JUNE 4, 2022 – “Tell me,” said the alien. “What’s your best stuff?”
I was taken aback. Was the question posed with low expectations or . . . by my having mentioned the human capacity for self-reflection, did the alien think I’d edified the case for humanity? And where to begin with a response?! This time, I took a sip, not a swig, of lemonade.
“Our best stuff is top flight,” I said, beginning from a point of pride but with only a tentative grasp of direction. “We’ve achieved many spectacular results in every conceivable endeavor, and we’ve been around for only a cosmic blink of an eye. It would be as difficult for me to identify our ‘best stuff’ as it would be to identify the most beautiful woman in the world. To be so foolish as to try either challenge would be to fail.”
“Let’s see you fail, then. Let’s see you try,” said the alien.
I fell silent. In the border region separating my subconsciousness from my consciousness rose an unsettling thought: humankind’s insistent belief that the sun still revolves around the earth and, in my individuality, my parallel assumption—despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary—that the world revolves around me.
Coming from a musical family, steeped for generations in the traditions and repertoire of classical music, I was initially inclined to say “the music of Beethoven,” except . . . what about Bach, Mozart, or any number of other composers of the Pantheon of Western classical music? The choices were nearly infinite. Was our “best stuff” Beethoven’s Ninth or Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion or Mozart’s 40th Symphony? Or was it any one of thousands of other masterpieces? Or was our “best stuff” the entire genre—except . . . for a composition to qualify as “best stuff,” wouldn’t its rendition have to be “best stuff,” as well?
Moreover, what about all other timeless works of art and wonder produced by people of all epochs and eras and from all around the world? What about engineering feats, medical breakthroughs, scientific discoveries, technological wonders of all kinds, or something very basic but paradoxical, such as our avoidance of self-extinction (thus far) despite our having created the means of total annihilation? Darkly speaking, wasn’t surviving ourselves possibly our “best stuff”?
Now infused with skepticism, my thoughts circled back to classical music. Here I was, representing the interests of humanity in a curious, improbable exchange with a cosmic alien. Didn’t I bear the responsibility to fellow humans to think as broadly as possible? Yet, I knew that only a tiny percentage of the 7.8 billion people on the planet would recognize the music of Bach, Mozart, or Beethoven if they heard it, and if they did hear it, most would shrug with ambivalence. I worried that most humans would puzzle over my choice of “best stuff” and even object vociferously. (Cont.)
(Remember to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.)
© 2022 by Eric Nilsson
