When Worlds Collide #84: Have Lankans Suspended Disbelief Permanently?

Text of my ‘When Worlds Collide’ column published in Ceylon Today Sunday broadsheet newspaper on 22 September 2013

A dozen years ago, a leading tele-drama director and I had a friendly debate live on national TV Rupavahini’s breakfast show. He argued that our island was being visited by alien beings who, he said, were making contact with ‘chosen individuals’ in certain remote locations.

I kept asking: show us some real evidence! Unidentified flying objects (UFOs) are spotted from time to time, I agreed. But further investigations reveal these to be natural phenomena or human-operated objects that had first observers failed to make out. There is no proven connection between such UFOs and intelligent life in the universe (which most scientists agree must exist).

I had argued many times with other peddlers of UFO myths, but wasn’t prepared for our artiste’s next argument. “Alien visitations are not my imagination. There’s plenty…