Flying On The Fringe

Welcome to my series “Interview With an Alien,”  part 2 of my conversation with Ambassador Phlip from the planet of Agzagi.

S: What is your family life like? Do you marry for life, or only for reproduction?

P: We mate for reproduction once every six cycles around our star. It is difficult to compare to your time frame, but I estimate it would be a little over three of your years. Different males mate each cycle.

S: Do you have a courting ritual?

P: Ritual? No. We have a procedure. The male puts on a mating necklace, goes to the female’s abode, and pounds on his chest and shrills at her. If she admits him, they go to the sleep pallet, and he walks around her several times, continuing to pound his chest and shrill, creating a track within which an egg nest will be built. If she touches noses with him, she has accepted him. Then he goes out and collects reeds and moss for the nest and brings it back. Then they mate. The eggs hatch half a cycle later.

S: Do you stay with that mate for life, or does you change each cycle?

P: Usually, the males will seek a new mate each cycle, but sometimes one of us finds a mate we choose to stay with for several cycles, though not a lifetime.

S: Forgive me if it seems I’m prying into personal things, but we are eager to learn about each new sentient species we encounter. Would you say that love, as an emotion, is important to your mating?

P: It is difficult for me to understand love as humans seem to define it. As a male, I look at the physical aspects of a female, her profession, and the likely qualifications of our offspring. Most of us use genetic testing prior to mating to determine the best pairing. Of course, we feel… a desire to protect our offspring, though that is more a community effort than individual.

S: Do the females ever choose their mate?

P: They do not actively pursue a mate, as they do in your culture, but they are free to reject any approach. If the genetic testing shows one male to be more of interest than another, she may indicate her interest to the preferred male. And they can reject a male in one cycle and still accept him in another. When they have accepted one, they put a mark on the door so others will know.

S: What does the courting necklace look like? Does every male wear the same type?

P: Each male has a unique design made by his mother for his first courting. The one on the left is mine. Black represents male in our culture, and red the female. White stands for fertility.  The design on the right was created by one of my mates for one of our sons.

 

S: These are beautiful! How are they made?

P: Some are polished from stones. At one time, our planet had seas, but those dried up ages ago. Some of the beads are fossils from ancient sea life.

S: Your mating procedure sounds much simpler than our way of doing things.

P: I don’t believe even humans understand how to mate properly. Some mate for life, some don’t. Some court for years, others for short periods. It is utter chaos. You breed too well in spite of that. You need to breed less often.

S: You’re referring to our overpopulation problems.

P: Yes. It is very impractical to populate beyond your resources. In the rare instance that our resources are lean for some reason, we refrain from mating.

S: Do the females on your planet raise the children, or do the males participate?

P: Our young are self-sufficient from hatching. They remain in the nest for a few days eating food provided by their mother. Then they move out to find empty homes or dig new ones. They are educated by the community, both males and females. I have heard some here claim there is discrimination against females, particularly in employment. We do not discriminate.

S: Do you have more than one baby at a time?

P: Normally there are two or three eggs to a clutch.

S: Do you ever have trouble getting your young to behave, or to do what they are supposed to?

P: Behavior is a learning experience for all young, even those that are not sentient. For those that are sentient and intelligent, misbehavior is inevitably a part of their mental growth. Those who learn quickly inevitably rise to advanced positions.

S: How do you discipline your young?

P: The teacher will isolate them for a time, or require them to do strenuous physical tasks. When possible, the discipline is related to the behavior. For instance, if a young one steals, he might be required to return what he stole, plus give something he values to the one he stole from.

S: What about adult offenders? Do you have prisons?

P: No. In rare cases, if an individual behaves in a manner counter-productive to the community, they are exiled to a less populated area and left to fend for themselves. Often, after a few cycles, they will apply for re-admittance. Some prefer a solitary life.

S: What about you, personally? Do you enjoy your role as an ambassador to other planets?

P: We do not choose professions based on what we might enjoy. That would be impractical. There might be some professions no one would choose. As I went through schooling, my teachers determined I would be suited to working with alien species. However, I find what I do to be fulfilling, in that it serves my people.

S: What surprised you most about Earth?

P: Chaos. Your people are disorganized and poorly disciplined. Streets have dead ends. Cars, on which you heavily depend, do not always function as they should. Perhaps such chaos is part of your youth as a technological species. I can see some similarities between how your people behave now, and how our species did two or three thousand generations ago.

