I think that, as an intelligent life-force, we are pretty much alone in the universe. I think that any hope of finding other intelligent life out there is pretty much nil, and we should begin to face up to that fact.

Why do I think this?

Because it's staring us in the face, and has been for some time now. Ever since we realised the earth wasn't flat, ever since we realised that we revolved around the sun instead of the sun revolving around us, ever since we realised that we weren't the center of the universe, ever since we realised that those shiny stars in the night sky were other suns probably with their own planets, or other galaxies with billions of their own suns, each with their own planets.

Ever since we realised the immense size of the known universe. Ever since we began to understand the complexities of space, let alone time. Since we realised that when we look at the night sky, we're looking at it how it was billions of years ago because that's how long it took the light from the stars to reach us.

Ever since we realised that the possibility of other intelligent life on other planets was so undeniably obvious, and that it became clear that it was almost inconceivable that we could be the only forms of intelligent life in the vast universe. A universe so huge that we, as mere humans couldn't even imagine.

And yet, throughout all this time, and in fact, throughout all of all of our recorded history, we seem to have never even seen, heard, been made aware of, or even been left with a single shred of evidence that these types of intelligent life exist, let alone have ever visited us or even made themselves known to us in the past, in any way, shape, form or whatever.

I find it completely inconceivable that the huge and vast opportunity of intelligent life existing elsewhere in the universe has not somehow, in some small way, made itself known to us by now. And it's this alone, that makes me think that maybe it simply doesn't exist at all.

It's not just the vastness of space we have to think about. When we think about space, we also have to think about the added dimension of time. Whole galaxies, let alone universes, have existed before our own was even a twinkle in it's mother's eyes. Whole races of intelligent life, billions of them, must have existed before us, and must still exist. Surely, billions of them would have worked out how to travel across space by now.

When we look up at the night sky, we should see space literally teeming with life. We may not see the actual space ships themselves, but surely we would have at least picked up on some kind of traces that they have left behind. We've been scanning space for any evidence of this for decades now, and yet, we've found nothing.

When we look up at the night sky, as we have done for Milena, all we see, hear, pick up and scan, is a totally dead universe. How can that be possible, when we assume that the opportunities of life in the universe are so immensely probable?

If we are to question ourselves as to the possibility of intelligent life, and use all of our reasons as to why we think this may be so, then surely, as a race intelligent of asking ourselves such a deep question, we must surely be brave not to end the question there, and be brave enough to follow the question through to it's natural conclusion.

Which would surely be..

So just where the fucking hell are they then?

Surely, absolutely surely, any logical mind would look at our history, our evidence, and conclude that they just don't exist. Amongst all of this logic, a mass of logic that prooves that they simply must, must, must exist... we must question why they aint here. Why we don't see them? Why aren't they there?

Where the fuck are they?

Of everything that we believe that must be true... it simply must be true... why are we left with nothing? Why does the universe appear so dead?

I'll tell you why. Because we are as freaky as our own existance. We are the exeption to the rule. We are the planet, in an infinate universe that dictates that in an infinate universe, life must exist on at least one planet, we are that very planet.

But we are alone.

I wonder sometimes how future historians will ever know as much about us as we like to think, and that maybe, our writings will be lost one day.

What is history, and what is 'pre-history' or 'pre-historic'? I'm assuming that history started from the time when man was able to write (in whatever way/language that they did) and 'pre-history' is the tens of thousands of years before that. An era where no records of writings exist, and we can only go on fossilised evidence or the odd cave paintings to paint a picture of their civilisations.

So what will future historians have to go on when they look back at us? Writings and paintings last the test of time because they are imprinted on hard copies of paper, canvas, wood etc.. but as we swim ever more so through the digital age, much of our modern writings exist as bits and bytes.

People go on about things such as blogging as creating a record of our times, something that future historians will have a field day with. Never before, they say, has the human race ever been able to create such a detailed record of our era and the part we played in history.

Which is all well and good, but what if, in a million years time, we've advanced so far, that we've simply forgotten what a computer used to be or how to build one. I mean, give it another fifty years, and our children will look at a VHS cassette and ask what it is. A VHS cassette is pretty useless unless you know how to build a VHS player on which to play it.

Similarly, a CD or DVD just looks like a shiny mirror unless you know what it is, and can build a machine that can read the data on it. Why would anyone, in a million years, look at it, and even begin to assume that it contained any kind of data? It's just a shiny disk unless you recognise it for what it is.

We dig up ancient texts and writings all the time, and we recognise it as some kind of communication device simply by the way that it's been drawn or written on, but will future archaeologists be so knowledgeable when digging up our Cd's, DVDs or Hard Drives?

They might in the next thousand years. They might even be able to in the next ten thousand years. But what about the next hundred thousand years? A million years? Surely it'll all look extremely puzzling by then. And even if some bright spark finds these Cd's and thinks that there's more than meets the eye, will he/she be able to build a machine that can actually extract the data on it?

