Okay, aliens might exist. So what?

I’m not sure alien disclosure would change the world as much as we think. Maybe that should be the real concern.

I find it interesting how ideas that once seemed crazy are not only becoming mainstream, but are now often assumed to be true.

Take UFOs and aliens. For decades, UFOs lived somewhere between conspiracy theory, pop culture, military secrecy, and late-night radio. There were stories of crashed spaceships and recovered humanoid bodies. There were naturalistic explanations: weather balloons, military testing, misidentified aircraft, and so on.

Now, with all the talk of government coverups, congressional hearings, declassified videos, and the release of many UFO files, it’s become fairly mainstream to believe that we’re not alone.

But, what if disclosure actually happened?

Information Overload

Over the last five years, I’ve been shocked at how many terrifying, world-changing events have happened. Covid-19. George Floyd. January 6. The Russia-Ukraine War. Climate crises. Unprecedented political unrest. The rise of AI. Various wars in the Middle East. Economic turbulence.

The list goes on and on.

Perhaps that’s why we’re so overstimulated and overwhelmed. So many huge things have happened in such a short span of time that we can’t possibly digest it all, and so we grow numb.

I wonder if aliens would, rather than being a life-altering “event of the century,” just get lost in all the noise.

Here’s a chain of events I can imagine:

Aliens are proven to exist.

The headlines talk about it for a while. People are horrified, confused, scared.

A few experts come out of the woodwork offering explanations and guidance.

Religion becomes cool again—at least, the trendy leaders who can answer the hard questions become cool. A few people have an identity crisis and deconstruct their beliefs. Some people live in denial, claiming that it’s all a hoax.

Then come the arguments, podcasts, blog posts, and social media threads. The people who build their entire brand around it, and the people who are already tired of hearing about it.

People talk about aliens for months, but gradually start to lose interest. Soon we’re talking again about politics, about celebrity deaths and scandals, about wars and movies and whatever the next earth-shaking event happens to be.

Aliens become embedded in the fabric of scientific conversation. Some groups would oppose teaching about aliens in schools. But to most people, it becomes common knowledge.

Then we’re on to the next thing.

Some people never let it go, but most people sort of just say, “Okay, aliens exist. So what?”

And they move on with their lives.

What would the existence of aliens mean?

Perhaps the larger question we should be asking is: if aliens were undeniably proven to exist, what would that mean for us?

Would it tell us anything we don’t already know about the miracle of life? Would it fundamentally change what it means to be human?

Some think the existence of aliens would be a threat for humanity. But if aliens exist now, and have existed for a long time, then whatever threat they pose has not yet interrupted most of our ordinary lives.

That might be comforting to some people. For others, it could feel even more disturbing. Some would start to believe that aliens are testing us for some unknown purpose, and that's the only reason life feels "normal" right now.

Others would say that the existence of aliens would challenge Christianity or other major religions. Maybe it would force some people to rethink creation, evolution, consciousness, and whether life is rare or inevitable.

Or maybe we would collectively shrug, and move on.

My theory

I think the biggest problem we would face is the decay of our own egos.

Right now, we live as if humanity is unique. We feel in charge of things. We vote our politicians into office. We believe we have economic levers to ward off serious financial collapses. We have medicine to help us live well. We have the ability to travel nearly anywhere we want to, almost instantaneously. We’ve even invented AI to help us accelerate human progress on a level never before imagined.

So, maybe the existence of aliens would challenge our perceptions of what it means to be human. Are we really so special, after all?

If we could learn about alien cultures, we might marvel at the similarities and differences. We might wonder about something greater than ourselves, some other intelligence beyond just humans and aliens. Or maybe we would continue to be skeptical, and keep believing that we are yet another random accident in a chain of cosmic accidents.

Maybe we would be changed forever. Maybe we would become more curious, more humble, more awake to the wonder of being alive.

Or maybe we would scroll past it.

Maybe most people’s worldview wouldn’t change much at all. And maybe that’s what we should really be worried about. Not, “Do aliens exist?”, but rather, “Are we curious enough?”

Are we still willing to be surprised and enthralled by something new?

Conclusion

We ask ourselves, "Are we alone in the universe?" But that's not the real question.

On some level, I believe we all know that there’s something more out there: God, aliens, another layer of reality, or something else. But it’s so much easier to live as though we didn’t have to grapple with these things. As though we could just go to work, spend time with family and friends, distract ourselves for a while, and keep moving.

It’s easier to live in our bubbles, and to stay away from anything that challenges us.

So the real question is, “What would we do if we found out we weren’t alone?”

Would it change us at all?