The threat of invasion by intelligent, high-tech aliens is not one to lose sleep over. Why would aliens even want our Earth? One of the few things we have learned about planets is that they are complex individuals no two will be exactly alike. Aliens will surely be better adapted to their own planets, and it is highly unlikely that they will be able to breathe our air or infect us, let alone eat us at least not without some expensive and messy food processing. As entertaining as "War of the Worlds" was for those who did not need treatment for shock or hysteria afterwards, Welles' scenario is not a likely one. But there is another threat that deserves immediate attention: the remote but scary possibility of accidental microbial contamination from space. In H.G. Wells' original "War of the Worlds" (1897), the superior Martian invaders were defeated in the end by "the humblest thing that God in His wisdom put upon this Earth" by microbes, who caused the defenseless Martians to catch colds and die. You may not know it, but NASA is guarding you against this danger through the "Office of Planetary Protection," which is charged with preventing the inadvertent spreading of life between worlds during space exploration. Our efforts to prevent "back contamination" the accidental return to Earth of dangerous alien microbes from other worlds are the subject of a new NASA report that details how we might test for living organisms in returned samples. NASA intends to return a sample from Mars within the next decade or two.
View: Full Article | Source: Astrobiology Magazine
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