the andromeda strain

            I just recently finished an addictive book called "the andromeda strain" by micheal crichton. the basic plot of this book is that the government sends eleven satelites into space. the intention is for the satelites to collect any possible forms of life while in orbit. when brought back, this new form of unicellular life is intended to be studied by a group of dedicated scienntists. however the goverments intention is to use them to try to create weapons of amss destruction. when the eleven satelites land on earth, ten of them are retrieved with nothing in them. the last one lands in an isolated village in arizona. after one day, the villagers decide to open the sattelite bvecause no one came to retrieve it. after only a few hours after opening, the villagers start to die of very rapidly. coincidence??
         This book really made me wonder about what would WE do in a worldwide health crises. the swine flu epidemic may have given us a glimpse, but that was bacteria that our current technology, and understanding of medicine made sense of. what if we were faced with a totally new foreighn, otherworldly disease from returning spacecraft. what if went against all our biological laws. life forms on earth have to have certain charectaristics to be considered liveng, but that doesnt have to be true for all life forms in this universe. maybe our charectaristics depend on the charecteristics that our habitat, or planet has. call me paranoid, but it could happen.
           Our current technology can see into the microscopic universe, scientists know that the electron is the smallest particle of matter  in the world. but to me, everything we know is just a hunch. the electron is the smallest particle.... we dont know that, thats just based on what we can see. the wall is white... we cant be sure, maybe its actually yellow, but the way our eye works, makes our brain iterpret it as the color white. we may think that our body works one way: that our heart pumps blood to our body cells, but our body may be actually working in a whole different way, we just cant see it. everything is based on what we can see, hear, feeal, smell. but that is what makes us human.