Extraterrestrial Contact: Distractions

Timing is everything. That old saying may be a consideration for extraterrestrials debating the timing of contact with planet Earth. Timing is only a factor in First Contact if the extraterrestrials in question (and I’m not saying there actually are any extraterrestrials in question) are closely monitoring what humans are doing. This could be accomplished with some sort of probe connecting to our Internet. That may sound far-fetched, but if you, an extraterrestrial, had the technology to do such, why wouldn’t you? Monitoring human activity would allow you to know exactly what you are getting into, before you say hello.

So, back to timing. What factors might an extraterrestrial consider when deciding if and when to say hello? It seems to me that one consideration would have to be critical world events. An example is the recent negotiations in the European debt crisis. There were tense moments as the world economic community waited for word that European nations had agreed on important measures to bailout Greece and shore up the European monetary system. And there may be more tense moments to see if Greeks actually agree to the deal in an upcoming referendum. Extraterrestrials, with our best interests in mind, would probably want to avoid saying hello to humans at such important moments. The distraction caused by any First Contact, but especially a dramatic Direct First Contact event, would likely be enormous. What if European leaders were so distracted that they didn’t take the necessary measures to stabilize the European economy? Some may laugh and say that important world needs would still be important. I think that is a dangerous under estimation of the effect that Direct First Contact would have on the human civilization. There would most likely be a period of a stunned reaction that would bring most everything, except for basic functions, to a stop. Then there would be a period of intense debate over what actions to take in response to First Contact. Both of these periods would involve concentrated focus. And that means distraction and likely a very high degree of distraction, especially for world leaders. A signal discovered in space is certainly much less distracting and yet still a concern.

Distraction can of course be viewed in several other ways. Perhaps the extraterrestrials don’t have our best interest in mind at all? They could pick a critical moment to say hello in hopes of distracting us and causing harm to the planet. That seems like a rather round-about way of trying to harm humans. Creative extraterrestrials could probably come up with much more sinister ways to tear at the fabric of human civilization. It’s something that doesn’t seem likely if First Contact ever occurs, but certainly an idea that must be considered.

And then there is the beneficial distraction. Perhaps First Contact would be powerful enough to stimulate the world economy and help lift us out of global recession? It could take away attention from differences between nations and join us closer together. First Contact could be excellent motivation for global cooperation.

How long humans would remain distracted would depend on the type of First Contact and the actual nature of the events involved in that contact. Dramatic events would probably have a more distracting effect than a series of less dramatic events. You would imagine First Contact distraction would have an initial peak of effect, dissipating over time in strength. The toughest part of distraction is that when it’s occurring virtually no one is considering the impact- they’re simply distracted. Keeping a watchful eye on old worries and needful realities, in any First Contact situation, would seem prudent. Now let’s just hope that the Greeks can stay focused.

Extraterrestrial Contact: Time to Prepare

Extraterrestrial First Contact ranges in impact from the least, an engineered signal being discovered, to the highest, in the form of Direct First Contact. Those two poles are also relevant in an examination of the time element in First Contact. By time element I mean the amount of time each scenario gives us to prepare our society and our institutions for the impact of First Contact.

The one end of the spectrum, discovery of an engineered signal, gives us the greatest time to prepare for impact, because it could take many years to decipher such a signal. Depending on the location of that signal it could take decades to send a signal in reply, if we should chose to do so. There would be much time to debate each step. The response would have time to develop organically.

Direct First Contact, an extraterrestrial civilization visiting Earth, provides no time to prepare and that would have major repercussions for our response. The lack of debate could cause a forced response, rather than an organic response, and easily lead to knee-jerk reactions. Those knee-jerk reactions could come in the form of an over-welcoming response, one that is not grounded in cautious, critical thinking. It could also lead to a hostile reaction, with too much worry and not much welcoming.

