I like to believe that no. But I also like to believe that if there is some other form of intelligent life out in the Universe that if they were a more "evolved" life form, they wouldn't have any desire to harm humans or planet earth. Seems pretty reasonable to me. I really like the comparison Neil deGrasse Tyson uses in the interview video I have posted in "Science" on my media page. He talks about how humans have a genome that's 99% identical to that of apes, and yet the smartest apes can only perform basic sign language. He then goes on to talk about how Stephen Hawking may seem like that Ape who does sign language to another life form that is only .1% more "evolved". And to be honest I expect that there is such a life form somewhere out in the known Universe, which contains 100-200 billion observable galaxies, each with ~300 billion stars. So in the observable Universe that's about 40000000000000000000000 potential suns. The Drake equation postulates that there could be approximately 156 000 000 (according to Wikipedia) "communicable" life forms in our Galaxy alone. Kinda makes a person wonder.. Do we really believe that humans are that amazing that we ARE the only life form able to wonder if there are other life forms out there? Some scientists believe that the conditions that resulted in life being possible on earth are so exceptionally rare that we likely are the only other life forms. But I believe differently. Sure, it seems at this time that there isn't likely another planet which could support life exactly like ours, but are we so anthropocentric so as to believe that another life form would be exactly the same as us? Seems a little bit ridiculous if you ask me. I like the idea of nice aliens coming to visit us. Maybe even helping to solve the problems we can't seem to solve ourselves. But that doesn't mean I'm going to wait around for it to happen.
Or maybe the aliens are already here. According to Star Trek the humans exploring the galaxy had to send down officers "in disguise" to planets who weren't ready to accept that there was intelligent life somewhere else in their Universe. Well I'm not sure that's true, but I can't say that for sure it's not. After all the creators of Star Trek are right about some things. 3D printers are able to print food - food replicators, virtual reality headsets are becoming the holodeck, NASA has now even suggested that "warp drive" - to travel faster than the speed of light by bending time - may be possible! Pretty trippy. Could the creators of Star Trek have been manifesting our current reality? Well in a way they were since they were the ones who put the thought out there. Seems like it was only a matter of time until someone took the idea and made it possible. Hand held computer anyone?
Or maybe we're the ones "inside". Another idea I've been contemplating is that maybe we really are in a simulation, as the simulation hypothesis predicts. Maybe we're avatars controlled by and outside entity, and only believe we're in control of our lives while some teenage alien is controlling us in his video game. Or maybe we're some type of sophisticated AI that is only now realizing what we are.. I'm pretty sure that's one of the fears people have about technological advances surrounding AI. We wouldn't want them to become self-aware. Something to think about for sure.
But maybe I just think too much. Oh and I liked ReBoot as a kid. Characters who live in a computer and who are scared of "the Game".
