Friday 27 May 2005

"No Intelligent Life" by Antony Sammeroff


Since the dawning of humanity the question had been asked "Is there intelligent life in space," and since the dawning of the question "Is there intelligent life in space," the question had been asked, "If there is intelligent life in space, why haven't they contacted us?"
Despite the level of mysticism surrounding the latter question on earth, to the Interplantery Council the response was rather straight forward: "Why would anyone want to?" It was generally agreed that the Earth, too primitive to to bother with and too insignificant to zap, was best left ignored, and so it was for a number of millenia.
Then one day someone there thought it might be a terribly good idea to export humanity, and more hideously Americanisation, to the rest of the galaxy. For some reason this school of thought seemed to catch on. Speculation into the reason why anyone might think this idea was terribly good as opposed to just terrible was largely fruitless, but at one point was summerised by an overweight advertising clerk working on a project for an Earth corporation specialising in the sale of toilettries, "Oh yeah, space, thats a huge market."