No matter what the type of First Contact, and how quickly a response must be developed, there are steps we will need to take:

-Appoint an organization or organizations to take the lead role in diplomacy and response

-Provide for international participation in that diplomacy and response

-Control the immediate situation and determine the most immediate needs

-Set up gatekeeping procedures for any information that might be received

-Develop an efficient bureaucracy to manage the response

-Create a framework for moving forward

-Develop a list of the most important considerations

-Bring in expertise to examine those considerations and provide recommendations

-Determine a method for making final decisions, while providing for as much global inclusion as possible

-Make sure that the process is transparent and open to all

-Determine, through gatekeeping, what information cannot be made open yet and develop a strategy to evaluate, act and then eventually make that information open for examination

-Bring in expertise to determine long-term impact

-Have a conversation about how First Contact could change humanity

-Make decisions about how we want to manage that change

-Develop long-term response strategies

Extraterrestrial Contact: The Media After First Contact

Our understanding of the larger world depends greatly on the media. These days those media sources are numerous and growing. A recently released Pew Research Center study shows that Americans are now blending their news sources among many outlets, including television, online newspapers, web sites, and blogs.

I have advocated that television would be an excellent tool for visiting extraterrestrials in a dramatic Direct First Contact event. I know that sounds a bit “out there” but consider the advantages: Television has global reach, specializes in breaking news and live coverage and has a sharing network among news outlets unrivaled in the world.  Clearly though, the type of coverage a Direct First Contact event received would change in the days and weeks following the initial event. Depending on how the event was to occur, coverage would begin to migrate from live to enterprise journalism. This is a natural cycle in the news business. When wildfires break out in a community, live coverage dominates at first. As the situation is eventually managed, the reporters begin to do enterprise stories focusing on the people impacted and critical pieces, such as determining the cause, the firefighting response and whether the proper precautions were taken to help prevent such fires.   

One could expect that Direct First Contact coverage would move in the same way. The question is how those follow-up enterprise stories would be handled. The big difference between wildfires and extraterrestrials visiting Earth, aside from the scope of the story, is that wildfires are something we understand fairly well. First Contact would create all sorts of uncertainty. The media would need to look for experts and that’s probably a list they don’t have prepared. Hopefully, they would look in the right places and interview the folks from the SETI Institute, the International Astronomical Union or the other astrophysicists who have actively considered First Contact issues. Secondarily, there would be futurists and science fiction writers who have explored First Contact scenarios. Unfortunately though, there is a whole other group of writers who fall into what one might call the UFO community. I know it’s unfair to lump people together, but I think it’s safe to say that in any First Contact situation the UFO community will be extremely vocal. Because of the high degree of uncertainty in First Contact they may suddenly seem more credible to the mainstream media. If aliens do come to Earth to say hello or if we discover an engineered signal far off in space, doesn’t that lend some credibility to alien abduction theorists or those who believe we have been visited by aliens in the past? In all fairness, I think you would have to consider those questions in some fashion- the best way would of course be to ask the aliens themselves. Still, the effect that uncertainty has is to create a vacuum of information and usually people try to fill that vacuum with any information they can find. The UFO conspiracies would receive much more attention from the general public and the news media. The difference is the media, in the many forms it takes these days, has the ability to influence public perception. If they are chasing after every alien conspiracy theory that could have a dramatic impact on how people view extraterrestrials. It could lead to fear and knee-jerk reactions based on fear. I have said it before: I think there will be a vocal minority of isolationists that will be active in any First Contact situation. They will advocate for isolationism and suggest that we tell the aliens to leave us alone. How much steam this movement picks up will depend greatly on the media coverage. If the mainstream media gives such views quite a bit of attention, the number of people advocating isolationism will increase. If the media manages to realize the danger in chasing after every conspiracy theory, calmer heads might prevail.

In the end it comes down to two primary points: critical thinking and credibility. We will need to utilize critical thinking in the wake of First Contact. This includes the news media. Plenty of tough questions will need to be asked. Any information provided to us by extraterrestrials would need to be carefully weighed. However, credibility will be essential. The media will need to realize that crack-pots before First Contact could still very well be crack-pots After First Contact. Just because their subject matter turned out to have some basis in truth (aliens do exist) doesn’t mean that everything else they advocate is true (aliens kidnapped my cousin Earl and he was forced to mate with them).

Is the collective global media up to the task of critical thinking? Well, perhaps some outlets. Others, one would imagine, will go crazy with fear-mongering, headline-grabbing stories just to get attention. It will be up to news consuming public to decide who they will trust. The sensible majority will need to stand up and be counted.

