From Space, Earth Looks Like an Ant Farm

It’s all a matter of perspective

From the point of view of an alien spaceship scanning Earth, maybe just on a random fly-by, we must resemble nothing so much as an ant farm.

From their cosmic perspective, the aliens can see us all scurrying around, witnessing our seemingly random activities and movements, and perhaps wondering idly about our motivation.

They perhaps can see purpose and motion, some vague plan or effort at cooperation but could never ascertain our true motivations from scanning us while in orbit or passing through our momentarily shared space.

They will never be able to realize how each individual ant is part of a colony of individuals, working together for the common good. Sometimes fighting with the other ants, or maybe just as creatures in constant movement.

The aliens could never grasp the depth of our emotions, the strength of our beliefs, and the power of our convictions from their lofty viewpoint.

They could not possibly ever understand our systems of government, our worries and concerns, our dramas and traumas.

We would be basically incomprehensible to them. They could never know how each individual ant (or human) lives their lives, how they go about their daily rounds, or why they even bother.

They would never be able to grasp the ant’s feelings, the things that motivate them, and why they make the effort to keep doing it again and again after each sleep cycle.

It would be a complete mystery to them.

They would never be able to discern the reasons we move from place to place, the pace at which we move about, or the point of going from Point A to Point B in the first place.

They could observe our movements, and note or record our constant activity. They might speculate about why we even bother.

Perhaps they would try to see if they could superimpose their vision of order as seen through their alien viewpoints on our ant-like activity in an attempt to understand what kind of life form we are.

They might try, but they never would be able to fully grasp our motivations, plans, or purpose.

To them, all this movement would just be chaotic, arbitrary, and pointless.

Like a random shifting of viewpoints, like a kaleidoscope of meaningless images, like wisps of fog drifting across a small, still lake in the early morning.

These fly-by aliens could never hope to understand this kind of emotion by simply viewing the movement of the ants from place to place.

They would never understand the sadness and sorrows, the hopes and heartaches, the suffering and sacrifices the ants go through every day.

Or the dreams and nightmares, overcoming the fears and terrors of the unknown, and the ability to push on through all these obstacles.

They would perhaps be vague shadows of thoughts, glimpses of movement, and flickers of speculation on their part.

They could never hope to grasp the depth and scope of the fire and ice, the smoke and mirrors, the power and the passion that comprise the life of any single ant.

Their imaginations, if they have any, could never grasp the joy of a beautiful sunrise or sunset, the taste of a well-prepared meal, or the comfort of emotional security.

The alien observers would never understand the importance of families and friends, customs and conventions, principles and values of a mere ant.

From a far enough distance away, they would only be able to observe incomprehensible movements and motions, actions without purpose, and seemingly pointless activity.

Perhaps this is the way we humans observe ants, from our own lofty viewpoints and assumption of superiority. We may pass them by, or we may reflexively try to stomp them out of existence.

We rarely consider how other species feel or think. We just observe their activities and filter them through our own sensibilities.

It’s just a matter of perspective. A different point of view. We are all connected…