen to us.
Perhaps these creatures are part of a culture that has visited Earth before. Maybe they will use the Nacza Lines in Peru to guide them back. Maybe some beacon from the Great Pyramid, which possibly their ancestors helped build, will bring them in.
How will we communicate? What language do they speak? Will they view humans as friends, enemies, potential slaves or possibly food? You may laugh, but these are legitimate questions.
Some speculate that, because of the apartment house-like structure of 3I/Atlas, the inhabitants might be the remnants of a civilization from a planet that has exploded or become incapable of sustaining life, space refugees, so to speak. Remember the Superman movie and how the infant who became Clark Kent was sent to Earth in such a manner?
Maybe this ship is from Krypton and maybe, because of that planet’s gravitational pull, these refugees will have super-human powers in Earth’s atmosphere.
Perhaps these creatures are on a mission from an over-inhabited planet looking for new worlds to colonize. Again, remember the plight of the Indians.
Maybe the inhabitants are the humans that have allegedly been abducted by space aliens over the years. Anybody checked for military operations at Devils Tower lately?
It could be that they are just scientists exploring our solar system. The object’s plane of entry, which takes it reasonably close to all our planets, would seem to indicate that it might be merely an exploratory mission similar to human space efforts.
There are, of course, other explanations (actually there are innumerable ones which the human mind may not be able to fathom).
Maybe, as in “Planet of the Apes”, this ship is inhabited by humans who were sent into space 5,000 years ago by a culture long forgotten, a mission all but lost in Einstein’s fabric of time and space. Or it could be “Planet of the Apes” in reverse, and a member of an advanced race of apes will step out of 3I/Atlas.
Then, too, it could contain a representative from another culture (“The Day the Earth Stood Still”) coming to warn us to behave or suffer the consequences.
What of the religious implications of confronting an advanced species completely unlike humans? Suppose they have a religious text that says these creatures, completely alien to us, were created in the image of God? How do theologians handle that.
Suppose they say they were here in ancient times and the story of Jonah was merely an ignorant civilization watching a man being taken onto a submarine and then getting off again? Or the Tower of Babel was a king trying to replicate a rocket ship that had landed on Earth?
No, I’m not being sacrilegious or doubting the biblical texts, I’m just exploring possibilities that may one day confront us, because at some point, given advancing technology (and providing that the human race doesn’t destroy itself), we WILL come face-to-face with beings from another world.
Believing that all the other planets in the known universe are uninhabited is, at least to me, an unacceptable possibility. It is like Armageddon; we don’t know when it will arrive, but the day when we confront a civilization from another planet is all but inevitable.
Is that day here? Will 3I/Atlas prove that there is other life in the universe?
Who knows? There is plenty of speculation, but world governments have been eerily silent on this issue. That in itself promotes suspicion that they know something we don’t.
Is 3I/Atlas a spaceship or a comet? Time will tell.
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