For some, the following information will appear to be Science Fiction. Indeed, many of our everyday experiences were considered Sci-Fi only a decade or two ago. We walk around with the capacity to almost instantaneously talk to anyone, anywhere on the Planet, at any time, using a small device in our pocket. From this same device, I can capture what I see, transmit it across thousands of miles, have it printed and shipped back to me in a variety of forms, overnight. I can view the weather in New Zealand, check traffic in New York, watch a video by a kid in London, all within the time it takes to listen to a short song produced today in San Francisco.
All the technologies we now consider commonplace were once Science Fiction, but more importantly, our current types of experiences were also viewed in this fashion. When does Science Fiction become Science Fact? What are the lines between “verifiable evidence” and “shared experience?” What changes in context occur that change the same type of experience from “impossible” to “standard?”
Only a few years ago, I suspected that there was other intelligent life out there, whether through the overwhelming mathematical probabilities, or the consistency of mysterious signs like crop circles and UFO sightings. Yet, I could not logically confirm or deny the existence of these other species without a direct personal experience or more “objective irrefutable evidence.”
Since that time, I’ve learned quite a bit more about the nature of objective irrefutable evidence, and I had my first major direct personal experience. Everything written here is based on personal experience and years of reflection, refinement, and slow processes of confirmation.
