EXCLUSIVE INVESTIGATION: Do Planets Have Feelings?

Of all the mysteries contained in this vast, wondrous universe, none has gripped philosophers, scientists, and amateur stargazers as tightly as one burning question, deceptively childlike in its simplicity yet so implacably difficult as to thwart centuries of tireless investigation by the world’s best minds. That question is, do planets have feelings?

It’s a question all of us have asked at one time or another, as we share a picnic blanket under the stars with our high school sweetheart or pause between hammer strikes as we bludgeon a stray cat to death to glare mistrustfully at the moon. Are those giant glowing orbs, spinning around up there in infinite blackness like the blades of a private helicopter, happy? Are they sad? Perhaps they’re racist, hurling epithets at our tiny blue dot like debris from an exploded star. We can’t know – we’ll be long dead by the time any of their hateful speech reaches us. The onus is on us to find the answer to this question, because our continued support of NASA, astrophysics, and the exploration of space would become problematic if it’s going to lead to the colonization of a bunch of racist planets. (Of course, our support will continue either way, our destiny lies in the Virgin Airlines shuttle that eventually takes us to Mars while the poors overrun Earth and deplete it to ashes like a bunch of locusts we inexplicably gave the right to vote, but before we get there it would be nice to know whether the Red Planet is leading an existence of contentment or despair, and whether or not it finds the word “Red” offensive.)

To solve this mystery, let’s examine what we know about the planets:

They’re distant. The planets are very far away from us, and, consequently, from each other. Must be lonely. Probably too far to hold a conversation, and definitely too far for a comforting hug or a smooch. Sure, there’s rocks and stuff swirling around them, Saturn’s got those rings made of ice, but have you ever tried to smooch a rock? It’s bullshit. Conclusion: Planets might be lonely.

None of them are smiling. This stands as powerful evidence both for and against the existence of planetary feelings. Sure, it could be they aren’t smiling because they are inanimate celestial giants, devoid of feeling. But it could also be that they aren’t smiling because they’re all miserable (see “distant lonely planets,” above). There also exists a third possibility, which is that they aren’t smiling because they don’t have mouths or faces. Conclusion: Inconclusive.

They don’t follow my dog’s Instagram account. Dr. Barks has over 10,000 followers, and not a single one of them claims an orbit in our galaxy. Sure, you can argue that maybe there just aren’t any wireless providers that offer coverage beyond the asteroid belt, but it is highly suspicious. Dr. Barks is adorable, and only a moldering husk of negativity could resist clicking that heart button after seeing one of his pics. Conclusion: Planets might hate dogs.

There is no evidence they have watched The Hangover trilogy. If you ask anyone, right now, what are the funniest movies of all time, every single person would answer “The Hangover trilogy” without hesitation. And yet we can find not a single shred of evidence that Jupiter, Saturn, or any of their cousins have ever seen it. What are we to make of this information? Could it be that the planets don’t have a sense of humor, or that they don’t appreciate fine art? Or do they just not have an adequate streaming service? They also don’t have eyes, but only maybe 30% of the jokes in The Hangover trilogy are visual, so we shouldn’t make any assumptions. Also their eyes might be very tiny and thus invisible to our telescopes. Conclusion: Planets aren’t funny, and are possibly blind.

Thanks to our inquisitiveness, and the power of deductive reasoning, we now know that the planets almost certainly have feelings, but are very private about them. They don’t want to share their joy, but they also don’t want to burden us with their self-doubt and probable blindness. Colonization may begin in earnest.