S: I don’t know. We’re obviously very different from you. What have you enjoyed most about Earth?

P: The one thing I have enjoyed are your mountain ranges. Our people love to climb, but our mountains are significantly lower than yours. I have climbed in Colorado and Utah, and I am looking forward to a chance to go to Asia to climb there, though I might have to wear some protective gear against the cold for the highest mountains.

S: I hope you do get the opportunity to do that. What type of climbing gear do you use? Something high tech? (I think he’s laughing, a gutteral hissing sound, and he’s waving his long fingers and sharp claws in my face.)

P: My race does not need assistance in climbing.

S: Yes, I can see that. Well, it has certainly been interesting talking with you, but I have to draw things to a close. Thank you so much for talking with me today.

P: You are welcome. It is part of my role to educate your people about my people.

Readers, join me next week, when I interview Chkben from Orozh (official Earth Department of Interstellar Affairs alliteration). Until then, fly high and free.

Welcome to “Interview With an Alien.” I’d like you all to meet Phlip, ambassador from the planet of Agzagi. I confess, neither of those pronunciations are accurate. The Ambassador has agreed to the nickname of Phlip for diplomatic purposes, since no Earther has yet managed to pronounce his real name. The planet’s name is the official English rendition the Earth Department of Interstellar Affairs has released. Ambassador Phlip is using an advanced translation device.

S: Ambassador Phlip, welcome, and I apologize in advance for all the times I will undoubtedly butcher your name and the name of your planet.

P: My device will correct your errors.

S: Good. My first question is about the translator. Is that technology from your planet, or something we have developed?

P: From [Agzagi], of course. Yours are not adequate for our language.

S: I know most of the planets we’ve established diplomatic relations with allow some exchange of technology. Is the translator one of the technologies you might allow us to have?

P: You would not be able to reproduce it. We will provide it as needed for our purposes.

S: I see. Let’s move on to another topic. I noticed your style of dress (he’s wearing nothing but a lightweight pair of gym shorts) is not typical of what most diplomats on our world wear. What is normal for your world?

P. I was required to wear covering while in public on your world. Ridiculous. We have superb bodies, as you can see, and we are well adapted to our planet. Humans are poorly adapted, and, in my opinion, not very attractive.

S: (I’m fighting to avoid laughing.) I suspect every species finds its own kind most attractive. Humans do wear clothing as an adaptation to our weather, because in many areas it changes from season to season. But our clothing also defines certain roles. Many companies and services use uniforms to identify their employees.

P: We do not need such things. When one of us needs to be identified for some reason, he wears a symbol on a band around one arm.

S: I see. You mentioned being well adapted to conditions on your planet. What is your home planet like?

P: It is mostly desert, much like the area designated as the American Southwest. It is very hot by comparison with your planet. The surface temperature is almost 150 degrees by your Fahrenheit measure.

S: So it must be uncomfortable for you here. How do you compensate, since you don’t use clothing to keep warm?

P: Your government arranged a large hotel suite for me. I use a heated chamber when I sleep. My people are what you would classify as cold-blooded, though that is an inaccurate description. My body temperature drops during the day, so they also installed a sauna in my suite that I can use during the day as needed. I would not stay here during your winter season.

S: A lot of our hotels have saunas and hot tubs for their guests. You needed one in your room? That must have taken a lot of work.

P: I would not join commoners. And they would want me to wear a covering.

S: I see. That’s probably true. How often does your planet revolve around its sun? Can you translate that into our time frame?

P: Our planet is larger and a little closer to its sun. It completes a cycle approximately once in every 270 of your days, but our days are much longer, almost double the length of yours.

S: Interesting. What are your homes like?

P: Our planet has an extensive underground labyrinth of tunnels and rooms created by volcanic activity. Our volcanoes are now extinct, except for a few. We utilize those areas, dig out and use surface rock to build walls, walkways, and transport tubes.

S: Transport tubes? What are those, or how do they work?

P: They are somewhat like your most advanced subway systems. The carriers look a little like the Japanese bullet train, except that ours are shorter, have no windows, and are extremely fast.

S: No windows? I suppose that’s because they are in underground tunnels. Do they ever go above ground?

P: Yes, but they are so fast, you would see nothing but a blur. It takes only a short time to get from one community to a far distant one.

