Over on the Book of Face, I ran into this excited proclamation:
The caption breathlessly asked, “Could humanity be on the verge of answering one of its oldest questions?”
Now, don’t get me wrong, I will be as tickled pink as anybody if they are able to prove there is life on K2-18b, or one of the other earth-like planets orbiting other stars. (They will be able to do it by analyzing the light from these incredibly small and remote objects via spectrographic analysis. If such things as chlorophyll or other chemicals that only appear in tandem with living systems show up, it’s Game Over and they will know Something is Alive out there. I am optimistic this will happen in my lifetime.)
That said, “Is there life on other planets?” is not really one of humanity’s oldest questions. It’s one of our biggest modern scientific questions.
The reason it’s not one of humanity’s oldest questions is that, for most of human history, nobody knew what planets were and nobody therefore wondered if organic life lived on them. Indeed, planets were often taken to be some sort of heavenly being themselves.
Relatedly, before we figured out what planets were, there was no question for most of our species that intelligent non-human life existed. Things like angels, cherubim, and seraphim were taken for granted, as well as all sorts of other spiritual, non-corporeal beings. And strange corporeal things like dog-heads, monopods and cyclops were also broadly assumed to exist.
Having no idea of planets as remote worlds did not deprive ancients of places to put their various non-human creatures. Some lived in the heavens, to be sure (and could even assume visible form now and then as they did to people like Abraham, Mary, and Peter). How they did so was open to speculation (St. Thomas played with the idea that angels could take visible form by some process analogous to the way invisible vapors took visible form as clouds):
Article 2. Whether angels assume bodies?
Objection 1. It would seem that angels do not assume bodies. For there is nothing superfluous in the work of an angel, as there is nothing of the kind in the work of nature. But it would be superfluous for the angels to assume bodies, because an angel has no need for a body, since his own power exceeds all bodily power. Therefore an angel does not assume a body.
Objection 2. Further, every assumption is terminated in some union; because to assume implies a taking to oneself [ad se sumere]. But a body is not united to an angel as to a form, as stated (Article 1); while in so far as it is united to the angel as to a mover, it is not said to be assumed, otherwise it would follow that all bodies moved by the angels are assumed by them. Therefore the angels do not assume bodies.
Objection 3. Further, angels do not assume bodies from the earth or water, or they could not suddenly disappear; nor again from fire, otherwise they would burn whatever things they touched; nor again from air, because air is without shape or color. Therefore the angels do not assume bodies.
On the contrary, Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xvi) that angels appeared to Abraham under assumed bodies.
I answer that, Some have maintained that the angels never assume bodies, but that all that we read in Scripture of apparitions of angels happened in prophetic vision—that is, according to imagination. But this is contrary to the intent of Scripture; for whatever is beheld in imaginary vision is only in the beholder’s imagination, and consequently is not seen by everybody. Yet Divine Scripture from time to time introduces angels so apparent as to be seen commonly by all; just as the angels who appeared to Abraham were seen by him and by his whole family, by Lot, and by the citizens of Sodom; in like manner the angel who appeared to Tobias was seen by all present. From all this it is clearly shown that such apparitions were beheld by bodily vision, whereby the object seen exists outside the person beholding it, and can accordingly be seen by all. Now by such a vision only a body can be beheld. Consequently, since the angels are not bodies, nor have they bodies naturally united with them, as is clear from what has been said (Article 1; I:50:1), it follows that they sometimes assume bodies.
Reply to Objection 1. Angels need an assumed body, not for themselves, but on our account; that by conversing familiarly with men they may give evidence of that intellectual companionship which men expect to have with them in the life to come. Moreover that angels assumed bodies under the Old Law was a figurative indication that the Word of God would take a human body; because all the apparitions in the Old Testament were ordained to that one whereby the Son of God appeared in the flesh.
Reply to Objection 2. The body assumed is united to the angel not as its form, nor merely as its mover, but as its mover represented by the assumed movable body. For as in the Sacred Scripture the properties of intelligible things are set forth by the likenesses of things sensible, in the same way by Divine power sensible bodies are so fashioned by angels as fittingly to represent the intelligible properties of an angel. And this is what we mean by an angel assuming a body.
Reply to Objection 3. Although air as long as it is in a state of rarefaction has neither shape nor color, yet when condensed it can both be shaped and colored as appears in the clouds. Even so the angels assume bodies of air, condensing it by the Divine power in so far as is needful for forming the assumed body.
