An Elizabethtown College student made international news last night upon discovering an extraterrestrial creature was hiding inside one of the rocks in the Masters Mineral Gallery. News outlets from all over the world rushed to Etown’s campus to get a glimpse of the alien, but the federal government had taken over the Masters Center and were not allowing anyone in the building. With the building under siege, the alien being examined and the student quarantined, I set out to understand the implications of this discovery.
While visitors were not allowed in, Etown’s professors were able to examine the alien and conduct experiments on it.
“We are very excited!” professor of biology Dr. Diane Bridge exclaimed when I asked what she thought of this discovery. “The first steps for researchers will be to evaluate important traits, such as fluffiness.”
However, Bridge noted that this was not completely unprecedented: “It has happened a few times. You may have heard of the Labradoodle. And also chicken tenders. We can only hope that our Etown life form has as much to contribute to our quality of life as these remarkable extraterrestrial species have.”
As much as scientific questions are important to address when navigating a world of aliens, there were political aspects that needed clarification. To answer that, I turned to political science major Brianna Nigrone.
“I think the consequences are going to be catastrophic,” she said bluntly. “I cannot envision a scenario where such a discovery would not cause political upheaval. I mean, who is going to teach the alien how to do taxes with the deadline being next month? Just tragic.”
I was intrigued by this solemn response, in complete contrast to the science community, who were now duplicating the alien in Etown’s labs to send it to labs all over the world. “It’s just that because the alien is autonomous, the United States cannot claim to own it. Therefore, countries will soon start to demand the alien to be shared, with no thought to the exhausting jet lag that would accompany that.”
With such large consequences, I had to ask Bridge if the discovery had to be made public or if it should stay hidden.
“There are certainly a few things the public doesn’t know about Labradoodles and chicken tenders!” she answered, “The National Security Agency, NASA and Walmart have already shared preliminary guidelines about what information can be released to the public.”
I wondered both about if it was safe for me to share such information and if Labradoodles had to pay taxes. That would surely shed light on a few questions the world was eagerly waiting to answer. But, I had to get back to more serious matters as Nigrone brought up an issue that I had not thought about.
“What if the scientists at Etown conclude that the alien would make a great pet?” she asked thoughtfully, “The world would surely go crazy. The cats v. dogs battle was intense enough. And now we might be adding in a third species?’
I found myself nodding intensely as I read her answers. I was already ambivalent about cats and dogs. If a third species was added, I would go insane, and I am sure a lot of people felt the same way.
Before suggesting putting the alien on a ship and flying it into space to avoid disaster, I had to find out if that was ethical. When I asked Bridge about their feelings, the answer was surprising.
“It’s already clear that these extraterrestrial life forms have strong feelings about carrot cake. We are currently in discussion with them about how much we are ethically obligated to provide per day,” Bridge said.
