In bygone days "people searched for unicorns by sending a virgin out into a field, says astronomer out to debunk the space alien fad. “But if you fail to find a unicorn by putting a virgin in a field, you don't then put a million virgins out."
Published: The Globe and Mail, March 19, 1987
BY DEBORAH JONES/HALIFAX
Nobody has ever proved that unicorns exist, and in recent history people have stopped looking for them. One day, astronomer Robert Rood says, people will also stop looking for extraterrestrial beings.
Society is so enamored of the idea of intelligent extraterrestrials that popular literature and films fantasize about them. But Dr. Rood says earth's creatures may be the only life forms in the universe.
The University of Virginia astronomer admits his view is unpopular and is probably as hard to prove as the absence of unicorns.
"People find the idea of other life forms comforting," he said, and many hope intelligent, benevolent extraterrestrials will rescue us from ourselves.
Dr. Rood, who was at St. Mary's University in Halifax yesterday as part of a North American lecture tour, said he does not want to denigrate searches for extraterrestrials at Harvard University and elsewhere. But if they don't succeed, he said, researchers should give up.
In bygone days "people searched for unicorns by sending a virgin out into a field," Dr. Rood said. "If she was a virgin, a unicorn would appear and lay its head in her lap. . . . If she wasn't, it would spear her. "But if you fail to find a unicorn by putting a virgin in a field, you don't then put a million virgins out."
Dr. Rood, whose book, Searching for Unicorns and Extraterrestrial Civilizations, was published several years ago, says discussion of extraterrestrials is worthwhile despite his own doubts. Extraterrestrials fascinate people, he said, and because they're so closely associated with astronomy, discussions of them can create interest in what many consider an obscure discipline.
But Dr. Rood said that if intelligent extraterrestrials exist, chances are their priority is survival, not rescuing humans from nuclear war or other calamities.
"Don't expect good guys in flowing white robes. They may be bad guys, at least in our view. And if they turn out to be bad guys, they're probably very, very competent bad guys."
Copyright Deborah Jones 1987
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