IS "WE ARE NOT ALONE" GOOD ENOUGH?

Just now on Fox News Sunday there was a long interview with a spokesman for NASA.  Mostly there were somewhat strained answers to questions about having completely safe (what a thought!) trips into space.  Seems congress had mandated that nothing whatever should come off the exterior of the space shuttle - clearly an impossible, unnecessarily nervous position to take.

But at the end of the interview, NASA's spokesman got to make the appeal that was really uppermost for him.  That appeal was that we should not abandon the effort to explore or colonize in space.  His voice was most emotional when he appealed that we should search for other life in the universe, in order to know "that we are not alone."

As a Christian, I never feel alone in the universe.  And I suspect that the other followers of God  - at least the one God worshipped by Abraham, followed by Jews, Christians and Moslems - likewise do not feel alone in the universe.  God is there.  God is everywhere.  God is here.  He is with us - or at the very minimum, with those who follow him.  We are never alone.  In short, I doubt most of such believing people have such a strong drive to look for other life in the universe to show that "we are not alone."

If that is the case, then a small percentage of the US population who do not believe in God would have all the rest of us fund very expensive space exploration to satisfy their existential anguish about feeling alone in the world.  On that basis, it seems pretty selfish to want the rest of us to pay so much to gratify such a longing in such a small part of the population.  However much they may manage to glamorize such a quest, it probably would not fly.

Are there other reasons to pay for expensive space exploration?  Without a doubt.  Most basic is that if we discontinue space programs, we lose the experts, the expertise and the capability.  If we learned someone had gotten ahead of us, the time needed for us to re-start and catch up could be fatal.  We don't dare stop, for our own security.

Are there practical, economic or scientific benefits to be gained from space travel, which we could not attain by other, earthbound, less costly ways?  We do not know.  Actually, that would seem to be a pretty good reason to continue in space, but not to the extent of going broke in the doing of it.

Our security is always the foremost issue, first and last, because - if we are no longer here, all other issues are moot!  And security is therefore always the most important consideration, at least for rational people.  For survival, no expense is too great.  If necessary, you spend all you have and all you can borrow, as happened in WWII.  None of our wealth will do us any good if we disappear.  So if spending on space is necessary for security, we have to spend it - not wildly, but as frugally as we can while still doing enough.

NASA's best point probably was when he said that we did not want to find out that any other country had gotten somewhere in space before us.  Obviously, that could threaten our security.  For that reason, we do have to persist in trying to be first in reaching the moon, mars, and in space-based defense and intelligence measures.  That is probably the best reason to spend on a very good space program.

But to find out whether there is other life in space?  What are the reasons?  One is human curiosity.  Another is merely hubris - scientists and others who simply want to confirm their theory of a creatorless universe, which was formed by purely random, meaningless events.  In such a universe, there would be other life simply because there could be.  Finding that there was would prove them right.  Should they raid the public treasury to satisfy such scientism?  Why should we want to pay for their huge, impractical, unnecessary and expensive obsessions?

There are practical reasons, however, to wonder about other life in the universe.  If there is, they may someday have an effect on us.  But probably not unless we are in contact, practically speaking.  The light-year distances are such that we are not likely to ever be in physical contact. 

Conceivably, if we spent enough and tried our best, we might someday have the technology for potential contact.  But if there is contact, would it benefit or harm us?  Anyone who rashly assumes benefits should also be willing to risk flying to Iran tomorrow and walking around carrying a large American flag!  Assuming good will from total strangers and aliens would be so stupid as to deserve termination.  Without being able to be certain of friendliness, we probably should not even be trying to make contact with "whomever" might be out there.  If we keep trying to make contact, we might succeed - and at the same time, risk also alerting "them" to our presence here. Would we really want them to know that?  Have we not seen enough wars yet to understand what a bad idea that could be?

In conclusion, it seems prudent and wise to continue in space, and to spend enough to ensure being first in space, everywhere we can and always.  But it would seem foolhardy and unacceptably high-risk to search for other life forms in space without being able to be sure they would always be benign toward us.  And as for using our taxes to satisfy the hubris of some scientists - well, let them look for private funding.  Maybe they could entice George Soros and other billionaires away from moveon.org.  They may yearn not to feel alone in the universe.  They may want to prove their non-creation theories.  We may actually sympathize with their disquiet.  But why should those of us untroubled by such longings be expected to finance theirs?