I like the alien perspective, by which I mean trying to put oneself in the shoes of an alien visiting the Earth for the first time. It gives us the possibility of creating some distance between our small, parochial existence, and seeing ourselves from a different point of view and/or in a different light. This can be quite useful, the same wat an out-of-body experience (OBE) can teach us stuff about ourselves.
I had one of those once, a few years back. I was floating a few feet above myself, looking back down at my body - parenthetic thought: why do we always seem to look back at ourselves. Aren't there more interesting things to look at? - and I realised I really needed to work on my weight. Later I realised I had wasted a perfectly good OOB: I could have seen that in a mirror.
But holding up a mirror to ourselves, metaphorically speaking, isn't a bad idea, which is why I would like to propose that we all create and cultivate our own invisible alien. To avoid it getting existentialist crises, you would have to ask it questions once in a while, like "why do people drive on the wrong side of the road in England" and "why learn the capital of Ukraine in school" (this does not apply, obviously, to Ukranian schoolchildren). Of course, you would only be allowed to ask it questions to which you yourself might reasonably be expected to know (or at least find) the answer. It would be pointless to ask you invisible, made-up alien to actually name the capitals of all kinds of far-off countries, if you don't know already the answer. You can and should certainly challenge it to stretch your understanding of things, but it only knows what you yourself know.
Note for U.S. citizens: when you invent your alien, please make sure that it does not go around sticking probes into people when you go abroad. I know that sort of behavior is quite common to aliens in the U.S., but it does not seem to occur anywhere else in the world, and foreigners don't like it any more than you do.
Also, I advise against consulting your invisible alien friend in public: people who don't have one might get jealous, and may make a big a deal about your "talking to yourself". If this happens, don't try to correct them. It is much easier to make them go away by smiling politely and telling them that you have to talk to yourself, because it's the only thing that keeps you sane.
[Note from my id: I think I had too much Halloween candy when I wrote this one]
I had one of those once, a few years back. I was floating a few feet above myself, looking back down at my body - parenthetic thought: why do we always seem to look back at ourselves. Aren't there more interesting things to look at? - and I realised I really needed to work on my weight. Later I realised I had wasted a perfectly good OOB: I could have seen that in a mirror.
But holding up a mirror to ourselves, metaphorically speaking, isn't a bad idea, which is why I would like to propose that we all create and cultivate our own invisible alien. To avoid it getting existentialist crises, you would have to ask it questions once in a while, like "why do people drive on the wrong side of the road in England" and "why learn the capital of Ukraine in school" (this does not apply, obviously, to Ukranian schoolchildren). Of course, you would only be allowed to ask it questions to which you yourself might reasonably be expected to know (or at least find) the answer. It would be pointless to ask you invisible, made-up alien to actually name the capitals of all kinds of far-off countries, if you don't know already the answer. You can and should certainly challenge it to stretch your understanding of things, but it only knows what you yourself know.
Note for U.S. citizens: when you invent your alien, please make sure that it does not go around sticking probes into people when you go abroad. I know that sort of behavior is quite common to aliens in the U.S., but it does not seem to occur anywhere else in the world, and foreigners don't like it any more than you do.
Also, I advise against consulting your invisible alien friend in public: people who don't have one might get jealous, and may make a big a deal about your "talking to yourself". If this happens, don't try to correct them. It is much easier to make them go away by smiling politely and telling them that you have to talk to yourself, because it's the only thing that keeps you sane.
[Note from my id: I think I had too much Halloween candy when I wrote this one]
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