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Far Out

In mankind’s noble quest to prove itself insignificant, many have concluded that there just has to be life on other planets. But we need to examine some of the common planks in this misanthropic platform.

1. God never said he didn’t make life elsewhere
2. The universe is so unimaginably large, the statistical probability of life on other planets is nearly certain
3. God wouldn’t create all that for nothing

Rebuttal to #1: This is a fallacious example of an argument from silence, because there are a large number of things God never mentioned, and it would be absurd to accept everything as equally possible by the mere fact of his silence about them. For example, the Bible never talks about pedophilia, but if we know even the most basic things about God, we can easily dismiss this as anything he’d be in favor of. Thus this argument would require the absence of any indirect statements in order to be valid. However, such statements certainly exist, as I will show in the other points. One thing we know for certain is that God never said the opposite either. He never said he did make life elsewhere; he never so much as implied it. Certainly such creations would at least get passing mention. We are told about the spirit world, about the entire universe generally, yet there is not the slightest hint of intelligent life on any planet but Earth.

Rebuttal to #2: To quote Yoda, “Size matters not. Judge me by my size, do you?” This argument is completely irrelevant, because God has a habit of defying probability, and he is the God of the infinitely small as well as the infinitely large. In other words, if there were no stars at all beyond our own and the universe consisted only of our solar system, would that decrease the odds of life beyond our knowledge or ability to discover? We haven’t even explored all our oceans, let alone micro worlds that, theoretically, could possibly exist. And if the idea of micro worlds seems preposterous, then so must the idea that the vastness of the universe is an argument for the certainty of extraterrestrial life.

Rebuttal to #3: Yes, he most certainly would create all that for nothing. Look at Job 38:25-27:

Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain, and a path for the thunderstorm, to water a land where no one lives, an uninhabited desert, to satisfy a desolate wasteland and make it sprout with grass?

Has it occurred to anyone that maybe God would create something just because he wanted to? If anything, the size of the universe screams out the greatness of God, his infinite power, his limitless range. As King David put it in Psalm 8:3-5,

When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, The moon and the stars, which You have ordained, What is man that You are mindful of him, And the son of man that You visit him? For You have made him a little lower than the angels, And You have crowned him with glory and honor.

What better way to put proud humans in their place, than to show them how great they’re not?

In Genesis 1:14-18 we are told the purpose of the stars: to tell time, and to give light. Oh, but that doesn’t include the vast majority of stars we can’t even see, you may object. That seems reasonable on the surface, but try telling God he wasn’t exactly honest with us in this passage. He told us point blank their purpose, and didn’t give a footnote qualifying his statement. And you would think that the proponents of evolutionism would be the first to acknowledge the time-telling power of unseen stars, since they hold them up as proof of long eons of time. Besides, it’s just as possible they could have some significance for the angelic beings as well. Hey, if we’re going to speculate, let’s be thorough.

One cannot escape the glaring fact that we humans are the object of God’s attention, and that he only stooped down to become one of us-- not one of every alleged race of beings he created. Who thinks that he might have repeated this kind of redemption for other life forms, or even more ridiculous, that only humans incurred his displeasure enough to require salvation?

No, we’re alone; get used to it.