"To Boldly Go There...Carefully"

The Lyceum at Unity Village, MO
Sep 30 - Oct 3, 2009

Lyceum 2009 theme - ..
..
“Science and Religion: An Evolving Dialogue”

“Before language, before ritual, before self-consciousness itself, our hominid ancestors probably looked to the night sky with wonder. We did not come down from the trees to sit on the ground. Perhaps we came down to find a meadow and get a better look at the stars.”

. ...................................................................................................TW Shepherd
_______________________________________________

Abstract of my upcoming Lyceum 2009 Lecture

“To Boldly Go There…Carefully: Theological Ethics after First Contact with Extra-terrestrial Civilizations”

A paper to be delivered at Lyceum 2009 by Thomas William Shepherd, D.Min.

My Lyceum lecture this year will discuss the new Copernican revolution which is coming after the religions and secular philosophies of humanity begin to realize how incredibly small and relatively insignificant the human race appears when viewed against the backdrop of deep space exploration. Specifically, humanity may have to reinvent its most cherished myths when our descendents encounter races from what is probably an ancient, complex, multi-species galactic civilization. This is not the fluff of science fiction but the hard science of astronomers, futurists and other serious theoreticians. The very likely existence of a myriad of intelligent lifeforms in our galaxy alone has been addressed seriously by scientists—to include chemists, physicists and, yes, exiobiologists— and popularized by the late Dr. Carl Sagan in his Cosmos series on PBS.

However easily those of us who have grown up with Star Trek and Star Wars may embrace the concept of a multi-species Cosmos, the potential discovery of intelligent non-human life raises serious challenges which have not yet been fully addressed by the religions of humanity, especially traditional Christianity.

The paper will begin by identifying three currently unfounded assumptions which shape and inform the topic to be presented:

1) Life exists on a multitude of worlds in billions of galaxies, to include our galaxy.
2) Some of those life forms are intelligent.
3) Some day humans will learn how to travel the vast distances between Earth and other biologically friendly planets in a reasonably short span of time.

From this starting point within a post-modern circle of faith, the paper will proceed to a brief overview of the intellectual history of the discussion about the implications of extraterrestrial life, which has been ongoing for at least twenty-five centuries, then proceed to consider how the “new” view of Cosmos affects central Christian doctrines such as the Trinity.

Finally, my paper will look at the ethics of First Contact and attempt to sketch the outlines of an environmental-ecological theology of deep space exploration which allows human development while avoiding the pitfalls of unchecked, conquistador-style exploitation by applying a modified version of science fiction visionary Gene Roddenberry’s “Prime Directive” to all human-alien interactions.

The paper will conclude with an assessment of both the need and longing for exploration of the Cosmos: “When searching for the deepest meanings of existence, humanity appears hard-wired to look toward space.”