Just what kind of problem?

I found this story over at the Beeb, and it got me thinking about the universe and exoplanets again. Always a dangerous thing that… This is the first discovery of a planet that could hold life, as we know it. It seems that only a measly 20 light-years away we could actually have neighbours! So? You might ask, we've had UFOs for decades. Well, to be honest, those are still unproven theories, even though I personally believe that there is more to those stories than what is generally disclosed. Anyway, if this observation turns out to be correct, and we were to find out that this planet holds some form of humanoid creatures, ie. in this case reasoning, thinking beings. What does this mean to us? Well, it will mean great implications not only to the natural sciences, it will also mean a great deal of problems to theology, but perhaps mostly the monotheistic ones.

If we were to find out that this is not the "only" creation, and that they have religions of their own etc, etc. This would not spell the end of Christianity in any way, but I really would like to see the Christian Right wriggle out of it. Believers everywere who believe rather than read fact in what ever book would have no religious problems at all as far as I can see, but if you take the Bible, the Qur'an etc., litteraly, then you are certainly in for a bumpy ride… Wiccans, Druids, Buddists, Hindus, Taoists, Pagans, Asatru etc., would not have religious problems per se with it, although of course they might have problems with ot for other reasons. Me, I find life fascinating, and the Multiverse is really an awsome (in the original sense, for those of you into Eddie Izzard, not like a hotdog…) place.




I couldn't find a good quote on planets, so enjoy thisone on L-space, in connection to the numerous wiki links in this posting…

The study of invisible writings was a new discipline made available by the discovery of the bi-directional nature of Library-space. The thaumic mathematics are complex, but boil down to the fact that all books, everywhere, affect all other books. This is obvious: books inspire other books written in the future, and cite books written in the past. But the General Theory* of L-space suggests that, in that case, the contents of books as yet unwritten can be deduced from books now in existence.

From The Science of the Discworld 2: The Globe, p. 43

Blessings on your path, it is yours alone,

/|\ Taran MacDuir

* There is a Special Theory as well, but no one bothers with it much because it's self-evidently a load of marsh-gas. [This footnote is a footnote in the original quotation. So this is a metafootnote] - Effectivley making this a metametafootnote…