Extraterrestrial First Contact: The Power of Humanity

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In the 1970s NASA sought to collect those very ideas on special discs that were placed on each of the Voyager space probes. They are now traveling outside of our solar system in interstellar space. Carl Sagan chaired the committee tasked to create the discs. Much of the information on the discs described our human biology and the physical makeup of our planet. Aside from the sciences, and an attempt to show how we view the world around us, there were also cultural depictions. Those included pictures of architecture, cities, and food. Music recordings ranged from Bach to Chuck Berry. These subjects, updated of course, might be similar to what we share with extraterrestrials if First Contact does occur someday. However, if the aliens are thoughtful and enterprising, they will have already seen much of that through our television transmissions flying through space or thanks to the Internet, if they have sent a probe to Earth orbit.

The bigger question is this: who are we? What would set us apart from other civilizations in the universe? I think we would inevitably turn to the basic, positive functions of human life: love, friendship, family, community, learning, creativity, communal progress, curiosity, religion, science and philosophy. That would, in turn, lead to questions: What about the negative aspects of humanity? Conflict is an inherent part of human existence. Just to live on this planet is a struggle. We could point to the institutions of government and religion as ways we attempt to join together and overcome conflict. And, of course, to be honest, we would have to share those same institutions as things that often drive us apart.

Despite horrific wars, daily violence, and conflict of all varieties, we are apparently thriving with 7.7 billion humans. We have built a large civilization. And as we have come to learn in recent years, that progress is not necessarily always a good thing. We are changing our planet in ways that nature did not intend, so much so that we face many new challenges. Climate change is impacting our weather and our coastal cities. Species extinction is at record levels and proceeding at an astonishing rate. We face the threat of ecological collapse. The threat of nuclear war hangs over our heads. Is this who we are- beings hell bent on dominating each and every square foot of planet Earth? Do we care nothing for other species? Do we care nothing about the future of coming generations of humans? Are we selfish creatures prone to self-aggrandizement?

Certainly all of those aspects of humanity are true to some extent. But let’s get back to the basic positive functions of human existence and focus on one in particular: love. Love may be quite unique in the universe. Perhaps extraterrestrial beings are already so closely connected to each other that they don’t even understand human differentiation and thus love? Or they could be so far advanced in technology to not even understand the concept of caring and love. So much of what I have described as human is the result of specific biological needs on this planet. Different biological needs on different planets would create not only different extraterrestrial biology, but also different alien psychology. This difference could be especially acute if aliens are machine-based artificial intelligence.

If love and friendship are so important to us, why do we so often dwell on conflict and division? Our existence in 2019 is beset by many challenges. It is difficult to support 7.7 billion humans. There are natural human behaviors that cause us to seek the best resources for ourselves and those closest to us, while leaving other people without. We struggle with how we govern ourselves and how we interact as communities. We are attempting to overcome the weight of our history.

Despite the news of the day, we continue to improve our lives. We generally live in a safer, healthier, and higher opportunity world than our ancestors. We face new challenges daily, and together we manage to overcome those challenges. We can find cures for disease and new ways to grow crops to feed more people. We have done these things for thousands of years. We continue to develop. How do we do that? We rely on love, friendship, family, community, learning, creativity, communal progress, curiosity, religion, science, and philosophy. And so I come back to the power of humanity. What is it that we can sum up as representing the human civilization? I think most of us would agree that it is love. Love, in it’s many forms, is the glue that holds our civilization together. Fred Rogers, of the TV show Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, perhaps said it best:

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”


There are humans dedicated to helping war refugees. We send aid to other nations in times of famine and natural disaster. We rush to assist a person who has been hurt. We take these actions every day, and perhaps in far greater frequency than we take part in conflict and violence.

Our civilization is built on the good work of people- the so-called “common people” in every city and every nation on the planet. I would imagine that they are the great majority of humans on the planet. They are often not the most famous or the most powerful humans. They are certainly not perfect. They may do an awful thing one day and then turn around and do something good the next. But they will most likely be there in times of need. There are billions of people on planet Earth helping other people in one way or another. That is the power of humanity. And no matter what we learn about alien worlds, that essential nature of humanity is something we need to come back to when assessing this new perspective. Humans have the power of love. We can support each other and create tremendous change when we work together. We can overcome nearly any challenge imaginable, if we just believe in each other and understand that power. The only things holding us back are negative thinking, selfishness, and inaction. Critical thinking is essential. It shows you how to make things better. Negative thinking becomes a spiral to drag us down, either individually or collectively. We give up and succumb to the horrible. Love can pull us out of that hole. We have used it to do so throughout human history. Let us proudly show off our great human power to any extraterrestrial strangers we meet some day. And let us resolve to use it here on Earth to heal wounds and make our world better.Photo by Tyler Nix on Unsplash

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