S: Are you able to go out on the surface, or do you stay completely below ground?

P: We go onto the surface for short periods, usually at sunset. But everything we need is maintained below ground—all of our food stocks.

S: Do you ever get tired of living underground? Do you miss the open spaces above ground?

P: I prefer living underground. The temperature and humidity are constant and comfortable. Here it is always too cold, and even with the air conditioning systems, the humidity keeps fluctuating. I don’t understand how you can live like this. No wonder you have trouble adapting.

S: Yes, our weather changes not only from region to region but day to day. So your entire planet has a similar climate?

P: Yes. There are minor variations from region to region, but the temperature is fairly constant from one area to the next. Some places have more vegetation where water sources are closer to the surface. Those areas tend to have less natural underground habitat available, and they are hot and have much higher humidity, so few of our people live there.

S: Really. Humans tend to gravitate toward areas of greater vegetation. We’re currently fighting to save our jungles and rain forests.

P: I don’t care for areas with thick vegetation. I prefer the open mountain ranges. When our people venture outside for recreation, we tend to go the mountains or open plains.

S: If vegetation is sparse, how does your planet maintain its oxygen level?

P: We have oxygen generators, and much of the rocky surface is covered by a type of lichen that produces oxygen. There is an oxygen-producing lichen that grows in caves, as well as a uni-cellular organism that lives in the underground water reservoirs. Our respiration is much slower than yours, and we maintain a stable population that does not stress the environment. Something your people still need to learn.

S: Is this a picture of an oxygen generator?

P: Yes, and lights that promote growth of some plants we cultivate for food.

S: How long ago did your people have to move underground?

P: It is difficult to explain in terms of time you would understand. Approximately two thousand generations ago, the surface became too hot, and water too scarce, to live on the surface, and our ancestors began to spend more time below ground. It didn’t require much physical adaptation, just a restructuring of our homes. But we make extensive use of the natural resources available to us. A great deal of stone, obviously.

S: Were the climate changes natural, or did your species’ activity contribute to the changes.

P: Some of both. There is no question that our industrial activity in the earlier stages of our development contributed to geologic changes and a rise in our global temperature. Like your people, ours were reluctant to institute major change until it was too late. We have since learned to adapt and live without causing further damage to our planet. One of my purposes here is to encourage your governments to change their policies and protect yours before it is too late for you as well. Your people expend a great deal of energy trying to change your surroundings instead of adapting to them.

S: After so many generations underground, do you have any problems with the light level here? I would assume you’re used to it being much darker.

P: We have a second eyelid that remains from the time when our species lived above ground. It closes automatically in brighter light, so your light levels have not bothered me.

S: Have your eating patterns changed as well over time?

P: Not as much as some of the other changes we’ve undergone. We grow crops in the cave openings where there is sufficient light. All of our water is below ground, and there are animals that live in the pools and lakes.

S: I have a couple of pictures. Could you tell me what these are?

P: The blue one is a plant called isha, one we can cultivate underground that does not require light. The other is aya zhizh, which would translate at water flower. The closest you would have is a fish, but it reproduces more like some of your plants, by sending out spores that others of its kind ingest. The young sprout from the body of the carrier and consume him or her, then detach when there is not enough of the carrier to maintain them. The adults eat lichen from the cave floors and microscopic creatures.

S: So, while on Earth, what is your favorite food?

P: I would not call anything here my favorite. I can tolerate one called escargot. Some of your sushi is also palatable. Fortunately, I brought food stores on my ship.

S: (Forgive me, readers, I’m having a hard time not laughing. He has expensive needs.) What is your favorite food from home?

P: Isha is one of my favorites. I cultivate it on the walls of my home. I also enjoy one called akhda. It’s more rare and grows in the darkest areas, so I only have it occasionally. It’s hard to harvest. Even a little light causes it to close up and camoflage against the stone it grows in. Some of our people have made a profession of seeking it out by scent. They are careful not to over harvest any one area.

Readers, come back next week for the second part of the interview with Ambassador Phlip. Until then, fly high and free!

Welcome to my series “Interview With An Alien.” Today’s blog features the continuation of my interview with Kuzh from the planet Akmandah. Last week Kuzh told us about his job aboard a Hapida space ship and a little about his people’s family structure. Today we’re going to delve a little deeper into what his planet is like.

PART TWO: KUZH FROM AKMANDAH

S: Tell me a little bit about what are your homes are like.