Extraterrestrial Contact Scenarios: Getting Beyond the Media Hype

As usual, the media distillations of journal articles are rarely a good judge of the actual content of the article in question. Such is the case with the media hubbub caused by the article in Acta Astronautica by Baum, Haqq-Misra and Domagal-Goldman titled “Would Contact with Extraterrestrials Benefit or Harm Humanity? A Scenario Analysis.”

While Acta Astronautica requires a subscription, Dr. Baum has now placed the article on his website. It’s a worthy read for many reasons. As I have discussed before, the article is a series of extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) First Contact scenarios, organized according to the possible impact on humanity. It’s loosely divided into categories: negative, positive and neutral. Most of the scenarios might seem quite familiar: ETI that enslaves us; outright destruction of Earth by ETI; helpful ETI that helps us solve problems; ETI that ignores us; ETI that spreads biological threat etc. The media had a field day with the negatives and the right-leaning media had fun with the scenarios that were based on environmental concerns. The primary ecological scenario involves ETI destroying us because of what we are doing to our environment and what we might do to the rest of the galaxy. Snickering media or not, it’s an interesting set of questions: at what point would ETI consider us a threat and what might they do to eliminate the threat?

Yet, it’s the extrapolation behind the rather general scenarios that provides the real meat to the article. The authors raise the idea that ETI might have a diverse population making up their civilization, with many competing, and perhaps conflicting, cultures and views. This possibility of ETI heterogeneity is of course based on our only possible study group: humans. If we were to land on another planet and meet another civilization, it seems likely that there would be a raging debate over what we should do. Some may advocate taking any advantage we can get. Others might say that we should have a policy of non-interference and only study the newly discovered civilization. So, if that’s how humans would react, who’s to say an extraterrestrial civilization visiting Earth wouldn’t have exactly the same situation? The authors point out that power shifts and changes in attitudes in ETI leadership could be dangerous for humans. We could receive mixed signals from competing ETI interests. This is an important point and it examines First Contact with a complexity that I think has been lacking. It seems likely that extraterrestrial First Contact will be extremely complex and nuanced, perhaps in ways that we do not understand at first.

Baum, et al. tackle many of what I would call the more subtle scenarios. Hollywood is fixated with marauding aliens or beneficent ones. In reality, the reaction of humans could be the most significant concern in a First Contact scenario. The authors point out that the detection of ETI could make existing conflicts here on Earth much worse, as nations compete for control. Religious groups could find a challenge to their beliefs and react quite negatively and perhaps even violently.

There is a primary way that Baum, et al. seek to define ETI: Universalist versus selfish. What this means for us would seem clear at first glance, but once again the authors examine the shadings of these definitions. For example, ETI could seek to destroy us for Universalist reasons- they want to save the rest of the galaxy from us. I would provide additional shading to the selfish end of the spectrum, not examined in the paper. Perhaps we offer ETI something significant that would not require our destruction. Perhaps it is in their best interest to befriend us?

The authors call for more in-depth study in their conclusion. With any scenario being possible and no data of any sort, it’s quite difficult to put together a quantitative risk analysis. However, they argue that we should work in that direction, as it would prove invaluable in the case of First Contact. They call for a development of scenarios, free from pre-conceived notions about what we expect ETI to be like. They also suggest that we should carefully consider whether we should send signals into space or respond to an engineered signal that we might find.

I would agree that caution and careful consideration are essential parts of any response to any type of First Contact. We quite simply have not examined this issue enough. The existence of ETI may be completely unknown to us now, but if we do discover an extraterrestrial civilization, the impact to humanity could be dramatic.

Who Reads This Blog?

You, my reading friends, are a very small group. This blog is a bit odd and I think it tends to alienate (pun fully intended) the two largest groups of potential readers. The UFO community doesn’t seem to like it much, primarily because I don’t believe that there is any evidence that aliens have visited, or are visiting Earth. I think that what is being currently presented as evidence is not real evidence. The scientific community, for whom I have immense respect for their efforts and incredible achievements, tends to shy away from this blog because of my focus on Direct First Contact, which is arguably the least likely form of First Contact, should it ever occur.

