What is an alien?

What is an alien?

(Defining aliens)

Often shown as little green men (called E.T.’s because of the definition below) flying on a spaceship (Called U.F.O.’s oftentimes) shaped like a flying saucer. They are often presented as an advanced race from another planet and often come as hostile to humans on planet earth. But what really is an alien? What makes something Alien? And more importantly, do aliens actually exist?

Before we can answer if aliens exist, we need to know what exactly an alien is, so what is an alien?

Well, the word ‘alien’ has many different meanings depending on the context it’s used in. In all situations, though, it means something very strange, isolated and/or different from the speaker saying it. There are all the definitions the word alien can be used to mean:

1 Something a person is not familiar with or finds strange

2 someone from a different country

3 something exotic

4 something not originating on or not originally from planet Earth. [1]

The term ‘alien’ basically refers to a wide range of things that, from the viewers perspective, are not familiar with or strange or from a different place.

For thousands of Years, the word Alien was strictly used to describe Human beings coming from foreign countries/races than the speaker did (another way to say foreigner).

In fact, the English word 'alien' comes from the Latin word 'alienus' which basically is the Latin word for 'foreigner' [2].

However, as time passed, Alien came to refer to just about anything strange or foreign to the speaker

But the alien we are specifically talking about is the newest definition of the word, defined as:

“Something that does not come from or originate from Planet Earth”

Another, much more specific, name for this particular type of definition of alien is:

“Extraterrestrial” (E.T. for short)

the meaning of this strange word is composed of two words “Extra-“ and “Terrestrial”. “Terrestrial” is from the Latin words “terra” which means “Earth/land” (This is where The English word terrain [meaning land] comes from) so ‘Terrestrial’ means “pertaining to the Earth/Earthly”. “Extra-” is an English word meaning “more, beyond, or above”, so together it specifically describes what the definition of this particular alien is referring to:

Extraterrestrial: something beyond the planet earth [4]!

By this definition, Asteroids, meteorites, and rocks from other planets would be considered aliens/extraterrestrials, because they do not come from earth but beyond the atmosphere in outer space from a different planet/other source of matter.

While all these things are considered aliens, usually when speaking about aliens we're really referring to LIVING beings from beyond Earth instead of just objects.

So, an alien can be anything (but mostly refers to a living being) not native to planet earth. So, for our definition for this study any living thing that originally came from beyond Earth's atmosphere is an alien/extraterrestrial.

Now since we have defined what an alien actually is, we can ask:

Do aliens exist?

Sources:

[1]

[A] Merriam-Webster “Alien”

Website:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/alien

[B] Collins Dictionary “Alien”

Website:

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/alien

[C] Dictionary Cambridge “Alien”

Website: