It took so much out of me I was not able to get up in time to write yesterday. It happens. I wondered if aliens feel like this when they get home. Like, man, I just traveled 90 light years - I'm beat! Honey, pour me a Scotch.
We can dig into this subject more, another time. For today I want to take things in a slightly different direction and talk more about the daily commute. Is it too much of a stretch of the imagination that aliens have jobs they have to go to every day?
I suppose if you were one of the first species to evolve into intelligent beings, and it happened say a billion years ago, it is possible that by now you have reached the point in time where no one has to work anymore. Everything is built by robots with AI and all you have to do is think about a glass of orange juice and it ends up in your mouth. That is a subject for another article. For now, we will assume that people on other planets have jobs.
I suppose if you were one of the first species to evolve into intelligent beings, and it happened say a billion years ago, it is possible that by now you have reached the point in time where no one has to work anymore. Everything is built by robots with AI and all you have to do is think about a glass of orange juice and it ends up in your mouth. That is a subject for another article. For now, we will assume that people on other planets have jobs.
How do Aliens get to Work?
Let us first think about how we get to work. Most people get in their car or hop on public transportation and go to a place of employment. Usually that is going to be an office building or an industrial building, maybe a mall or other retail location. This requires roads and public transportation infrastructure.
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| Art by Dexter Morrill |
Assuming the wheel was done away with and cars can fly, would there be any need for roads, anymore? Why do we have roads in the first place? I often think about Colonial America. When European settlers first arrived, there were only foot paths through the woods from one Indian village to another. When it became necessary to drive horse-drawn wagons down these trails, people widened them. This is how US 1, the Boston Post Road, was built. Other times, a general wanted to move an army from one place to another and needed a fast and easy way to do it. This was one of George Washington's biggest accomplishments, prior to the American Revolution. He led the effort to cut a road through the woods of Pennsylvania, so the British could attack the French at Pittsburgh. Ultimately, this is also what led to the Interstate Highway System when Dwight Eisenhower realized it was not possible to quickly move US troops from one side of the country to another, in the event of an attack on US soil or to evacuate cities in the event of a nuclear attack.
The Alien Commute
Today, roads are everywhere. Our cities are built so that people and goods can be transported through them on roads. This is all because we are dependent on moving people and things on wheels. If we no longer used the wheel, would we still need roads?
I can imagine a place in the Universe where roads once existed and then became obsolete. Everyone and everything there is now transported through the air or underground. Since the roads were no longer needed, they soon fell into disrepair and became an urban blight. Anyone who lived or worked in New York City prior to the past decade probably remembers what the Highline looked like before its current state. It was a rusted out, derelict icon of the past, most famously memorialized by Saul Chase's inspiring 1974 painting Glass Building with Structure. It was an elevated train line which had been abandoned and became an eyesore.
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| Highline NYC by Saul Chase |
Perhaps aliens did this with all of their former roads. That would make alien cities green and beautiful with plenty of fresh oxygen. If humans can do this, only 6000 years into Civilization, surely aliens could do this within a billion years. Even if one cannot imagine a civilization that old, surely it is possible that intelligent life evolved somewhere by the time the dinosaurs inhabited Earth. That is still many millions of years ago. It is safe to say that somewhere in the Universe, there are green cities.
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| Green City |
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If you have seen an alien spaceship or any type of unidentified flying object (UFO) contact me using the Contact form on this page. You may remain anonymous if you want. I will not ridicule you or try to tell you why you are wrong. I get it, I saw one too.
Thank you for reading and keep an eye on the sky.
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