K: Most of them are built into Makka trees. The trees grow from the top down.

S: The top down! How is that possible?

K: The seeds wedge into cliffs or banks and sprout roots that grow downward to solid ground and outward. They grow for hundreds of our years. The roots become massive trunks, and a single tree can cover a hundred kelas or more, Eventually, the original trunks die. Then we can chop them out to form rooms. It only takes a little wood, stone, or mortar to waterproof them. We have a lot of rain.

S: Very interesting. It makes a beautiful home. What is the interior like?

K: Inside is simple. Just furniture for sleeping and sitting and using our sitkas–like one of your electronic tablets. We paint the insides in bright colors, but we do not do much other decorating. The cooking and eating area is outside our home. The cooking fires are kept in a clearing away from the houses. Several related families eat together, usually fifty or sixty people. We like to eat together. Sometimes a meal can last half a day cycle. It is much more fun than the fast way your people eat.

S: I don’t think we would get much work done that way. So your weather must be warm most of the time.

K: Our planet is a little hotter than yours, similar to your tropical areas, but with temperatures closer to your deserts. It always seems cold to me on Earth, even in the summer. We work in the early morning and the evening. Midday is for eating and enjoying the company of others.

S: What else do your people do for fun?

K: A lot of water sports, of course. The Makka sap can be used to produce a substance similar to your rubber. The wood also floats. We do a lot of rafting for fun, but the rivers also provide key transportation routes. I am going to take a trip to your state called Colorado. There is a fast river there, and I want to go rafting.

S: It is very fast–too much for me, but I hope you enjoy it. While I was looking through pictures from your world, I came across this creature. Do you recognize it?

K: Yes. It is an asa dema—it translates as a seedbug. In this photo it’s carrying one of the Makka seeds. These are the creatures largely responsible for Makka reproduction. They put the seeds in crevices in the rock, where they take root. They build nests among the early sprouts. As you can see, much of our culture depends on the Makka. Fortunately, it exists almost everywhere on the planet.

S: What other kinds of animals do you have? Do your people have pets?

K: We have animals that live near our homes, but they are ones we use for their… something like your milk. I can’t understand keeping animals in your homes just for fun. That is very strange. They don’t seem to serve any purpose.

S: Purpose? Well, I suppose the purpose is that we love them, and love us, so we gain affection and comfort from them. For many people they become almost as important as family.

K: If  you spent more time with your family members, you would not need pets.

S: Maybe so. But sometimes members of our families are far away.

K: That is sad.

S: Can you tell me about the religious beliefs of your people?

K: We believe in a single god, creator of the universe, as many of your people do. We have small temples all over the planet, some so old they’ve been completely consumed by the Makka trees. Some are still partially visible, and we build new ones from time to time as we move into previously uninhabited, or abandoned, areas. But we primarily worship within our homes. Each extended family has a priest or priestess. 

K: Here on the left is one of the ancient ones, and on the right, is one of the newer ones we’ve built. The columns represent the roots of the Makka. Earth has some beautiful temples. I want to visit some of those, too, if my ship is here long enough. But your religions confuse me. If you believe there is only one god, how can you have so many different religions? That does not make sense.

S: That is a difficult question to answer. Many of our people believe in the same God, but we have very different ideas about how to worship. What have you enjoyed most about Earth so far?

K: I’ve been exploring your oceans. I went fishing, caught a fish as big as one of our boats.

S: Congratulations! That’s every Earth fisherman’s dream.

K: And I like sampling food from different countries. We do not have as many different… cultures as Earth does. It would take a long time to experience all the different ways of living here.

S: Yes, it would. Well, Kuzh, thank you so much for talking with me. I hope you stay long enough to do a lot of the things you want to do.

K: Me, too. I enjoyed talking to you. Aza kimai jaina to you. That means blessings of god .

S: Thank you so much.

 

Readers, hope you’re enjoying meeting these fascinating folks from other worlds.Special thanks this week to Queenie at MS Travel Solo for allowing me to use one of her extraordinary photos. If you enjoy travel to exotic locations, check out her site at           https://www.mstravelsolo.com/solo-travellers-guide-tainan-taiwan/

Join me again next week when I interview Ambassador Phlip from Agzagi. Until then, fly high and free.

