When the Ant Speaks

Sir / In your story "Is There Life on Mars --or Beyond?" [Dec. 13], your writer commented that possibly the civilization that received our message would not bother to reply, and you quoted Astronomer Carl Sagan as saying that they might find men as inferior as men find ants.

I would be willing to bet .that anyone, including Mr. Sagan, would talk back if an ant looked up from the sidewalk and said something to him.

STEPHEN COWDERY

Dayton

Sir / There is nothing in exobiology or any other real science that should throw any Catholic theologian into a tizzy.

There is indeed "only one sovereign Lord of all creation," no matter how far into the wild black yonder that creation exists. Far from quaking in our cassocks, Catholic priests welcome and bless those looking for life out there.

Glory to God in outer space and peace to men of the good blue planet.

(THE REV.) JOHN J. DAHLHEIMER

Hollywood

Sir / It is my fervent wish to be alive when we receive the first message from "out there."

Unhappily, modern history tells us that we live peacefully only when we share a common fear. The psychological effect of that first intergalactic greeting will be an everlasting sword of Damocles for us all. Only then will our differences shrink to petty insignificance, and the global peace that eludes us will be ours at last.

WILLIAM T. KUHN

Cedar Grove, NJ.

Sir / I agree that any extraterrestrial civilization capable of communicating with Earth would be older than man's, and would thus have solved the problems of pollution, overpopulation and war. I also believe that such a race could teach its secret of survival, but I do not feel that man could learn it.

At this moment in time man has the technological knowledge required to end these problems, but is incapable of utilizing that knowledge.

RAYMOND D. CLARKE

Milford, Conn.

Sir / Why assume that an "advanced" civilization would be technological at all? Any superior intelligence would have long since outgrown the adolescent machine-freak stage we wallow in, and would have evolved to a new reacceptance of nature. Technology implies a Western psychology--aberrant enough when compared to the myriad other, better-adjusted cultures that have bloomed during man's hundred thousand years on this planet. It is audaciously chauvinistic to expect to find a duplicate neurosis in the depths of space. We are searching only for ourselves.

BILL WEINREB

Petaluma, Calif.

Sir / Very interesting. A billion dollars for Project Cyclops to listen for messages from outer space? When we come off the neon merry-go-round of Mars and Jupiter missions, the problem-plagued home base Earth might look a little dull in comparison, but it will still be here, and it is all we've got. If beings from outer space exist, let's let them come to us, and start cleaning up our own little speck of space while we wait. We do want to be here when they arrive, don't we?

DENNIS JENNINGS

Pasadena, Calif.

Sir / Why couldn't there be an infinite number of life forms in a universe that is infinite?

I. MARK BROOKE

Radnor, Pa.

Sir / Those people who contemplate contacts between earthmen and intelligent beings from other worlds might consider whether the great religious leaders who established the world's major religions were such visitors. Having been revered as "gods from the heavens," they may have given us the main ingredients for the survival and full evolution of our species. All we have to do is implement their philosophies (which are essentially alike) and return their visits one day.

SERGEI JOHN RIOUX

Miami

Sir / Our astronomers and exobiologists would be thrilled if they could communicate with life in outer space. But scientists are likely to get carried away in their specialties, and not see the effects of their work on mankind. Are we sure that we wish to reveal our presence on earth to such other living creatures? If they are not like us, they will be monstrous to us, whether larger or smaller. If they have become miniaturized and computerized, we would prefer to destroy them as a threat to us, and they would surely try to destroy us gross, primitive creatures, except for a few live samples for experimentation.

WALTER J. SCOTT

Owings Mills, Md.

Stroke of Genius

Sir / The idea of Nixon picking Senator Edward Brooke as his running mate in 1972 [Dec. 13] would be a stroke of political genius! As a middle-of-the-road lifelong Republican WASP, I take heart that we would have an excellent chance with such a ticket.

(MRS.) HELEN I. OTTI

Royal Oak, Mich.

Sir / To counter any shenanigans of the Republicans, may I suggest a ticket of Muskie and the well-qualified Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm of Brooklyn?

DOROTHY HOLCOMBE

Hood River, Ore.

Sir / When whites stop voting for whites, Chicanos for Chicanos, Negroes for Negroes, then and only then will we have attained a measure of political maturity, and perhaps this vicious fragmenting of the American people will be reversed.

BETTIE GREFFET

Tucson, Ariz.

