From: Michael Lorrey (retroman@together.net)
Date: Tue Oct 14 1997 - 20:36:59 MDT
The Low Golden Willow wrote:
>
> } CALYK writes:
>
> } >Crop circles coming from an alien intelligence are obviously trying to tell
> } >us something,
>
> "We hate wheat."
> "Build more landing pads!"
> "THIS PLANET HAS NO PROPER BATHROOMS."
>
> Hmm. Has it occurred to anyone that the aliens don't care about us at
> all? They're just using the wheat as a bulletin board to each other.
> Or as a graffiti area.
How rude. Apparently they have no concept of property rights... ;)
>
> } >I posted on this list how someone believes they are parts to
> } >some sort of engine.
>
> If we wave the wheat back and forth very quickly, like cilia, maybe the
> Earth can crawl through space!
Hmmmmmm. Earth as bacteria. Unfortunately, they haven't been observed
having any traction against the Zero Point Field.....
>
> Or a senile Monolith is trying to teach us about the wheel.
Must be a government Monolith. It saw us thousands of light years away
as primitives, took a couple thousand years to have studies done, review
all of the differing scientific opinions, tried to push it through the
Galactic Congress, but it got stuck in committee for another thousand
years, as the Chairman of the Committee didn't like the Monolith
nominated to go; he thought it supported politically incorrect
technologies. So the other member planetary bodies of the committee had
to gather signatures to override the Chairman's decision, and finally
had hearings and then turned down the nominated Monolith. The President
then nominated a completely incompetent and unqualified paperpusher who
happened to have some good connections, and it got approved. So the
incompetent Monolith undertook its eons long mission to travel here at
sublight speeds, and once it got here found we had already invented the
wheel, but since it made the effort, and the Galactic government had
budgeted $20 Googolbucks for the project it was gonna reteach it to us
anyways, so it started making funny circles in fields of monoculture
cereals, since if the money wasn't spent this megayear, then they
wouldn't get the same level of appropriation in the next fiscal
megayear, which would mean a loss of power and prestige for the
Secretary of the Galactic Department of State. Seeing the outcome, there
were classified discussions in the Intelligence Committee on whether
they should manipulate us into blowing ourselves to smithereens in a
nuclear holocaust, just to push us back to the stone age, so the
Monolith could then really teach us about the wheel. Makes the USSR look
like a model of efficiency...
>
> } Danny, whether or not aliens built crop circles is about as interesting
> } to me as whether the Mayans or the Incas built some particular burial
> } mound, unless the fact dictates a particular course of action.
>
> This is harsh. That aliens caused crop circles would indeed be
> interesting. It would teach us not only that there were other people,
> but that they were deranged people. This is at least as interesting as
> Martian bacteria, the past existence of which also fails to dictate any
> particular course of action.
>
> Although I suppose that our cattle would be the ones really de-ranged by
> the loss of their feed.
Well, the aliens figure that since they already mutilated the cattle,
then that wheat wasn't really needed....
>
> Speaking of aliens, Babylon-5 is back!
> It's occurred to me that Banks and Vinge are like Star Trek and
> Babylon-5, respectively, but with much more SF imagination. Or that
> Banks is a Trek version of Vinge. Or what Trek should have been.
>
> Of course, I had to stay up late to watch it.
Yeah, what's with that. I've got to deal with waking up all groggy for
work on Monday if I want to catch BV at midnight on Sunday night. I
swear its a government/media conspiracy to prevent quality science
fiction from reaching the masses, for fear that the masses might
actually develop an imagination.... oh my. (DON"T ask me about my VCR)
-- TANSTAAFL!!! Michael Lorrey ------------------------------------------------------------ mailto:retroman@together.net Inventor of the Lorrey Drive MikeySoft: Graphic Design/Animation/Publishing/Engineering ------------------------------------------------------------ How many fnords did you see before breakfast today?
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