Welcome to Author Susan Eschbach’s series “Interview With An Alien.” I hope you enjoy this series. Also check out my books A Trial By Error and Man On The Fringe in the links above. Book three in the Fringe Cycle, Salvation’s Star, is due out this spring.

PART ONE: KUZH FROM AKMANDAH

Today’s blog features Kuzh from the planet Akmandah.

S: Kuzh, welcome to Earth. Are you enjoying your visit here?

K: Yuh. It is pretty. Many oceans.

S: Do you have any oceans, seas, or large areas of water on your planet?

K: Four seas, much smaller than your oceans. Most of our water is in rivers. We have many large rivers.

S: I understand from Nasa’s Department of Interstellar Affairs that your people have not developed interstellar travel yet, but you have contact with species that have.

K: We trade with the Hapida, but they will not give us ships.

S: I see. And you came to Earth on a Hapida ship, correct?

K: I work for them.

 

S: What kind of work do you do?

K: Maintenance, cleaning.

S: Can you tell us  a little about what we are looking at here?

K: This is the corridor leading to the flight deck. The blue rods are data transfer links.

S: Are they anything like our fiber optic cables?

K: Much faster, almost light speed, and they carry much more data. Sometimes I have to replace one, or reroute it.

S: Do you enjoy the work?

K: Yuh. I like to travel to other planets, and I make good income for my ikan.

S: Ikan—according to my information, that is an extended group of related individuals, somewhat like our Native Americans, right?

K: Right, except we have three sexes involved in making children. The mikah provides an enzyme that allows the female egg to join with the male spore. The mikah can serve any family. When a child is born a mikah, that child leaves its own ikan and joins the mikah ikan. When a man marries, he joins his wife’s ikan, and all of their female children remain in the mothers’ ikan. Male children go to the father’s ikan when they reach adulthood.

S: A complex structure. So, you mentioned that you make a good income for your ikan. Is that spread evenly among the individuals in the ikan?

K: Yuh. All income is shared by the whole ikan. Members work together to harvest crops, and each member receives what they need. When someone needs a house, they move into an empty one or the ikan works together to build one.

S: That’s a very cooperative system. Are there ever battles or wars between different ikans?

K: Yuh. We are good warriors. Not so many wars any more, but we still take pride in strength and physical training. We have battles every year at the Comdena. The new president is chosen from the winning ikan.

S: Is that your uniform?

K: Not uniform, protective gear. During battle there is a lot of fire, smoke, and chemicals. The picture at the top shows our ceremonial dress. Each ikan has a particular emblem. Mine is a Badri tooth. They are extinct now, but there are a lot of fossils around.

S: You mentioned harvesting crops. Do you grow a lot of different varieties of crops?

K: Yuh. We don’t eat animals like humans do. We eat a little (he’s scratching his head)… I think it’s a little like some of your snails, or worms. The ibit lives in our rivers. Also, sukat and bitta are our main crops, and we have a lot of different kinds of fruits, and root plants.

 

 

 

Readers, thanks for joining me as we explore Kuzh’s world. Join me next week for the rest of the interview. Until then, fly high and free.

Welcome to my new series, “Interview With An Alien.” It’s long been a dream of mine to be scooped up by some UFO, and if not to be transported to another planet, to at least have a meaningful conversation with a being from another world. This series is for all those as crazy as I am, whose imaginations run wild in the ships of science fiction.

PART ONE: AMBASSADOR IKIRA FROM THE PLANET HAPIDA

S: Amabassador Ikira, thank you so much for agreeing to meet with me.

I: My pleasure. We’re looking forward to a friendly relationship with Earth, and I’m happy to have the opportunity share with you.

S: We’re eager to get to know you. How did Hapida become aware of Earth?

I: We received a signal from a probe launched from your planet long ago. Of course, by the time it was within range of our system, much had changed on your planet. Humans, fortunately, still look much the same as the images on that probe, so at least we knew a little of what to expect. Your technology, however, has progressed significantly.

S: Yes, Voyager launched in 1977. I would imagine our current technology is still primitive by your standards, since, if I understand correctly, your people have been space farers for over a hundred generations.

I: That is true. However, our lifespan is comparatively much shorter than yours. Our planet rotates faster, and because our sun is small and has a weaker gravitational pull, it also revolves around the sun in a shorter time period. It’s a complex mathematical formula, but our year would be roughly equivalent to about seven months in your time.

