Peter Cawdron - Xenophobia

Bower listened intently. “Oh, there’s no doubt whales are intelligent, but the whale’s response could just as well have been one of astonished bewilderment, curiosity or disbelief as much as gratitude.

“You see, the point is, these are our emotions, not theirs. If those divers had freed a hungry Great White Shark it would have probably attacked them, but if it hadn’t been hungry, it too could be described as grateful. The reality is, those divers freed a mostly docile aquatic mammal, one that doesn’t have Homo sapiens on the menu.”

“Isn’t it a matter of degrees?” Elvis asked. “I mean, a cricket’s smarter than a rock. A lizard is smarter than a cricket. A dog is smarter than a lizard, and on a good day, I’m smarter than my dog.”

Jameson laughed. “You wish.”

“Haw haw,” Elvis cried, laughing in his southern accent.

“In some regards, it is a matter of degrees,” Bower replied. “As there’s no doubt a doe cares for a newborn fawn, but too often we read too much into these behaviors. Chimpanzees share 98% of our DNA, but that doesn’t make them 98% human. We’re not the benchmark other species are trying to attain in terms of their intelligence and emotions. They’re quite happy being themselves.

“There’s little in the way of common ground between us and other animals. Think about dolphins. Cute, cuddly, friendly dolphins. Everyone loves dolphins, right? They’re the good guys of the ocean. And yet for all we think we know about them, we really don’t understand them at all. Dolphins will gang-rape females for days on end. Rival males will kill newborns to bring a female back in heat. As playful as they seem in a dolphin show, as intelligent as they appear, they’re not people, and we shouldn’t treat them as such. Our morals, our values simply do not apply to them.”

“I can’t believe you’re picking on dolphins,” Elvis quipped. “Don’t they save swimmers by dragging them to shore?”

Jameson added, “Yeah, but you never hear about the people they drag out to sea.”

Elvis laughed.

Bower continued, saying, “Try as we may, we can’t imagine life as a bat, relying on sonar rather than sight. We can’t imagine sensing electrical fields like a shark, or being a spider that sees four primary colors rather than three. In the same way, animals cannot imagine being human. We can teach chimps to use sign language, we can teach parrots to hold a conversation, but they’re adopting human precepts, not inheriting them as a child would.

“Think about it. Does a dog care who’s President of the United States? Does a cat care how much you earn? Does a goldfish know if you’re married or single?

“We surround ourselves with artificial constructs, things we think are real, and these influence our sense of culture, they carry emotional weight, and yet they’re meaningless to other animals.”

“And you think these aliens are like animals?” Jameson asked.

“Not terrestrial animals. But if we can’t communicate openly with any other species on our planet without reading our own emotions into their responses, what chance do we have of talking to beings from another planet? And what chance do they have of talking to us without there being some kind of misunderstanding?”

“None,” Elvis replied grinning. “If any UFOs touch down south of the Mason-Dixon line, they’re gonna regret cashing in those frequent-flyer miles.”

“You’ve got to see this from their perspective,” Bower added. “Saying, ‘We come in peace,’ is probably all they could say without someone, somewhere taking things the wrong way. And, even then, can you imagine the conspiracy theory nuts? Oh, they’ll be swinging from the chandeliers.”

“Oh yeah,” Elvis said. “And I could name most of them. Ha ha.”

Bower was excited about the conversation. The two soldiers might have had only a passing interest, but Bower was electrified to think about alien contact in detail. She made the point, “We don’t just speak with words. Some scientists estimate that words make up only about half of any conversation. Most of what we say is conveyed by our posture, our body language, our tone of voice, our eyes. More than that, most of what we say is an extension of what has been said before. Saying, I love you to someone after screaming at them for an hour in an argument doesn’t really mean anything, right?”

“So you think these aliens are going to have a hard time understanding us?” Jameson asked.

“We have a hard time understanding each other,” Bower replied. “Our alien friends simply won’t understand the subtleties and nuances of any one culture, let alone all of them. It doesn’t matter how intelligent they are, it will take them time to figure out our quirks and idiosyncrasies. They know nothing of our culture and idioms.

“Someone from another world isn’t going to understand how heavily laced our speech is with references to our senses. Can you see what I mean? Can you hear what I’m saying? Has someone touched a raw nerve? Do you smell a rat? Find something distasteful? They may have none of these senses, so even our most simple sentences could be meaningless to them.

“Here on Earth, we have creatures with completely alien senses. Stingrays detect the sensitive electrical impulses of a heart beating beneath the sand. Bats build a picture of the world around them using sonar. Butterflies taste with their feet. Chameleons move their eyes independent of each other, giving them two views at once. Imagine how confusing any of these senses would be for us and you get an idea of how confusing our perspective could be be to visitors from another planet.”

“So,” Elvis said, “You feel these aliens will be alien in more ways than one?”

“Absolutely, they’re aliens, right?” Bower asked rhetorically. “They’re not movie-extras in cheap plastic suits.

“And as for feelings. Think about what feelings are. They’re a figurative extension of what we feel physically through our sense of touch. What about concepts like art, music or religion? There’s so much ground work that will have to be covered before we can even start to talk to ET about these subjects.

“No, I think our alien visitors have said just enough: We come in peace. It’s not too little, it’s not too much. It’s just enough to let us know they’re in the neighborhood.”

“So how do we talk to them?” Jameson asked.

“Well, it’s just a guess on my part, but I’d say through science. Regardless of which culture you’re from, regardless of which planet you call home, two plus two equals four, hydrogen has only one proton, stuff like that. Science is universal, so it’s the logical place to start. Oh, these are exciting days.”

“Yeah,” Elvis replied, sarcasm dripping from his words as he stared out across the dry savannah. “Real exciting.”

An uneasy silence fell upon the cabin of the truck. Physically, the cabin still groaned and shook as the truck hit potholes and gravel flicked up to strike the underside of the vehicle, the old diesel engine rattled with a steady rhythm and the springs in the seats wheezed, but nothing more was said.

Although the skies were clear, Bower felt as though a dark cloud had descended upon them. Was she right? Or was pride obscuring her point of view? She’d been so passionate, so confident, but since when were those tools of scientific investigation? In 1616, the pope was convinced Galileo was wrong, calling his ideas foolish and absurd. Was Bower being just as bullheaded? Was her conviction blinding her? Was she afraid of being wrong?

Bower looked at Jameson. He was examining the map. He radioed something through to the Hummer, but she was barely aware of the words leaving his lips.

The soldiers had deferred to her judgement, and why wouldn’t they? They were men of war, not science, but as for her, she was a medical doctor, not a scientist. She understood the principles, but she had no reason to be so confident in her position. She sighed, knowing passion had got the better of her, hoping she was right but knowing hers was an opinion, nothing more.