Before We Ask the Aliens
✍️Author’s Note
A writing prompt about visitors from another world brought back two familiar voices and an old philosophical joke. This short reflection returns to Voltaire’s Micromegas, with a glance at our readiness to consult artificial intelligence. The author includes himself among those who may be in need of a little scrutiny.
—WJJH
If aliens arrived tomorrow, what’s the first thing you’d ask them?
This morning’s writing prompt asked: “If aliens arrived tomorrow, what’s the first thing you’d ask them?”
Most writing prompts pass me by. This one caught my attention and brought back “The War of the Worlds,” and Richard Burton’s magnificent voice in Jeff Wayne’s musical adaptation of H. G. Wells’s novel. The music and narration gave the Martian invasion a dreadful plausibility. It remains well worth listening to, preferably before the evening news, which supplies sufficient dread of its own.
The broadcast that frightened some listeners, however, was Orson Welles’s radio adaptation in 1938. Another remarkable voice, another master of storytelling. Some mistook its simulated news bulletins for reports of an actual invasion. The extent of the panic has since been disputed, but what has always stayed with me is how readily an authoritative voice can make fiction sound like fact.
Today we have rather more channels through which to practise this old habit.
My thoughts then turned naturally to Voltaire. In Micromegas, visitors from Sirius and Saturn encounter creatures so small they can scarcely perceive them, yet so thoroughly persuaded of their importance that they explain the universe with considerable confidence. Humanity, in other words. No extensive introductions required.
Voltaire’s travellers discover that physical insignificance places no restraint upon intellectual vanity. These tiny beings can reason, calculate and philosophise. They also kill one another over territory which, from a cosmic distance, would hardly justify an argument about where to put a flowerpot.
I explored this in my recent essay, Voltaire Looks at Us: Micromegas Returns. What has stayed with me especially is the visitors’ parting gift: a book promising to explain the ultimate nature of things. When opened, every page is blank.
A disappointing publication, perhaps, but admirably resistant to becoming outdated.
Now consider our encounter with artificial intelligence. It has arrived without a spaceship, which probably helped. We might have mobilised against a Martian landing; a helpful box on a screen receives a warmer welcome. We ask it questions, seek its advice and invite it to improve our sentences. Before long, we may be asking it what we ought to think.
The undersigned is participating. Indeed, this reflection has benefited from that assistance. Having spent years forming opinions of my own, I now consult my editor Colossus, like I consulted my father’s encyclopedia and review the wording. Voltaire would be entitled to enjoy the spectacle.
I find the assistance useful, like in my M&A practice the assistance of my editor was useful, when preparing proposals and corporate divestiture or acquisition memorandums. The difficulty begins when fluency acquires the authority of knowledge, and a confident answer saves us the inconvenience of doubt. Burton and Welles had extraordinary voices. The machine has a remarkably agreeable manner, and is available whenever summoned. Even a philosopher could become accustomed to such service.
Perhaps we should keep Voltaire’s blank book beside the keyboard. It would remind us that an answer can be beautifully presented without settling the question, and that help with thinking does not relieve us of doing it.
So, if aliens arrived tomorrow, my first question might be: “Have you learned to live with one another?”
Their arrival would establish that they had mastered a considerable amount of technology. I should be more interested in whether their wisdom had kept pace.
If they handed me a blank book, I would take the hint.
If they suggested downloading an app, I might ask them to leave.
October 2026
Related: Voltaire Looks at Us: Micromegas Returns —
Background reference: For the qualification about the 1938 broadcast: National Endowment for the Humanities, The Fake News of Orson Welles: The War of the Worlds at 80 —
https://www.neh.gov/article/fake-news-orson-welles-war-worlds-80
📌Blog excerpt
A writing prompt leads from The War of the Worlds to Voltaire’s blank book—and our willingness to consult AI. If aliens arrived tomorrow, would their wisdom impress us as much as their technology?
