World’s in a bit of a mess at the moment, isn’t it? Wars and conflict. Trump in the US, Brexit in the UK. The ice caps melting, species becoming extinct, pollution, internet trolling, fake news, stabbings, car bombs. If there are living beings on any one of those seven new planets the astronomical community has recently been getting so excited about, and if those beings can see us and what we’re up to, you wouldn’t be surprised, would you, if they’d taken one look at us and switched their lights off so we can’t see them any more – that way hopefully ensuring we’ll give up any thought of visiting.

What is it with us? We seem incapable of coming together and sorting out our differences without resorting – or threatening to resort – to violence in some form or other. If you were an inter-galactic psychologist and the human…