Last week, NASA announced that its scientists had discovered evidence that water lies beneath the surface of the planet Mars. Peter Berger reflects on the link between religion and our fascination with the possibility of life on other planets:
Contemplating the night sky full of stars probably led individuals to a sense of both awe and vulnerability even in ancient times—say, some Israelite resting alone for a quiet moment in the clear desert air on the endless journey [from Egypt] to the Holy Land. I don’t think it is an oversimplification to say that all religion is an attempt to answer the question of whether we insignificant beings are alone in the universe. Alleged answers then come, in innumerable versions, asserting that no, we are not alone, and that there is an order of meaning that encompasses the distant stars and our own rather pitiful lives.
But modern science has vastly (indeed “astronomically”) expanded our perception of the star-filled sky—millions and millions of galaxies expanding or contracting, with a strange counter-world of “dark matter,” operating by laws that are increasingly unimaginable and incomprehensible. And now come along some astronomers—mind you, sober scientists, not initiates of some mystical doctrine—who claim that there is actual empirical evidence of not just the immense universe of the galaxies that our telescopes explore, but of a possibly infinite number of parallel universes operating by laws that we cannot imagine in our wildest dreams.
Read more on American Interest: http://www.the-american-interest.com/2015/10/07/looking-for-jesus-on-planet-gliese-832c/