Carl%20Sagan%20-%20The%20Demon%20Haunted%20World

THE DEMON-HAUNTED WORLD
trying to find missions that justify its existence - particularly a
good reason for humans in space. If the Earth were being visited
daily by hostile aliens, wouldn't NASA leap on this opportunity to
augment its funding? And if an alien invasion were in progress,
why would the Air Force, traditionally led by pilots, step back
from manned spaceflight and launch all its payloads on unmanned
boosters?
Consider the former Strategic Defense Initiative Organization,
in charge of 'Star Wars'. It's fallen on hard times now, particularly
its objective of basing defences in space. Its name and perspective
have been demoted. It's the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization
these days. It no longer even reports directly to the Secretary
of Defense. The inability of such technology to protect the United
States against a massive attack by nuclear-armed missiles is
manifest. But wouldn't we want at least to attempt deployment of
defences in space if we were facing an alien invasion?
The Department of Defense, like similar ministries in every
nation, thrives on enemies, real or imagined. It is implausible in
the extreme that the existence of such an adversary would be
suppressed by the very organization that would most benefit from
its presence. The entire post-Cold War posture of the military and
civilian space programmes of the United States (and other
nations) speaks powerfully against the idea that there are aliens
among us - unless, of course, the news is also being kept from
those who plan the national defence.
Just as there are those who accept every UFO report at face value,
there are also those who dismiss the idea of alien visitation out of
hand and with great passion. It is, they say, unnecessary to
examine the evidence, and 'unscientific' even to contemplate the
issue. I once helped to organize a public debate at the annual
meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science between proponent and opponent scientists of the proposition
that some UFOs were spaceships; whereupon a distinguished
physicist, whose judgement in many other matters I
respected, threatened to set the Vice President of the United
States on me if I persisted in this madness. (Nevertheless, the
debate was held and published, the issues were a little better
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