"A mass of inexplicable phenomena have been recorded in history and literature. The majority of them can undoubtedly be classified as hallucinations and other delusions, but does this apply to all such phenomena? Now that the possibility of interplanetary travel hasbeen proven, man should show greater consideration for such 'incomphrehensible' phenomena. I believe that some such phenomena are not illusions, but real proof of the presence of unknown intelligent forces in outer space."
Tsiolkovsky categorized as such phenomena, in particular, images of a geometric figure and a man which had been observed in the sky in the spring of 1886 and the word "ChAU" which he had seen spelled in Russian letters on the horizon during the sunset on May 31, 1928. Thus, Tsiolkovsky observed what is known as anomalous phenomena himself.
In many of his writings, Tsiolkovsky tries to convince his readers that life does exist on other planets, that outer space is populated by highly intelligent social beings and predominantly highly developed civilizations. In his "Scientific Ethics" he wrote: "Since life has appeared on Earth, why shouldn't it have appeared on billions of other planets having the same conditions as our own? The presence of life in the Universe is an incontestible fact. To assume that, apart from man, the Universe is unpopulated and lifeless because we cannot see its life is a gross delusion." According to Tsiolkovsky, when civilization spreads from one area of outer space to another, it "creates a wide variety of breeds of perfect beings -- capable of living in different atmospheres, at different gravity, on different planets, in a vacuum or in rarefied gas, living on food and without food - exclusively on sunrays, beings which resist cold, and beings which resist abrupt and considerable temperature fluctuations".
But a question arises, why have representatives of extra-terrestrial civilizations to this day failed to present themselves to mankind with full visual clarity? As if anticipating this question, in 1933 Tsiolkovsky wrote on a letter from student A. Yudin of Tomsk: "Attempts of higher beings to help us are possible, because they continue to be made to this day. We, people, do not try to convince animals of the irrationality of their life. The distance between us and perfect beings is hardly any less."
Tsiolkovsky was against any limitation of the sphere of scientific research. Speaking with his friend Alexander Chizhevsky, one of the founders of cosmobiology, he made indignant remarks about people who regarded as scientific only what they already "hold in their hands", excluding obscure phenomena from the sphere of science.
"Man is yet to study the entire Universe, a place which abounds in unknown and simply obscure phenomena. And yet he is already putting up fences between the possible and the impossible! Study this, but don't dare touch that!"
Another pioneer of Soviet cosmonautics, Friedrich Tsander wrote:
"Who, fixing his gaze on the sky on a clear autumn night, at the sight of the stars glimmering in it, has not thought that distant planets are perhaps inhabited by intelligent beings like ourselves but are culturally thousands of years ahead of us? Innumerable cultural values could be delivered to the Earth and multiply the treasury of science if man could transport himself there. What negligible expenditures this great scheme would require compared to what man squanders!"
Russian Visionary: Unknown Intelligent Forces
Here is what Tsiolkovsky, a great Russian visionary, wrote in 1928 in his work, "The Will of the Universe. Unknown Intelligent Forces" :