Sir / A Nixon-Brooke ticket will not draw even limited support among blacks. The reasons are simple: blacks are thoroughly disgusted with Nixon and his policies. Many blacks resent the fact that Senator Brooke has a white wife, making it impossible for him to identify completely with blacks. We are tired of being second-class citizens, and Senator Brooke, as a black man, would have a second-rate position on the ticket. Nixon is a conservative and Brooke is a liberal; the ticket couldn't run a united campaign.

LARRY CHANCE

Greenville, N.C.

Rats Aboard

Sir / Your story on the clergy's condoning extramarital sex, "Thou Shalt Not--Maybe" [Dec. 13], points up only too well the accelerating paganization occurring among some of the "mainline" Protestant churches. Seems some of our theologians and denominational leaders, not to mention parish pastors, would rather be Playboy philosophers than servants of the Son of God. There are some rats aboard the ship of faith.

THOMAS ELLIOT BLANCH

Lutheran Seminary Gettysburg, Pa.

Sir / Where are the true clergy and laymen when such teachings are being proposed? Out committing adultery?

(MRS.) JOAN L. ALLEN

Stumptown, W. Va.

Sir / How many more of the Ten Commandments will church leaders bend in order to soothe the aching conscience of a straying nation?

(MRS.) EILEEN STOESSER

Waco, Texas

Sir / Just whose side are the churches on? I can't help wondering when they attempt to alter God's commandments to "Thou shalt not--unless you get the urge to." That's one way to do away with sin. No wonder churches are emptying. They've cut the quality of their product, and now it's hard to sell.

(MRS.) KAREN SIRRIDGE

Tulsa, Okla.

Sir / Charles Wesley. John Wesley. Martin Luther. John Calvin. Ulrich Zwingli. Will no one rise to protest sin in the church as did these mighty men of God?

(MRS.) MARGARET MCNITT

Adelphi, Md.

A New Diversion

Sir / It is a disgrace for you to publish "Working Through College in the Nude" [Dec. 13]. The kooks who don't know about such photography studios will have a new diversion. Similar studios will spring up around the country. And when young college girls, the mothers of tomorrow, embrace such immorality, I say, "We are on the road to hell."

JEROME DAVID ROCK

Rockville, Conn.

Sir / It is not surprising that there are 15 schoolteachers among the women who work at the Blue Orchid: they have to make a living. Are there any Women's Libbers who would pay 50-c- a minute to discuss their problems with an intelligent nude man? I need Christmas money.

WILLIAM PLANK

Seattle

Soft Pillows

Sir / Our family discussed the TV special showing the private life of Sam Greenawalt of Birmingham, Mich., and his family [Dec. 13], and we decided that the villain was the lifestyle: a preoccupation with material goods, social standings, and fac,ades. There was nothing new in the premise that, once you go the Horatio Alger route, you just might not live happily ever after.

Overall, we reaffirmed a truth that we had known for some time: the American Dream is no panacea for anxieties. Your pillow will not get any softer if you stuff it with money.

DAN DRAZEN

Berrien Springs, Mich.

Sir / The Greenawalts are to be praised for being candid. Without their frankness the film would have been useless.

The Greenawalts deserve an award, and so does CBS.

MATTHEW VANCE

Dexter, Me.

Sir / Mrs. Greenawalt could not have meant it when she said that her children were old enough to make their decisions without her. Every child needs a parent who is willing to express opinions and deliver ultimatums.

JANE G. MILLER

St. Pauls, N.C.

Batman Fights Alone

Sir / Mr. Clarke's Essay on the changes in comics [Dec. 13] was handled well, considering the large area he was trying to write about. I thought your readers would like to be brought up to date concerning some of the characters Mr. Clarke mentioned. First, Superman has decided to keep his superpowers to aid mankind; Wonder Woman has lost her powers and is now simply Diana Prince ("She's still dynamite in a fight"); Robin is in college, while his partner Batman ("the creature of the night") fights crime alone. Green Lantern, who now has a black substitute, has won the best-individual-story and best-continuing-feature awards given by the Academy of Comic Book Arts.

HERSCHEL HOWIE

Wilmington, N.C.

Sir I think you are wrong when you say that the Agnew Great Dane-hyena in Pogo wears the uniform of a Greek colonel. Look again, and you may find that his attire more closely resembles Nixon's little joke on us all: the new White House guard uniforms, which were introduced in 1970.

JIM MEADOWS III

Park Forest, Ill.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.