The Universe Has Terrible Aim
The Multiverse Employee Handbook defines “Interstellar Relations” as “the ongoing diplomatic failure between one small planet and a galaxy that keeps sending rocks instead of messages.”
And really, it’s hard not to take it personally. Every few years, the cosmos lobs another icy fragment our way—first ‘Oumuamua, then Borisov, and now 3I/ATLAS—each one careening through the Solar System as if to say, “Sorry, wrong address.”
Astronomers call them interstellar objects: travellers ejected from distant planetary systems, wandering the galaxy until they accidentally collide with our collective sense of importance. The latest arrival, 3I/ATLAS, even had the audacity to fly past while our governments were still arguing about telescope budgets.
How to Lose a Planet in 10 Billion Years
Every planetary system, including ours, produces debris—frozen leftovers flung out by gravitational mishaps during its formative years. Most drift quietly between the stars for billions of years, gathering cosmic-ray scars and a certain existential charm.
Occasionally, one crosses paths with us. Humanity, naturally, reacts by assigning it a press release, a tracking designation, and a personality. We send telescopes to study it, write papers about it, and hold committee meetings to decide whether to panic.
Meanwhile, the rock continues to ignore us with the serene indifference of a glacier checking its email.
Why We Keep Getting Hit With Invitations We Didn’t Ask For
The James Webb Space Telescope recently peered at 3I/ATLAS and found familiar ices—water, carbon dioxide, complex organics—proof that the ingredients for worlds are everywhere. In a sense, these visitors are postcards from other suns, carrying the same chemistry that built us, just mixed in a different galactic kitchen.
Which raises a question: if we share cosmic ingredients, why does the universe keep sending them at ballistic speeds directly toward our solar system?
The official explanation is celestial mechanics: gravity’s messy bookkeeping. The unofficial one is that the universe finds us entertainingly reactive.
What to Do About It (Besides Complain)
Future observatories like the Vera Rubin Observatory will soon spot many more of these wanderers—faint streaks of motion against the stellar wallpaper. Some scientists even propose intercept missions, which is a polite way of saying we plan to chase them down and drill holes in them before they leave.
It’s an exciting prospect: finally, first contact with another solar system’s geology! Though from the rock’s perspective, it’s probably more like: “I travelled twenty light-years for this?”
Still, each visitor teaches us something new. Their orbits reveal how planetary systems scatter matter; their composition tells us which stars cook with carbon and which prefer nitrogen. And the act of noticing them reminds us that science, like bureaucracy, only functions because someone insists on writing things down.
Conclusion: The Universe Is Not Targeting Us (Probably)
So no, the interstellar isn’t really throwing rocks at us. It’s just being its usual chaotic, gravitationally uncoordinated self. We’re simply standing in the cosmic splash zone, clipboard in hand, marvelling that debris from other worlds occasionally lands in our paperwork.
And that’s the wonder of it: in a galaxy of a hundred billion stars, we can spot one tiny fragment passing through—and, for a moment, feel connected to everything. Then it leaves, and we go back to arguing about the banner budget.
Want to hear more? 🎧 Listen to the full episode — What 3I/ATLAS Taught Us About the Galaxy—and Ourselves