The puzzle for people like Thomas was not so much whethere spiritual creatures like angels could become visible now and then. Scripture plainly said they could. Rather, the problem was what the distinction would be between such creatures and the incarnate Son of God who clearly was fully human with a fully human, physical body. That is the question Thomas is tackling above.
Meanwhile, the issue of corporeal non-human creatures was puzzled over by people like Augustine, who place them, not on other planets, but on remote islands and far-off lands (most of the time) but who also records seeing extraordinary creatures with his own eyes as well:
Whether Certain Monstrous Races of Men are Derived from the Stock of Adam or Noah’s Sons.
It is also asked whether we are to believe that certain monstrous races of men, spoken of in secular history, have sprung from Noah’s sons, or rather, I should say, from that one man from whom they themselves were descended. For it is reported that some have one eye in the middle of the forehead; some, feet turned backwards from the heel; some, a double sex, the right breast like a man, the left like a woman, and that they alternately beget and bring forth: others are said to have no mouth, and to breathe only through the nostrils; others are but a cubit high, and are therefore called by the Greeks Pigmies: they say that in some places the woman conceive in their fifth year, and do not live beyond their eighth. So, too, they tell of a race who have two feet but only one leg, and are of marvelous swiftness, though they do not bend the knee: they are called Skiopodes, because in the hot weather they lie down on their backs and shade themselves with their feet. Others are said to have no head, and their eyes in their shoulders; and other human or quasi-human races are depicted in mosaic in the harbor esplanade of Carthage, on the faith of histories of rarities. What shall I say of the Cynocephali, whose dog-like head and barking proclaim them beasts rather than men? But we are not bound to believe all we hear of these monstrosities. But whoever is anywhere born a man, that is, a rational, mortal animal, no matter what unusual appearance he presents in color, movement, sound, nor how peculiar he is in some power, part, or quality of his nature, no Christian can doubt that he springs from that one protoplast. We can distinguish the common human nature from that which is peculiar, and therefore wonderful. [1]
It will be noted that Augustine is relying on the data to which he has access and so makes no distinction between dog-headed men (which turned out not to exist) and pigmies (which do). But that is unimportant. The point is that he recognizes that a rational soul is what matters, not how you look. For Augustine, there would be no doubt that Mr. Spock was “human” whatever the color of his blood or the shape of his ears.
Indeed, the medieval mind would take this very far, even granting (in popular legend, not in the Church’s actual teaching) the rank of saint to a dog-headed man.
Now this Christopher was one of the Dogheads, a race that had the heads of dogs and ate human flesh. He meditated much on God, but at that time he could speak only the language of the Dogheads. When he saw how much the Christians suffered he was indignant and left the city. He began to adore God and prayed. ‘Almighty God,’ he said, ‘give me the gift of speech, open my mouth, and make plain thy might that those who persecute thy people may be converted.’ An angel of God came to him and said: ‘God has heard your prayer.’ The angel raised Christopher from the ground, and struck and blew upon his mouth, and the grace of eloquence was given him as he had desired.[2] So far from being unimaginative bigots who thought you must look human to be human, medievals understood that a rational soul was all you needed. If you had that, you were human. And if human, then eligible for redemption–if you came of a race of sinners as we do.
The question of life on other planets is an issue that has only occupied the sciences once we started to have a firm idea of what planets were and that is relatively recently. The answer to the question of non-human intelligent life, whether corporeal or incorporeal, was assumed to be answered in the affirmative for most of human history. Now we are trying to nail it down scientifically (at least the corporeal part). Odds are good we will find the answer to the “life” part of “corporeal life” question soon. Whether we will get a scientific answer to the “intelligent non-human” part is, I think, a lot further off.
[1] St. Augustine, The City of God XVI.8. (Available on-line at http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/120116.htm as of June 27, 2018.)
[2] For a fuller account of this and other curious medieval legends about non-human intelligent races, see Michael Flynn’s “St. Christopher, ET, and the Middle Ages” available at https://strangenotions.com/st-christopher-et-and-the-middle-ages/ as of June 27, 2018.
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One Response
“I am optimistic this will happen in my lifetime.”
Same here. There is yet no proof, but if I had to make a bet, I would bet that not only is there life elsewhere in the universe, I suspect the universe is TEEMING with life. Intelligent life? Carbon based life? Maybe. Maybe not. But our cosmos is so vast and our Creator so joyful in His creation, I just can’t fathom that the entire rest of the universe is a radioactive hell and lifeless rock and ice.
Has such life ever visited Earth? Perhaps in saucer like spacecraft? Of that, I am A LOT more skeptical. I don’t find the possibility impossible, but until I see some very convincing evidence, my money is on the notion that UFOs are something else entirely.