That’s fine. I don’t mind chatting with a small group. I am fascinated by a few things about you, the readers. First, you are an international group. From the time I installed Google analytics on the blog, a few years ago; it has received hits from 112 different nations. Most readers are in the United States and Europe. The United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Poland, Germany, Finland, India, Brazil and Ireland make up the top ten nations. And this part is perhaps the most interesting to me: China, the most populous nation on the Earth, has exactly one page view, out of Shanghai, in all of those years. Are the Chinese just not interested in this subject? Or perhaps they are blocked from being able to search about this subject? I’m not sure why the Chinese government would care enough to block viewing. Who knows? Interesting, though.

A few locations stand out as regular readers: Hello Rohnert Park, California, Lambeth, England and lately Stuttgart, Germany. And also a shout out to long-time readers in Georgia and Utah. I thank all of you for taking the time to read and I encourage you to chime in on the comments. They are open to everyone. 

Welcome.

Good Guys or Bad Guys?

A recent opinion column in the New York Times by Gary Gutting, a professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, points to a serious concern that people have about contact with an extraterrestrial civilization. The primary questions are simple: would extraterrestrials be good guys or bad guys and do we really want to risk the bad guy scenario?

The debate is not new, however it has become re-energized with statements by Stephen Hawking and a recent study published in Acta Astronautica by a group of researchers postulating possible First Contact scenarios.

The possibility that aliens might be harmful to the human race must be considered. However, I would urge a more thoughtful approach to the debate. Perhaps we should take a look at the only civilization we currently know: humans. Let’s say that we develop space faring technology some day and travel to another planet. What type of extraterrestrial visitors would we be? Of course, John Cameron took his stab at the idea with Avatar. Science fiction writers have been exploring the topic for decades. The answer those authors usually come up with is based on the reality of humanity: we are neither good guys nor bad guys; we’re a mixed up, confusing, stew of good and bad intentions, and good and bad actions. Sometimes we think we’re doing something good and it goes terribly wrong. Humanity is complicated and often difficult to understand. I think we are naïve to expect aliens to be any different. They are likely to have motives that we might consider to be good and others that we might not like at all. Perhaps the most dangerous situation would occur if they have motives with good intentions that lead to bad consequences for us. It might be hard for us to recognize the danger because of the good intentions. 

No matter how long a visiting extraterrestrial civilization might have been studying us, they would be relative novices at dealing with the human race, assuming that the First Contact in question is their first attempt. That means that they would not fully understand our society or how we might react to First Contact. Even worse, because of our lack of serious consideration of the issue, we would not be able to predict how we might react to First Contact. There would be a high degree of uncertainty for all parties involved. There is always risk inherent in uncertainty.

So, if aliens present themselves do we collectively turn off the lights and hide behind the couch? Of course not. We do what humans have done from the beginning. We move forward cautiously. We use reasoning and critical thinking to set a course. We learn from our mistakes. We analyze, make decisions and adjust our path. We keep moving forward. It is what humans do and it is what we will need to do in the wake of First Contact.

Higher, Higher Education

High-information First Contact with an extraterrestrial civilization presents many challenges. One would expect that aliens with advanced technology would easily be able to communicate in our languages. In a Direct First Contact scenario, you would assume that they would have done research to figure out who we are and how our cultural, governmental and scientific institutions work. If their motives are altruistic, the primary reason for offering us information would be, presumably, to help us along. However, we can’t assume altruism, even that’s what they profess. A healthy dose of critical thinking would be essential in our decision making.

The first challenge would be the nature of the information itself. If our new alien friends are thousands, if not millions, of years in advance of us in terms of technology, understanding their social and scientific systems could be complicated, if not impossible. The only solution would be for the extraterrestrials to act as teachers. They would have to integrate their knowledge with our way of thinking and our current development. In more blunt terms: they would have to dumb it down for us.

High-information contact provides plenty of opportunity, but it also presents clear dangers. It could cause hostilities here on Earth as countries fight to take advantage. It could leave third world nations even further behind in development, as they lack the scientific structure to take advantage of such information. Without control, alien information could lead to dangerous new weapons and encourage us to create technology that is damaging in ways we might not be able to foresee.

