by FRED CHARUNDER-MACHARRUNDEIRA, Alternate Reality News Service Science Writer
Everybody is curious about extraterrestrial biology. Will alien beings have six arms and four legs, or merely four arms and six legs? Will they have mouths and tongues capable of communicating with us, and, more importantly, will they have anything to say that's worth listening to? Will the design of their nervous systems enable them to appreciate Mamma Mia?
Good questions, all. But, mostly, people want to know: if aliens exist, will we be able to have sex with them?
Exobiologist (somebody who studies alien biology, not to be confused with a skin cream that gets the dirt out of your pores) Betty-Lou Bialosky laughed at the question. "No, actually, I'm laughing at your tie," she corrected me. "How do you get it up your nose like that?"
After I dealt with my haberdashery malfunction, Bialosky, a researcher at the Astounding Science University of Ontario, explained that it would be possible for human beings to mate with aliens thanks to the anthropic principle. According to the anthropic (Latin for: as you always suspected, you are the centre of the universe) principle, the physical laws that we all know and love developed in order to make possible the beings that made High School: The Musical. Any aliens we might encounter, would, by this theory, be bi-pedal and carbon based and, therefore, disposed to enjoying bad television musicals, as well as being imminently mateable.
?It's like...on the original Star Trek," Bialosky explained, "Spock was half human, half Vulcan. Obviously, alien sex will be possible, only, hopefully, without the pointy ears."
Other exobiologists (really, not a skin cream - why do you persist in this mistaken belief?) disagree with that optimistic assessment. "You'd be better off trying to have sex with your vacuum cleaner!" snorted Melanie Haeber, a researcher at the Outer Limits Institute. "If we ever meet aliens, it will be because they are so advanced that they come to us, because lord knows we're never going to be advanced enough to get to them."
A race sufficiently advanced to travel to Earth, Haeber argued, would likely have evolved beyond us, making sex between the two species highly unlikely. "They would most likely be disembodied intelligences with really deep voices," she stated. "Sort of like the Metrons on the original Star Trek. You can't exactly mate with a gas cloud, although, I suppose, it would be possible that it could excite the pleasure centres of the human brain - ooooh!"
Clearly, the possibility of sex with a highly evolved, disembodied intelligence excited the pleasure centres of Haeber's brain.
A third possibility is that aliens will have appendages that satisfy human beings in new ways. "Consider William S. Burroughs' Mugwumps," exobiologist (look, you really have to get over this whole "skin cream" thing - it makes absolutely no sense and, in any case, it's making you look like a flake and we're trying to have an adult discussion about a serious subject of scientific speculation here) Alexander Fieresine mused. "They have...extensions that look like human sex organs, but, when you suck on them, they excrete a very powerful drug."
Fieresine, of no fixed academic address, pointed out that aliens could reproduce in a variety of ways, including asexually (aka: the No Fun Option), hermaphroditically (aka: the Talk To The Hand Option) and even in groups of 12 or more (aka: the Do We Have To Spell It Out For You? Option). "Because their reproductive capabilities evolved under different environmental conditions, their sexuality could, to us, look like anything from slam dancing to wallpapering your child's bedroom. We just don't know...we just don't know...
"Exciting, isn't it?"
"Well, sure, I suppose aliens could be like that," Haeber objected. "They could have 27 vaginas. They could satisfy all your sexual needs with vibrating fingers. They could be anything that we can imagine. But, without some sort of scientific theory backing these ideas, they're just idle speculations."
"Besides," Bialosky added, "Fieresine didn't use a metaphorical reference to Star Trek! What self-respecting alien biologist would talk about his work without some kind of reference to the classic fictional study of alien life?"
Even Enterprise?
"Oh, it's easy for an untrained layperson to criticize exobiology," Bialosky defensively responded. "But, even the least of the Star Trek spin-offs has a lot to teach us. About a lot of things. So, why not sex with aliens?"
Although there seems substantial disagreement among the experts as to the possibility of human beings having sex with aliens, it's as nothing compared to the wide variety of beliefs on possible alien mating rituals. Despite this, there is one thing that everybody can agree on: exobiologists (alright, alright, they help give your skin a smooth, healthy pinkish glow) are all science fiction nerds!