The Stars

Are We Alone

Your sacred space is where you can find yourself again and again.

-Joseph Campbell

I had previously planned to keep "The Stars" as a stand alone chapter, but later decided to add upon with other related topics. If you have an idea you want me to write upon do feel free to let me know. Hope you enjoy ..... CHEERS.

Is humanity the last stage of life? Will there be a future for the beings of earth after our planet gets uninhabitable? Are we alone in this unfathomably large universe? Do we have any odd's of survival even though the odd's are inherently against us? These are some of the few questions that anyone who has spare time gets thinking about. This is what i'll try to answer and satisfy most of the minds.

Aliens is a commonly known topic for us all. Frankly speaking, I've had far too many debates about green people and space than i can keep track of (Yeah, you know who you are). Hollywood keeps making movies about it and conspiracy theorists keep finding "their" evidence, but no significant evidence of such that I can accept has been brought to light. Still we cannot dismiss it away all together. Mainly because we just started to explore our solar system, and the vastness of the universe has its huge distance gap from one corner to the next against us.

Look at this beauty. All I think and all that I want to speak out is here in this one illustration. We got close to Pluto a few month ago, and the resulting image data from the "New Horizons Probe" just take my breath away. Absolutely stunning

Let's run the numbers shall we, starting with our solar system there are nine planets (I personally still consider Pluto to be one, the verdict on that keeps fluctuating which I don't care about, so thats that), we have moons in all different distributions among the planets and the countless asteroids in the belt. Out of all these we have humanly explored two rocks, i.e. the earth and the Moon. Now i'll be spammed by you guys saying "probes have been sent etc etc" not going to change my mind. The probes are just space holders with which research is pursued. Yes, the success of the probes is a big achievement but at the same time just one small stepping stone when we consider the bigger picture. Which begs the question are we even eligible to ask the big question of other living beings, when we are mere space toddlers learning to walk. After a stage of advancement in astro-physics and space travel, that allows us to explore farther than we ever have, will we even have the smallest chance of being space explorers. Right as now, we are just learning about our home, Our solar system. The milky way shall be explored and we might live as in the movies that show adventures beyond our wildest dreams, this will be the point when fantasy becomes reality. Then and only then can we do justice to the question are we alone and only then can we ponder on this deeper.

The innovations from Elon Musk's brain child SpaceX and virgin galactic from Virgin Group and many more, are taking steps to commercialise and simultaneously removing the huge costs of space travel. With just one fool proof example from any of these companies, we will se a huge spike in people willing to invest in funding and experiencing space travel for the masses. More funding equates to larger research grands which equate to improving the new budding field. Time and time again where humans have pushed the limits and kept new sights in mind to advance in the ages.

Quoting from Star Trek The Original Series " Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilisations, to boldly go where no man has gone before. " Reading this in my mind or aloud just sparks some more fantasising. The common misconception that space is empty thus its easy to travel, quite on the contrary side its rather strenuous, there are many systems required to sustain a course and even if one fails the whole craft goes down. We have lost many a brave cosmonauts due to accidents or unforeseen circumstances, God rest their souls.

Soon space will be the vacation of the rich and will have higher safety precautions. At that stage discovering a new alien inhabited system will not be something of science fiction. Will we be alive to witness it, i cannot say but our future generation will have the privilege of dealing with other species and races among them. Another possibility is that it may never happen at all, which i tend not to believe so i can die hoping. Something that we hope is not true is that we alone in the universe, that isn't a good feeling to have in our gut or our hearts. They might not be green, they might not look like us but they are there in a galaxy far far away or hiding close by. Another far fetched probability is that they are observing us right now and deciding wether to help us or leave us dry.

YO, i'm back with another installation to this series. Hope you liked it, show it off by leaving a comment below and smashing that vote. I'll continue with the part text part image format as i haven't heard from any of you not liking it. Cool ..... see you all real soon. The next chapter will be here sooner than ever, the reason behind this will be out soon too. If you want to be notified about future updates think of following me. As always criticism is openly accepted so don't feel shy now.