From a meteor crashing down off the coast of South Florida, to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-N.V.) accusing Lockheed-Martin of housing UFO fragments, to the widely popular “Ancient Aliens” of the History Channel, curiosity about the existence of aliens has continually captured our imaginations. As just one example, take the Area 51 raid craze, where such feelings of curiosity evolved and gained mainstream traction. But why do aliens keep popping up?
Well, there’s a specific kind of enjoyment we get from entertaining the possibility of aliens. It’s somewhere between the mystery and wonder that comes from looking out at space and asking “what if?” It’s exhilarating, and the thought that there might be something indescribable and completely unknown in the dark of space captures our imaginations. But most of the time, we don’t actually need to imagine the possibilities ourselves because movies and video games do it for us.