Did the Inca's think that their civilisation was destined to be recorded in much greater detail than it actually was? Did the Egyptians think that their writings would last an eternity, only for us modern humans to still have great trouble in understanding it? Are we not going down an even worse path, by putting all our historical data on electronically read disks instead of hard copies?

Will we simply be forgotten? Are we living in the modern equivalent of the dark/middle ages? (called so because very little evidence exists of their era's)

Spooky.

Well, that didn't take long. Maybe I should have gone to university after all. So, I've no idea what this blogging is all about. Am I writing shite for myself or shite for others to read? I think I'll just go down the route of writing shite for myself. Can't imagine why anyone would want to read this. Personally, I can't think of anything worse than reading about other people's lives. Other people have never generally held any interest for me.

So anyway, let's kick this thing off. What do I write about? I've been thinking all day at work about starting a blog, and must have thought of a million things I wanted to write about, but now I've come home and I'm sitting here, my mind is as blank as a letter-less, no score 'c' at the front of the word 'lueless' on a scrabble board.

Did that make sense? Not to others I guess, but that's not why I'm here. I guess I'm trying to think of something to kick-start this blog off, but I'm thinking too hard, which is why I'm just typing and hoping something will shine through. Should I start with something political? Controversial? (I'll have to Google spell check this before I post it) Deep? Philosophical? (I'll definitely have to spell check it now) or just mundane, day to day ramblings?

Well, one thing has been on my mind all week. I work with a lot of Muslims and have done for the last nine years or so. I get on with most of them, and the issue of religion only ever rarely enters the general conversation, and even then it's just as casual banter between work colleagues. But on Monday, I was sat with a group of them in a van, and one of them (who I've known for some time and is a nice guy) started asking me if I ever think of 'the dark box...the dark box with the light in it'. I had no idea what he was on about and just kept saying 'yes...yes...' hoping that somewhere down the line it would all become clear, but at the end of it, I must have looked quite dazed, because another guy prodded, laughed, and said "He's talking about when you die".

Which kick started a conversation that has lasted all week. My private thoughts on religion is that I don't believe a word of it. Any religion. I think it's all a lot of mumbo jumbo, invented in a world that has long gone, and that although science doesn't have the answer to everything, it has explained a lot, and continues to do so.

However, I didn't want to tell them this, as I find debates quite interesting, and if I had come right out at the start and said something along the lines of "I'm simply not interested", they would have shut up. But something in me wanted to hear what they had to say about it. I know very little about any religion, let alone Islam, but I'm interested in why people believe what they do, when scientific evidence seems to contradict a lot of what they believe.

So I simply said that I was one of the undecided. I told them truthfully that I hadn't been bought up with religion, it wasn't part of my culture, as it is theirs, and that as far as I was concerned, nobody knows for sure what is true and what is not. Different countries and different societies around the world all have their own beliefs, and for someone nonreligious like me, I simply look at them all, and wonder why people believe what they do, when people in the country next to them believe something different.

This is, of course, all said and talked about in a very banter-like way, and I certainly didn't get the impression that he was somehow trying to brainwash me. I've known him (and his friends) for a long time, and brainwashing just isn't their style.

However, it has somehow, made me think that it wouldn't be a bad idea to at least read up about it a little. When I said to one of them that even if I decide to follow a religion, I wouldn't know which one to choose, he simply said "just read about them and make up your own mind", which made me think that maybe I should.

I have no interest in religion, in terms of becoming a follower, suddenly 'seeing the light' or becoming instantly converted overnight, but it does intrigue me a little as to knowing just what it is that makes people follow this type of, well, if I'm honest, rubbish.

I just feel, a little, that I'm not really qualified to have the view that I do, without at least knowing a little more about it. I read on the net yesterday that if I was to read the Koran, I would understand it a little more if I read the Torah first. And it also surprised me a bit to see that there were version of these books written in quite easy to understand English, which is also a blessing because I just can't bear all those "thous" and "thees". I sort of look at it like having to read 'The Hobbit' before I dive into 'The Lord Of The Rings'.

I'm hoping that it would make a good read if anything else, and it would at least broaden my mind a little as to why people believe in this sort of stuff. I even went to the bookshop earlier to get a copy of the Torah, but they didn't have it. Divine intervention via Jesus? Who knows...

Anyway, that's been on my mind all week, for some reason. It even got to the stage where when I saw the guy today, I lifted my newspaper up over my face and shouted "Don't look at his eyes...don't look at his eyes". He took the joke quite well.

Anyway, well, that's at least kick started this blog off. I can now take a deep breath and feel a little easier about writing any old shit.

Can I swear on here? I love a healthy expletive now and again.

Well, I've just set this bloody thing up so I guess I may as well write something, if only to see how it looks on the screen. I'm not even sure how I'll log back in to see it. Where do I go to see it? It's just taken me staight to this page and expects me to write someting. So here it is. I'll just post this for now, have a little play around, and get my bearings.