We Think Too Highly Of Our Visitors

Posted on December 15, 2023 by Douglas

The New Message from God speaks of the shock of the future and how to mitigate it. One thing I am doing is reading science-fiction novels. One book I have particularly enjoyed is the book “The Three-Body Problem,” written in 2014 by Liu Cixin, and translated into English by Ken Liu. Here is the premise.

Set against the backdrop of China’s Cultural Revolution, a secret military project sends signals into space to establish contact with aliens. An alien civilization on the brink of destruction captures the signal and plans to invade Earth. Meanwhile, on Earth, different camps start forming, planning to either welcome the superior beings and help them take over a world seen as corrupt, or to fight against the invasion. The result is a science fiction masterpiece of enormous scope and vision.

We think too highly of our visitors

One of the main characters of the book is Ye Wenjie, an astrophysicist. During the Cultural Revolution, she witnessed her father, a physics professor, beaten to death by Red Guards. Later, through an unusual turn of events, she got to read the book “Silent Spring” by Rachel Carson. This book was not readily available in China at that time. After reading Silent Spring, Ye Wenjie thought: “If this was so, then how many other acts of humankind that had seemed normal or even righteous were, in reality, evil?” As a result of these two events, Ye Wenjie lost her faith in humanity.

I have already written about the possible disastrous consequences of seeking to establish contact with aliens. The New Message from God teaches there is an extraterrestrial intervention currently underway. Part of this is an attempt to cause humanity to lose faith in human leadership and human institutions.

Perhaps we should rethink our attitude

We think too highly of our visitors. Liu Cixin wrote a postscript to The Three-Body Problem. In this postscript he shares something he considers to be an anomaly:

“There’s a strange contradiction revealed by the naïveté and kindness demonstrated by humanity when faced with the universe. On Earth, humankind can step onto another continent, and without a thought, destroy the kindred civilizations found there through warfare and disease. But when they gaze up at the stars, they turn sentimental and believe that if extraterrestrial intelligences exist, they must be civilizations bound by universal, noble moral constraints, as if cherishing and loving different forms of life are parts of a self-evident universal code of conduct.

I think it should be precisely the opposite. Let’s turn the kindness we show toward the stars to members of the human race on Earth and build up the trust and understanding between the different peoples and civilizations that make up humanity. But for the universe outside the solar system, we should be ever vigilant, and be ready to attribute the worst of intentions to any Others that might exist in space. For a fragile civilization like ours, this is without a doubt the most responsible path.”

Will we take the most responsible path?

We think too highly of our visitors. We confuse advanced technology with advanced spirituality. The Europeans had better technology than the Native Americans and the Aztecs. It didn’t make them better people. Are extraterrestrials spiritually advanced? It ain’t necessarily so. The New Message from God teaches what is currently a minority viewpoint on the subject of extraterrestrials.

1) Intelligent extraterrestrial life exists
2) Extraterrestrials are intervening in human affairs today
3) This extraterrestrial intervention is a threat to human freedom

Maybe there are other things we should work on. How about developing our vigilance? How about developing the requirements for freedom (unity, self-sufficiency and discretion)? I’m with Liu Cixin. Let’s turn the kindness we show toward the stars to members of the human race on earth. We think too highly of our visitors.

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My People Are Reckless Blabbermouths

Posted on November 22, 2017 by Douglas

The prophet Isaiah experienced a powerful vision of God in chapter 6 of the book of Isaiah. His response to this vision?

“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.” (Isaiah 6:5, New International Version)

My people are reckless blabbermouths

I consider Isaiah to be referring to the kingdom of Judah when he spoke of “a people of unclean lips.” I am conducting an experiment. I am keeping track of how it feels when I refer to humanity as “my people.” My people might be a people of unclean lips. My people are indisputably a people of overactive lips.

My people are reckless blabbermouths. We speak when we should be silent. We are silent when we should speak. Our speech is not informed by Knowledge, the deeper spiritual intelligence that God has placed within each person. This is how my people are a people of unclean lips. But this is not particularly newsworthy. Neither is it my primary complaint.

My people are reckless blabbermouths. My primary complaint is that my people broadcast a great deal of information about themselves into space. Radio, television, internet, it all goes out into space when it is sent to a satellite. My people send probes into interstellar space announcing ourselves. We have gone so far as beam messages into space in an attempt to contact extraterrestrial life. We act as if there will be no negative consequence to this. We act as if there could not possibly be any negative consequences to this.

My people are reckless blabbermouths. The New Message from God considers all of the above behavior to be both foolish and dangerous. Consider this paragraph from the book Life in the Universe:

“The wise remain hidden. Your world is known to a few, but not to many. You do not want to broadcast into the universe who you are and what you have. In the future, your radio technology will have to be completely changed. You cannot be broadcasting out into space. That only invites inquiry, interest and suspicion. Right now you think that there is no one else out there, that the universe is vast and empty and that there might be some distant planet somewhere that could receive your transmissions. If you understood the situation, you would see how dangerous and unwarranted this is.”

My people are reckless blabbermouths. My only consolation is that some of my people are starting to recognize the folly and danger of this. As evidence, I offer this quote from a review of the science-fiction novel “The Dark Forest” (黑暗森林) by Liu Cixin:

“At the end of the second volume [The Dark Forest is the second volume of a three-volume set], one of the main characters lays out the trilogy’s animating philosophy. No civilization should ever announce its presence to the cosmos, he says. Any other civilization that learns of its existence will perceive it as a threat to expand—as all civilizations do, eliminating their competitors until they encounter one with superior technology and are themselves eliminated. This grim cosmic outlook is called “dark-forest theory,” because it conceives of every civilization in the universe as a hunter hiding in a moonless woodland, listening for the first rustlings of a rival.”

My people are reckless blabbermouths. We will have to fix that to function successfully in a greater community of intelligent life.