Yesterday, I was really interested in the Mars Rover that just landed on (where else?) Mars on Sunday evening. I was telling my wife that I hope it runs across a sign on the planet that said, "GO HOME EARTHLINGS!! LEAVE US ALONE!!! Of course, if it did, I'm certain that the Martian people would have written it in English so that we Americans could read it.
A thought just came into my head! Shocking, right? Scared me too. But read me out here. If life on other planets is more intelligent than we, why wouldn't they leave any message for us in English? It is not so hard to imagine, and this will go against the grain in Hollywood, that Martian people are nice and smart. Nice Martians don't sell books and movies here though, but what if they really are nice? They would have to be pretty smart to have figured out a way to live there and go unseen by the prying eyes of humans from Earth.
So, Yeah, I can see the Rover coming across a nice sign that is written in English requesting us to leave them alone. Sometimes I would like to have such a sign on my front door. I like my privacy and I can imagine that Martians do as well.
Now, think on this. IF the rover were to find such a sign, would we humans be able to accept it for what it says or would we have to decipher some cryptic meaning to it and have everyone try to determine what it really says? Of course, OUR scientists would need it to be the meaning of life, but not written in English at all. Instead they would invent some universal language that we don't yet understand.
Some egghead would come out of the woodwork and convince us all that he and he alone has figured it out. We would be led to believe that even though it resembles and looks like it was written in our English, it's really not. Instead the language would be dubbed to be Anhydrous Vermillion Clef, or something like it. That's great, they would all say and then begin patting each others back and handing out Nobel prizes.
These people are so brilliant! Why, they've even discovered the entire alphabet (from just this one sign) and even know how to speak it fluently. We believe them, do we not? After all, they are more brilliant than the rest of us combined.
So, all TV programming is interrupted so that the mightiest brain on Earth can enlighten us as to what the sign truly says. Sir Oliver Hammelbleeb, A.B.,C.D.,E.F.,G.H., AD NAUSEUM, approaches the podium. Using his graphs and charts, along with references that compare the writing to man's early and primitive way to communicate, He informs us that the sign really says "Bee's water underneath the great provocature of universal truth." We are to take that to mean that we are welcome to anything on the planet, even the Martian women. So, the rover mission is now changed to gathering up the Martian women and bringing them to Earth.
Sounds a little out there, doesn't it? Makes you wonder though, what would happen if we actually did find a people living on Mars, or under the surface, that really did offer up a way to communicate with us.
Disclaimer: Lest anyone reads this and thinks it is something more than the weird ramblings that come from my imagination, let me assure you poor, sad little people that is is not real. I made all this up.