S: Tell us about your home planet. How does it compare with Earth?

I: It’s radically different. Hapida is surrounded by dense clouds, and our sun is a weak, red dwarf, so very little light reaches the surface. We have many tall, slender trees with foliage high above the ground, but almost no ground plants. I am utterly fascinated by your oceans. So much water! Our only water sources are below ground, and we are adapted to using very little. It seems you waste a lot.

S: We are guilty of that. Until recently, it seemed to us to be an abundant and never-ending resource. We’re only now beginning to understand how little is fresh, drinkable, water, as opposed to salt water, and conservation efforts are far from adequate.

I: Our planet would be grateful even for the salt water. It could be treated and made drinkable.

S: An expensive process when our human population is so huge. Your population numbers only a few million, is that true?

I: Yes. We marry for life, and each couple has only one or two children in a lifetime. We are cold-blooded, so our entire metabolism is slower than humans’. You eat three times a day! I can’t imagine consuming that much. I eat about once every seven or eight of your days.

S: You have large, beautiful eyes. I assume that’s an adaptation to the dark conditions on your planet.

I: Yes. As you know, I had to ask you to dim the lights in your office. Most of the time here I have to wear very dark glasses, as well as a breathing apparatus. Your atmosphere is too oxygen rich.

S: That seems awfully inconvenient. I hope it isn’t too unpleasant for you.

I: For me, it is worth the inconvenience to explore your world.

S: Definitely worth some inconvenience. I’d like to ask another personal question, if that would be all right?

I: Of course. I can always choose not to answer. (She utters a series of quick hisses through her nose, a sound I learned earlier is a chuckle. She has a wonderful sense of humor!)

S: Tell me about the appendages on your head. Do they have a function?

I: Yes. Because our planet is dark, our eyesight is poor, compared to humans. Our filiki provide extra sensory data. It is apparently a sense humans lack. We… touch the air around us and pick up vibrations and magnetic and electrical currents.

S: Fascinating. I wish I had those senses. What other species inhabit your planet?

I: Like most planets that have achieved sentient life—there are quite a lot of them, you know—we have a variety of species, though not so varied as earth. Many of ours have developed life cycles below ground, and cold-blooded species outnumber warm-blooded ones about fifty to one. We only have sixty two warm-blooded species, and most of those lay eggs. We don’t have any birds, though we have a dozen species that float in the air. Most of them look a little like your lizards or snakes with flaps of skin that unfold to glide through the air. I have a pet peliri at home. It has a soft, fuzzy skin but is long like a snake. They love to wrap around your arm and be carried around. They coo, or kind of trill, when they’re happy.

S: Interesting. A fuzzy snake. What do they eat?

I: They inhale microorganisms in the air, so they are very easy to care for.

S: (Now I’m really laughing). That would be a blessing. I have five cats, and I’d better not forget to feed them!

Readers, check in on January 13, 2010, for the continuation of this interview. In Part Two of my interview, we’ll learn a little more about Ikira’s world, Hapida, her culture, other species, and some of their holidays and celebrations.

I was hoping to get to see some of the Delta Aquarid meteor shower from a mountaintop in the Ozarks this weekend, but the viewing will be hampered by a full moon. Fortunately, according to earthsky.org, that won’t be my last chance.

Meteor numbers for this shower don’t bump up significantly at this shower’s peak; in fact, they’ll continue on into August and overlap with the famous Perseid meteor shower. The moon will turn new on August 11, 2018, providing dark skies for both the Perseids and the Delta Aquariids around then. The Perseids radiate from the constellation Perseus. The Delta Aquariids radiate from the constellation Aquarius. That means those August meteors will be flying from two different directions in the sky. Lots of fun to watch!

(By Bruce McClure and Deborah Byrd in ASTRONOMY ESSENTIALS, earthsky.org, July 23, 2018)

Where I live, my view is obscured to the south, but I have a great view to the north, so I plan to go out sky-watching on August 11 and focus on the Perseids. Who knows, with any luck, I might get to see meteors streaking across from both north and south.

Here’s a beautiful shot of one (from earthsky,org) taken in my neck of the country, in the Geno Ketcham Richland Creek Wildlife Area in Arkansas.

Have fun my friends, and keep looking to the stars!

For all those who believe in UFOs…

For all those who’ve been fortunate enough to see one…

And for all those who are waiting for good fortune to visit them in the future…

July 2 is World UFO Day.