The biggest challenge comes in devising a system that might work for such a teaching experience, that can also be controlled to protect us. Gatekeeping is probably the best method for high-information dissemination. The first gatekeeping would have to be done by the extraterrestrials themselves. They would need a plan to educate us without endangering us. Once they have determined what information they are willing to share and how they might teach us that information, it would be up to us to decide who leads the human part of the effort. One could imagine a system of higher, higher education. It would need to be conducted in specific academic areas, let’s say biology, for example. You could gather 40 of the top scientists in the field of biology and they could be taught the basics of alien biology and what aliens know about manipulating biological systems. Biology is a very wide field, with many specialties. However, being general at first would be important. We would want to start at a macro level, with experts representing the many specific specialties within biology, and then have more teaching sessions in those specific areas. Working from a macro to micro view would be important. We would have to understand the big picture of the alien knowledge system before we could hope to understand specifics.

Another challenge comes in deciding who gets to be in this prestigious group of scientists. Needless to say, membership in the exclusive club would be highly prized. More so, nations would consider it a necessity to have their scientific leaders involved in such efforts. That presents an even bigger problem: the pressure on scientists to share information with their country, exclusive to the rest of the world. There would be immense pressure on a Chinese or American scientist to make sure that what he or she learns would be brought back to their government to help in technological developments. This would be especially significant in physics and other scientific areas that could have a bearing on weaponry and space travel. So how do you prevent the teaching system from becoming an information grab by powerful nations? How do you ensure that the top scientific minds are in those valuable higher, higher education seats, without leaving the rest of the world behind and providing unfair advantage?

Selection could come based on a formula decided by some outside system. One possibility: each of the G20 nations could select one scientific representative. However, that could leave some top scientific minds out of the picture. Perhaps the other 20 members of the higher, higher education group could be chosen by a non-profit group representing that area of scientific study? In our biology example the group leading the selection could be the Society of Biology. With 80,000 members it represents many of the world experts in biology. Clearly the selection of the group would be controversial and there would be much debate. The Society of Biology was created in Great Britain and Russian scientists might see this as not representative of the larger world group. IEEE is another possibility for such an organization dealing with engineering information. It has 395,000 members in 160 countries in fields ranging from electrical engineering to robotics and computing.

The groups would need to be non-profit and not controlled by industry or government. They would have to be true scientific communities, with members from many different countries and well-respected within the academic field.

Once the 40 scientific representatives are chosen they would attend class of some sort, probably needing to last many months or years. This would be a critical juncture. There would have to be absolute secrecy as they are being taught. A member who fed juicy information back to their home country, or perhaps a corporation, could cause major global turmoil. The group of scientists would have to do more than just learn. They would have to decide how the particular information could be aligned with our current knowledge. They would also need to consider the implications of dissemination. Would the information provoke major disruptions in our global economic system? How would academia incorporate the new information? The scientists would need to work with human gatekeepers in deciding how the information should be released and make preparations for reactions to the news. This would have to be done behind closed doors at first. However, it would be important to document everything, including all of the classes and each step in the decision making process. When the proper precautions had been taken and a plan put together, then everything could be released to the public. All of the information that the extraterrestrial teachers provide would become common human knowledge. In this way, there is no unfair advantage. Gatekeepers might have to work with nations to set up treaties and controls for usage of new technology. Perhaps it is realized that specific information could be used to create weapons, or if not carefully pursued, present a physical risk of some sort. Some global group or world body would need to oversee such treaties to make sure they are being followed.

If this sounds like an unwieldy and complicated structure, I agree. But it would be necessary. Humans have often considered the positive aspects of high-information First Contact. We tend to be naïve in our thinking, dwelling on the exciting benefits that might be derived from gifts of knowledge. Such thinking belies the true nature of human civilization. We strive for advantage and support our own interests. It is part of human nature. Even the best of intentions are often wrapped up in self-interest.

There have been very few in-depth considerations of just how high-information dissemination might work. I know that it seems crazy to discuss the specific elements of something that might never occur. We may be very alone in the universe. However, if we do experience high-information First Contact, the plan of action for information dissemination may be the most important series of decisions in the history of humanity.

