sunshine and rainy days: ET, phone home

So, I was going to make a post about aliens and my recent obsession with the possibility, but then I reevaluated the idea and realized it is as silly as I have always thought.

After further consideration, however, I have decided to go with it. This is a space for me to share my random thoughts, so that is what I will do. So, this may sound silly. Actually, if it doesn't, you are worse off than I am.

Anyway, a few nights ago I had a dream. In this dream, I was some sort of conspiracy theorist who saw signs of extraterrestrial life and believed the government was hiding this information from the public for "protection," as certain people believed this knowledge would be destructive. They believed that this information, the possibility that we, as a global community were coexisiting with another form of life somewhere else would be too much to handle.

I woke up that morning utterly confused. Why was I dreaming about aliens? Since when have I been into these conspiracies?

To my shock when I got my morning newspaper, the cover story described how scientists across the world were joining together in a hunt for extraterrestrial life. The story went on to describe this two day collaboration, which did not mention any alien sitings (http://www.expressnightout.com/, November 8, 2010 cover story.)

Then, yesterday on Castle (classy source, I know), the whole episode was about aliens. Some of the absurd comments Castle made only furthered my thinking and offered support to the theories I developed in my dream. Needless to say, it turns out (surprise, surprise) aliens were not involved in this murder and everything could be explained logically.

While I am still unsure of what I think about this whole alien idea, I do know one thing. This string of thoughts has led me to wonder about the world we live in. There is no doubt in my mind that far from every detail of every story is revealed to the public (as no one knows what happened to JFK). In fact, sometimes the story may not even make it to the press. So how can we carry-on despite this blatant withholding of information?

I understand that a certain level of non-transparency may be justifiable in the interests of National Security, but as we know, "absolute power corrupts absolutely." There are certain departments within the government that are seemingly beyond reproach and have no need to divulge what they know. Unfortunately, it is likely that the secrets and lies will continue, and they will only become more sophisticated as time goes on.

At the same time, however, we often turn a blind eye to anything that doesn't fit nicely into our predispositions. So how much use would it be to know that aliens really do exist when it is significantly easier to live with the belief that aliens disappeared when ET returned home?

. . . . .

For something less "heady," check out this picture. And I promise that this is one of the few conspiracy theories I will babble on to you about.