Some people celebrate it on June 24, the anniversary of the date that American aviator Kenneth Arnold sighted nine UFOs near Mount Ranier, Washington on June 24, 1947. July 2 commemorates the date of the infamous crash at Roswell, New Mexico.

My interest in was sparked in the 1970s after I became hooked on reruns of Star Trek in college. I joined the organization MUFON and followed it for several years. As a science fiction writer, I spend a lot of time researching space and space-related issues. The Milky Way is estimated to be about 100,000 light years across. It’s next to impossible to estimate the number of stars it contains, but the European Space Agency’s Gaia mission is mapping the locations of approximately 1 billion stars in the Milky Way. ESA says Gaia will map one percent of the stellar content of the Milky Way, which puts the estimate of the total stars in our galaxy at 100 billion. Gaia’s goal is to make the best-ever three-dimensional map of the Milky Way.

Just a few decades ago, astronomers debated whether planets like Earth were rare in the galaxy. With the power of modern day telescopes and other instruments, we now know non-Earth planets, called exo-planets, are quite common. And a large number of them orbit their stars in what is referred to as the “Goldilock’s zone,” the zone in which a planet can contain liquid water. One system recently discovered has six planets orbiting in the habitable zone, so close to each other that a being standing on one of them could see the others even during the day. Now that’s what I call cool!

All of that leads me to believe it won’t be long before we discover some type of extraterrestrial life.

But the big question is, has extraterrestrial life already discovered us? Although governments around the world have done their best to hide evidence of such life, there is evidence out there.

In 1977, Peter Sturrock, a professor of space science and astrophysics at Stanford University, mailed 2,611 questionnaires about UFO sightings to members of the American Astronomical Society. He received 1,356 responses from which 62 astronomers – 4.6 percent – reported witnessing or recording inexplicable aerial phenomena. This rate is similar to the approximately 5 percent of UFO sightings that are never explained.

The countries of Brazil, Canada, Denmark, Ecuador, France, New Zealand, Russia, Sweden and the United Kingdom have been declassifying their UFO files since 2008. The French Committee for In-Depth Studies, or COMETA, was an unofficial UFO study group comprised of high-ranking scientists and military officials that studied UFOs in the late 1990s. They released the COMETA Report, which summarized their findings. They concluded that 5 percent of the encounters were reliable yet inexplicable: The best hypothesis available was that the observed craft were extraterrestrial. They also accused the United States of covering up evidence of UFOs. (https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/do-aliens-exist-are-they-real-national-ufo-day-13033434.php)

We might not yet have what would be considered incontrovertible proof of extraterrestrial life visiting Earth, but we certainly have enough evidence to warrant open minds and serious scientific study.

Live long and prosper…and dream big.

You might also like to visit:

https://www.theufochronicles.com/2018/07/scientists-revisit-question-of-aliens.html

https://wgnradio.com/2018/06/25/world-ufo-day-and-ufo-sighting-phenomenon/

While visiting one of my favorite Facebook groups, Space Opera, I came across an interesting topic. Someone had posted a photo of an asteroid named Bennu and a claim that it was “expected” to strike the Earth in 2135. That sort of thing always peaks my interest, so I checked it out on Space.com. No big surprise, the claim was bogus. “Expected” turned out to be about a 1 in 1265 chance, and it isn’t due to make its pass until “late” 22^nd century. Sounds like pretty unlikely odds to me. Not to mention that would give us plenty of time to do something about it if it was on a collision course.

For those of us who write in the realm of science fiction, science FACTS are important. Of course, we have the advantage of suspension of disbelief, and I for one, play heavily on things that are currently hypothesized, but not yet known. Nonetheless, one thing that bothers me in science fiction is when a known fact is ignored or stretched beyond belief. There is plenty of room for us to imagine in the realm of the unknown, without ignoring what is already known as fact.

My favorite was a line I caught in an old Star Trek rerun. Dr. McCoy and Kirk were on a previously undiscovered planet, and McCoy was scanning for life signs. They are standing in front of a bush, and McCoy’s scanner picks up something several meters away. He says something like, “It’s the only sign of biological life around.” Really? Is there a form of life that isn’t biological? And what is the bush they’re standing in front of? Maybe it’s one of those non-biological forms of life. Or maybe, it’s a stage prop, and it isn’t a form of life at all.