LOCUTUS: Faces of Apolyton #12, 19/Jun/2004

PART 2 | PART 1

Solver: What are your future plans? Do you want maybe to go into self-employment? Also, are you planning on creating a family now?

Locutus: A family? By Sid, no! Im waaayyy too young for that :lol: Maybe in a distant future, but for now I'm happy on my own. If I meet the right person I certainly wouldn't resist getting into a relationship, but starting a family is as still a looong way off far as I'm concerned. I'd have to finish my studies, get a decent job and start earning some money for one thing.

As far as career goes, I'm currently at a crossroads. I know more or less where my studies are going, but now I have to make up my mind about where I'll go after I graduate -- something which I dont have the slightest clue about yet. I could just find a job that matches my IT expertise (the most logical course of action but with the current economic situation that could prove tricky), or I could continue my studies and do research for my university (and eventually earn a doctors degree), or I could do a follow-up course in education and become a math and/or IT teacher for the Dutch equivalent of the American highschool (a job thats very unpopular in the Netherlands but because of that also very much in demand; and I already did a sort of a trial internship for this which I really enjoyed doing). Or I could do something completely different entirely. I really have no idea what I want yet, so you'll probably have to ask me again in a year or so.

Solver: It seems that you're quite a sci-fi fan, and a nerd, too, as you admit on your own. And I can't really resist asking whether you believe in aliens? I mean, do you think there are some other guys 'out there', or maybe you believe in UFOs as well?

Locutus: I don't 'believe' in anything really. I rely on science to provide me with the best answers available and accept that there is an awful lot that we simply don't know (yet). At present we simply don't know if there is life outside our own planet, so we can only wait to see if we will one day encounter it (or not). It's one of the most fascinating questions in the world of course, so it can be fun to speculate about, though we shouldn't forget that we really can't possibly know at this point. If I do speculate, it seems rather unlikely that in the infinite space and diversity of the universe, with countless stars and planets, this planet would be the only one on which life has formed. Even if there's a one in a billion chance of life forming on a planet and assuming an average of 1 planet per star, that would still mean there should be at least a hundred planets in our own galaxy where some form of life exists (or once existed or will in the future exist) -- not to mention the billions of other galaxies out there. Of course, what this life looks like is impossible to say, it may or may not be anything like life as we know it.

If you're asking me if there are space-faring civilizations out there and if Vulcan science ships are lurking in the atmosphere waiting for Zephram Cochrane to make his first warp flight, then I say you're pushing it. Even if there are others out there that match our definition of intelligent life and even if they're capable of interstellar space flight, as far as we know (for whatever that's worth) faster than light travel is still impossible and without it, it's bloody unlikely that anyone travel hundreds of lightyears or more (at a presumably huge cost) and then not make theirselves known. But of course, that's pure speculation, there's really no way to tell for sure, either way.

An UFO is just that: an Unidentified Flying Object. Scientific research and common sense have proven 99% of them to be regular aircraft, satellites, weather balloons, climatic or atmospheric phenomena, optical illusions, etc. As far as the other 1% goes, we don't know what they are, we just don't have enough evidence to provide any kind of sensible explanation for them. Most, if not all, of those too will have perfectly earthly explanations as well, but we can't really say for sure based on a few eye-witness reports or a few shots of shoddy, dark unfocused camera footage. We cannot entirely rule out the possibility that they're little green men in flying saucers, but we can't entirely rule out an old bearded man with a sled propelled by reindeer, or a young boy on a broomstick with a scar on his forehead either.

Solver: I see you talk about chances of intelligent life to form on a planet.... so how did you believe did intelligent life form here, on Earth? Are you an evolutionist?

Locutus: Uhhm, well, yes, that's the commonly accepted theory supported by a wide body of evidence, isn't it? I mean, what's the alternative? God created the earth 6,000 years ago, dinosaurs are just some of his failed experiments, and the centuries-old astronomic phenomena we can view with our telescopes are all frauds created by evil scientists? Puhlease! As is by definition a necessity in science, I'm always open to alternative explanations, but creationists' literature I only read for their entertainment value…