A Decision to Interfere

Let’s say that an extraterrestrial civilization was watching and studying humans as we scurry around on planet Earth (and I'm not saying they are). What might cause them to reconsider a hands-off policy and decide that intervention, through Direct First Contact, was necessary?

This, of course, depends on their reason for studying us in the first place. Are they just scientific minded (in an alien sort of way)? Or perhaps they want to help us along and have good intentions for human civilization? They could also have ill will towards us of some sort? The motivation for First Contact is essential in any scenario. It ultimately would direct how they might respond.

So perhaps they do have our best interests at heart. What might cause them to step out of the wings and say hello? If they really do care what happens to us, then perhaps it would come down to what they think might happen to human civilization in event of First Contact. From our extremely limited perspective it could certainly appear that western civilization is on the ropes and democracy is facing a huge challenge. Will our economic woes lead to the failure of the American dream? Do the aliens even give two damns about the American dream? Who’s to say the Chinese model doesn’t make more sense to them? But let’s say they do care about democracy and the freedom of the individual being. What would provoke them to say hello?

I can think of a number of reasons they may want to do contact us. The first would be to shock our economic system back to life. If the U.S. economy goes flatline, the mere appearance of extraterrestrials could jump start the global economy. Suddenly, there would be all sorts of economic opportunities. Investors might see a reason to re-enter the market to try and capitalize on what could be the next big things: space development and cutting edge technologies. Banks could be more likely to loan money as new ideas enter our system. A little alien information could be a big boost to the faltering world economy. The next reason could be that extraterrestrials do give a damn about individual liberty and freedom of information. As many problems as we have in the United States, we have about the best system on the planet for continuing these human freedoms. Extraterrestrials may not be American supporters per se, but they could support the ideals we stand for, no matter how much we might trample them ourselves. The third reason could be to interject themselves into a larger philosophical war, one that we can’t fully see, due to our limited perspective. The rise of religious fundamentalism is a global phenomenon. It’s happening all over the world, including in Muslim, Jewish and Christian sects. Perhaps there is a larger battle occurring between secular-scientific thought and regressive religious thought, and perhaps they are worried about how it might turn out for us?

Much of this line of thought is wishful thinking on our part. It would be swell to have extraterrestrials come and help us solve our problems. There have certainly been points in human history where civilization was much more endangered. World War Two and the Cuban Missile Crisis are two examples. Aliens didn’t show up then, so why should they now?

It could be that from the alien perspective it’s not so much a case of humanity on the ropes and needing help, as it is humanity in an important phase of development. Despite world economic woes our technology has drawn us together, the threat of all-out nuclear war has lessened considerably in recent years and we are showing signs of greater global cooperation. Maybe we’re ready and that is their only consideration? They may have just been waiting for us to grow up.

Economic Interests and Control After First Contact

In a high-information First Contact scenario there would be plenty of money-making opportunities. New information can lead to new technology. New technology means profit, and in the case of extraterrestrial information, potentially huge profit. Now an extraterrestrial civilization may not want to share much, if anything, with us about science and technology. But even if they offer only minimal information that we can use, it is bound to have a massive impact on the world economy. For the most part I have ruminated over the potential challenges that information would create here on Earth from a governmental and institutional perspective. Blog reader Geoffrey has inspired a new line of thinking lately. He recently posted in response to the declaration of human rights entry I made several months ago- my rather naïve set of statements that I think we need to consider expressing to any extraterrestrials we might meet. My concern, as far-fetched as it may sound, has been extraterrestrial meddling in the human civilization After First Contact. Geoffrey thought it was interesting that we would ask more of the aliens than we do of humans. He is worried, as are most Americans these days, about recent economic turmoil and the underlying reasons for that turmoil. In particular, he points out that many self-interested groups have been manipulating the American financial system for their own benefit and to the detriment of the country as a whole. I agree with him in that assessment. I think that no matter what your political inclinations, most Americans could agree that decisions have been made, in terms of banking, trading and financial regulation, that have benefited a powerful few, while leaving the rest of us with dwindling 401-K plans, if we’re lucky, and unemployment and financial collapse if we are not so lucky.

