Reaction to extra-terrestial life.

[CapnAwesome]

I guess it depends on the circumstances. I personally don't think the discovery of life on Mars or Europa would be that philosophically important. I sure if Christianity and Islam can survive the sun being the center of the solar system and the earth being round, they could survive the discovery of extra-terrestrial life. They have to do so much brain twisting to be religious in the modern world, what's a little more?

On the other hand if intelligent extra-terrestrial life contacted earth I would shit my pants. That would mean so much more and open up the whole universe to us. Seems unlikely though.

In my opinion the most likely scenario for contact by likely intelligent aliens would involve profound mystification and total incomprehension by us.

The scenario would be something along the lines of aliens 3 billion years more advanced then us doing whatever they do with universal gravitational constants, cosmological constants, and other what we conceive of as bedrock of the cosmos in much the same way that we might pour concrete to hold up a mailbox post. We would sudden find all our understanding of the fundamental universe turned upside down, and some would see the hand of god.

In the meantime the hand of the aliens would pass on, the effects of its actions upon us, or even our existence, a matter of supreme disinterest to them. Aliens 3 billion years more advanced than we won't routinely dumb down their data packets to enlighten us.

There will be no two way meaningful,communication.

Not between 3 billion years and us, but what about 100,000 years or 10,000 years. It's hard to say how far we are from any sort of travel to other planets or if such a thing is even possible. I personally think it is not possible and thus we will never be contacted by extra-terrestrials.