9. Are We Alone? Summary and Analysis

There are no known myths about life on other planets. This, in and of itself, is indicative of a larger problem with myths, namely that they do not describe phenomena that do not concern primitive cultures. There have been countless myths about strange and magical creatures, such as genies, vampires, or fairies, but these creatures always live on Earth, or at least a culture's conception of it. With the rapid technological advancement of the 1950s, stories about aliens became hugely popular, often amongst people already fond of science fiction stories. Psychologists have studied people who claim to have memories of alien abductions, and these memories often turn out not to be memories at all, but instead are a combination of different memories and perceptions all combined out of the order in which they occurred to produce what...