It does beg the question. What would the powerful cadre of investment bankers, speculators and corporate leaders do in the event of First Contact?

I think that there would be two corporate reactions. The first would be much the same as the general global response- a period of being stunned. I doubt there is one major company on the planet that has considered how to respond to extraterrestrial information. Why should they? Right now it appears that there are no extraterrestrials for us to contact and if there are they could be hundreds of light years away.

The surprise of an extraterrestrial contact event would soon wear off and companies would start considering how to respond. On the speculation side of things, the stock market may reflect this reaction quite quickly as investors try to decide which businesses are likely to capitalize on extraterrestrial relations and information. Of course, until we know what information they would be interested in sharing with us it would be tough to decide who is likely to profit from extraterrestrial information. Perhaps the wisest investment would be with the companies supporting robust research and development wings, particularly in physics. Aerospace might be another logical choice. Even if the extraterrestrials would not be thrilled about sharing their interstellar travel technology, humans would most likely want to invest in satellites and other space monitoring technology for defense and science. We would suddenly be aware that there is much more out there than meets the eye and we would be keen to know more, both for safety and knowledge. Space will suddenly become the hottest frontier for corporate interests and for speculators.

All of this is expected and welcome in a free market. China and Russia would be sure to respond as well, and once again that is beneficial to the global economy. One positive outcome of First Contact could be a stimulating of the world economy. Needless to say, we could certainly use stimulation. Such a rush of new opportunities could also cause investment banks to loosen up the purse strings and start loaning out the piles of cash they are sitting on.

The real issue comes in the long-term. The development of legitimate business would be fine. What happens along the way could be the problem. Regulating information flow so that everyone on Earth has an equal chance in responding to opportunities would be essential. Big business may attempt to tie such opportunities to defense related industries and thus keep some development top-secret. There would likely be all sorts of efforts to take advantage of the new situation. This is a plain fact of a free-market society: big business is tied closely to governmental leaders and corporations spend a great deal of money, time and effort lobbying to make sure they get an inside track in anything that involves the government. Any attempts to coral extraterrestrial information and keep it available to only a privileged few would be detrimental to the global economy and, needless to say, morally wrong. It may sound like a speculative conspiracy theory, but I think we have all been naïve about how the financial game is actually played. Whether or not extraterrestrial information could be kept for a select few would be dependent on the type of First Contact, who that contact is with (government, media, and scientists) and of course what the aliens decide they want to do. After all, it’s their information and ultimately they would be in control.

Then there’s the flipside- corporate interests arguing for a free flow of information. I have said for some time that gatekeepers of some sort will be critical for information flow After First Contact. I think regulating information flow will be important to help us decipher that extraterrestrial information and make sure it doesn’t erode the foundations of our social, civic and scientific institutions.

I think an interesting and unusual alliance could be forged between free speech/open sourceware/free Internet folks and big business. If we do assign gatekeepers to control information flow After First Contact, both of those interests would be upset. They would want as much information as possible to be released, although the two groups would have very different motives. Big business will want as much opportunity as possible and that would come through information about the sciences and technology. They would likely be opposed to gatekeeping on a purely economic basis. The freedom of information folks will be upset that anyone is controlling information flow. This unholy alliance of freedom of information and big business would probably never gel as a concerted, joined effort, but the primary argument would be the same.

No one nation, or bloc of nations, should be allowed to control information After First Contact. It should be a global effort, involving all nations and with protections to make sure the powerful countries don’t subvert the process for their own interests. Transparency in process would be essential.

Any information that comes to humans from extraterrestrials would have to be considered a gift to all humans. However, that information flow needs to be controlled to help protect our institutions from being harmed. It will probably take quite a bit of work to even understand alien thought and logic, let alone decipher scientific ideas. The key is to set up gatekeepers who will not be subject to national or business pressure. Those gatekeepers would need to have careful oversight. And the entire process would need to be transparent to the point of causing boredom. Every meeting must be streamed on the Internet. Every decision should be tracked and monitored. The gatekeeping process would likely need a bureaucracy of huge proportions. I personally hate bureaucracy, but sometimes it’s necessary. It doesn’t have to be inefficient and ineffective bureaucracy. That will be up to us.

