Before scientist and Cosmos creator Carl Sagan passed away in 1996, he was known to believe that intelligent life existed beyond Earth. In an interview with Studs Terkel, released in animated form as a new episode of “Blank on Blank” by PBS Digital Studios, he talks about what exactly he means by intelligent life, and it’s not anything you’d see in Cloverfield or Men in Black or anything else in Hollywood, probably.
“Our civilization is the most backward civilization in the galaxy that can communicate at all,” Sagan said. It’s not so much a criticism of Earth as reframing of what it would mean for aliens to touch down here. If we, human beings, were not capable of reaching another planet, what makes us think that we would be more advanced than whatever sort of civilization is able to reach ours?
Watch the animated clip below.