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Earlier science fiction, including The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), explored similarly religious themes, notably technological resurrection. But godlike superhumans date to much earlier fiction, such as Edward Bulwer-Lytton's The Coming Race (1871).

Author L. Ron Hubbard chose a direct path to spiritual influence, founding the now worldwide Church of Scientology in the 1950s. Scientology's teaching that humans lived among extraterrestrial cultures before being trapped in bodies on Earth reveals Hubbard's early work as a science fiction writer. Other relatively new religions—Mormonism and the Nation of Islam among them—incorporate interplanetary narratives as well.

Science fiction also animates the work of many scientists. Jason Pontin, editor in chief of MIT's Technology Review, writes, "Most of us came to technology through science fiction; our imaginations remain secretly moved by science-fictional ideas. Only the very exalted are honest about their debt." Many working in space exploration and artificial intelligence are either fans of science fiction or freely acknowledge its deep influence on their thought.

Science fiction is important to scientists interested in transcendent themes such as the design and purpose of the cosmos and the future of humanity. Dyson, a devoted reader of Stapledon, writes, "Science is my territory, but science fiction is the landscape of my dreams." Ironically, the universe that science stripped of the supernatural is being resupplied with deities and redemptive purposes by science fiction writers and moviemakers. Apparently, we cannot do without myths.

Perhaps Kurzweil was correct when he said that a dawning techno-spiritual age would require a new religion. In a 1999 interview with journalist Bill Moyers, Star Wars director George Lucas said, "I put the Force into the movie to try to awaken a certain kind of spirituality in young people—more a belief in God than a belief in any particular religious system." There is some evidence that his efforts have been successful: In the 2000 British census, more than 390,000 people listed their religion as "Jedi," a reference to the pantheistic spirituality of Star Wars. The numbers probably reflect a coordinated effort to skew census results, but still suggest the vast reach of the Star Wars myth. (Lucas's view of myth's cultural role was shaped by Joseph Campbell, who more than any other writer made myth relevant to late-20th-century Americans.)

Recent polls indicate that a majority of Americans expect human contact with extraterrestrials during this millennium. Moreover, we anticipate that the aliens will be "friendly" and "superior." Major scientific figures, including Nikola Tesla, Stephen Hawking, Francis Crick, and Carl Sagan, among others, have popularized their ideas. Whether panspermia (Earth was seeded with life from space), space colonization, highly evolved extraterrestrials, or genetically enhanced post-humanity, each belief has its advocate in the academy. And well-publicized projects such as the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence involve both the public through donated computer time and private business through donated money.

What exactly are we expecting to encounter? Perhaps the advanced and benevolent extraterrestrials who in Star Trek: First Contact (1996) speedily usher in an earthly utopia free of poverty and warfare. Or maybe the childlike aliens of Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), who disembark from their space-faring city of light as a human priest reads from Psalm 91: "He will give his angels charge over you." After all, angels had accompanied an earlier salvific arrival.

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February 2009, Vol. 53, No. 2