Humans or the Birds and Bees?

It’s easy for us to view our planet as the home of humans, but what about small mouth bass, golden retrievers, honey bees, red-tailed hawks and iguanas? Humans are just one of about two million known species on Earth, according to the National Science Foundation “Assembling the Tree of Life” project. That’s just known species. The actual figure could be five to 100 million different species on Earth. So, what makes us think that extraterrestrials would only be interested in humans?

This thought comes thanks to a classic book, Carl Sagan’s Cosmic Connection: An Extraterrestrial Perspective. Sagan points out that we assume extraterrestrials would only be interested in intelligent life on Earth. Even that assumption leaves out dolphins and a whole lot of intelligent primates. One would imagine that visiting extraterrestrials would want to communicate with humans, but they could also be interested in a much wider range of life on Earth.

I find myself re-reading Sagan, every now and then, to reconnect with the wonder of extraterrestrial considerations. While parts of the science he explores in the book have moved on in the last 20 years, the over-arching themes are timeless. We bring a lot of assumptions to extraterrestrial First Contact speculation. Anthropocentricism is perhaps the biggest and it occurs in much of our logic. If extraterrestrials did view all beings on Earth as important they might hold us in contempt for the way we treat the natural world. Humans have spread across the globe in a relatively short time span, upending entire ecosystems and forcing some species into extinction along the way. We demand much of the planet. Could that fact become an issue in future extraterrestrial relations? My vegetarian wife would certainly snicker if the extraterrestrials looked down on our meat eating ways. Of course it’s hard to say realistically how extraterrestrials could form relationships with whales or spiders. Still, they might respect life forms in a way we don’t fully understand. And as in all speculation there is the flip-side: they could also not give a damn about anything with an IQ lower than a chimp.

It’s all certainly worth pondering and there’s no one better to ponder with than Carl Sagan.

What Technology Demands of Our Society

We like to think of technology as providing tools for us to use. While humans do control technology, the growth also creates technological demands and institutional challenges. The most striking example is information technology. The demands and challenges are becoming more apparent daily.

Information is becoming democratized. Transparency is becoming a technological imperative. The complexity of the networks involved and the vast numbers of people with access to those networks are only part of the story. Many of the people who worked to create those networks have an ethos that believes strongly in transparency and free access. It’s what has helped keep so much of the internet free. Open source software and wikis are examples of how this philosophy has helped to drive the nature of our modern information technology.

People are using communication technology to band together in new ways, outside of the usual institutions of governments, religion and media. In Egypt it helped to fuel a revolution. The transparency that technology creates is becoming harder and harder for traditional institutions to squelch. The Chinese government had another reminder of the power of social media recently. People posted more than 26 million messages to a Chinese Twitter-like microblog called Sina Weibo, full of information about a high-speed train accident that the authorities had tried to prevent from being released.

Twitter, Facebook, and You Tube are just the latest trends. Wikileaks is an example of where things might be headed. The release of millions of pages of top-secret government documents from many nations was aided by a sophisticated system of servers, protected networks and technically savvy activists. It showed that the technology we have come to rely on can be used in ways that many people might disagree with. 

Transparency, no matter how much it is given lip-service by politicians, flies directly in the face of bureaucracy as we have known it for hundreds of years. Usually bureaucracy is controlled by a few and access is tightly restricted. When it protects our social security numbers and medical records we seem to appreciate such restriction. Transparency creates a disruption in the fundamental protective and restrictive nature of institutions. We may applaud the use of technology when it creates revolution in a dictatorship. When it jeopardizes the lives of soldiers, or threatens our collective interest, transparency takes on a dangerous tone.

Technology is proving more powerful than censorship and governments will need to realize this to stay relevant, and in power, in the next 50 years. The human race tends to move in fits and starts culturally. Our technology, however, is skyrocketing with new developments and new possibilities. Governments and other organizations will have to work hard to keep up and stay in control.

The demands of technology will only grow. The transparency movement may continue in ways far beyond our current imagining. If a technologically advanced extraterrestrial civilization was watching this unfold they would probably view such developments with great interest. They may have already experienced where we are ultimately headed and have an understanding of the dangers along the way.