Abstract
For much of their time on Earth, most humans have believed that they share their world with non-human intelligences, particularly spirits that animate natural phenomena. Those spirits could do good, providing rain for crops and granting survival to children. They could do harm, bringing droughts, floods, or disease.
One can hardly be a complete human being without at least occasionally calling to mind the community of rational beings, as yet unknown, to which we presumably belong. —Stanislav Lem, 19761
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References
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Michaud, M.A.G. (2007). A Belief in Other Minds. In: Contact with Alien Civilizations. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-68618-9_2
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