Aliens! Trivia Quiz

Answer: Cattle mutilations

In a 'usual' case, a cow has its eyes and genitalia removed with what looks like surgical precision, its interior organs dissolved or removed, most blood drained and strange holes in the earth nearby. Popular explanations include: Satanists, PTSD Vietnam veterans snapping, government experimentation and, of course, aliens with their probes. Most experts, though, have come up with perfectly natural explanations for the dead cattle.

Answer: saline

Their oceans are the same as ours. Saline water means a 3-5% amount of salt to water, by volume, and Earth's oceans come in at about 3.5%.

Answer: David Bowie

The Bowie concept album "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars" was a success, but a modest one. It hit platinum in the UK, but only gold in America. But "Rolling Stone" magazine named the album #35 on the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, and it reached #11 on Virgin's list of the best albums ever. Ziggy played guitar...

Answer: Art Bell

Art Bell served in the Air Force during the Vietnam conflict and operated a pirate radio operation from Amarillo AFB, playing protest songs. After the war, he worked as a DJ in Japan, then moved back to America where he went to work for KDWN in Las Vegas.

After the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, he shifted the focus of "Coast to Coast AM" from straight news call-ins to an emphasis on crop circles, ghosts, doorways to Hell and, of course, aliens. All sorts of aliens.

Answer: The Great Gazoo

Gazoo showed up halfway through the show's final season, an exile from the planet Zatox. The only people who could see him were Fred, Barney, Pebbles and Bam-Bam--and, of course, all those who use Flintstones Chewable Vitamins.

Answer: Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence

SETI was originally partially funded by NASA (in 1971), but later the various projects under the SETI umbrella, including META (for Megachannel Extra-Terrestrial Assay) and Project Phoenix (which is a general survey of stars), have depended on private donations. Dr. Carl Sagan and Soviet scientist Iosif Shklovskii popularized the program in 1966 with their book "Intelligent Life in the Universe".

Answer: Nevada

Area 51 is part of the military base on Groom Lake, about 85 miles from Las Vegas. It's part of the Nellis Military Operations Area. According to alien experts, it contains crashed alien spaceships that the government is reverse-engineering, corpses of interstellar travelers, and time-travel devices. Portrayals of Area 51 have appeared in the movie "Independence Day" and the video game "Tomb Raider 3".

Answer: John Adams

The Alien Enemies Act, which gives the government the power to arrest and deport citizens of countries at war with America, has never been repealed. The Naturalization Act, which expanded the residency requirements for naturalization (to 14 years, from 5 years) was repealed in 1802, during the Jefferson presidency.

Answer: Kenner

When the "Star Wars" line of action figures was revived in 1995, Kenner was a division of Hasbro, which held the rights to the toys. The original release was so popular that other films and series decided to release their own little plastic androids, robots and aliens--I had five or six Cylon action figures from the original "Battlestar Galactica" myself.

Answer: Chariots of the Gods

Von Däniken and his theories managed to get 62 million books sold, in spite of real scientists taking the time to refute, page by page, everything he postulated. On the plus side, his works inspired "Alien vs. Predator" (though some say that his works were stolen from earlier writers, such as H.P. Lovecraft).

Answer: Whitley Strieber

Strieber said that on the day after Christmas in 1985, he was abducted by non-human creatures (that he called "The Visitors"). The book "Communion" appeared on the New York Times bestseller list in the 'non-fiction' category, hitting #1 and staying on the list for fifteen weeks (in hardcover) and the paperback stayed on the list for 36 weeks. Strieber is otherwise known for his books "The Hunger" and "The Wolfen" and for his podcast "Dreamland".

Answer: James Cameron

"Aliens" starred Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley, pressured to return to LV-426 to once again face the creatures that haunt her dreams. James Cameron decided to make the movie more of an action film than a horror movie, and his decision paid off handsomely. "Aliens" grossed $131 million worldwide during its release and scored seven Academy Award nominations, including a Best Actress nomination for Weaver. Cameron would go on to direct "Titanic", "Terminator 2" and "Avatar".

The other three listed answers also directed films in the "Alien" series.

Answer: "Rapture" by Blondie

Whether or not "Rapture" was the first rap song, it was definitely the first rap-influenced tune to hit number one on Billboard. It was the second single from Blondie's "Autoamerican" album, and Erasure covered the song on their 1997 album "Cowboy". And I think it's pretty much the only song to have a Martian eating your head.

Answer: Jimmy Carter

In 1969, Jimmy Carter (then working on his family's peanut farm) was getting ready to deliver a speech to a Lions Club meeting when he and about ten other people saw a bright light in the sky which moved around, changed colors and finally disappeared into the distance.

He made a detailed report of the incident four years later, when he was Governor of Georgia. Of course, this is the same guy whose boat was attacked by a rabbit. Strange things happened to Carter...

Answer: Scientology

Xenu (or Xemu) came to Earth 75 million years ago and killed billions of members of his alien race via hydrogen bombs. The spirits of those unfortunate ETs have hung around ever since, plaguing human beings. The Xenu teachings are nominally available only to those who've contributed considerable sums of money to the Church, but news of them has leaked out to the general public.

Answer: Voyager 1

Voyager 1 and its sister probe Voyager 2 each carry the message "This is a present from a small, distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours" from then-President Jimmy Carter. Also on the discs are whale-song, sounds from earthquakes, Chuck Berry performing "Johnny B. Goode" and recordings of brainwaves.

Answer: Golf

Astronaut Alan Shepard, the first American in space and the fifth man to walk on the Moon, brought a modified lunar scoop with a six-iron head attached to it and knocked a couple of golf balls around in the low-gravity surface. Due to the constrictive nature of the suit he wore, he had to make his drives with one arm only, but he still achieved a pretty impressive distance.

Answer: Solomon

The Solomons were played by Lithgow (as Dick Solomon, High Commander), Kristen Johnson (as security officer Sally), Joseph Gordon-Leavitt (as information officer Tommy) and French Stewart (as communications officer Harry, who occasionally channeled messages from the home planet and the Big Giant Head). The show won eight Emmys and two Golden Globes.

Answer: Space Invaders

Space Invaders, when released in Japan (by Taito--they licensed the American rights to Bally Midway), caused a shortage of 100-yen coins and certainly took in its share of shiny American quarters. By 2007, the game had earned $500 million in revenue. It influenced many other early video games, including Galaxian and Centipede.

Answer: Peru

Some of the designs are over 200 meters across, and include representations of spiders, birds, fish, llamas and one that looks suspiciously like a guy in a spacesuit. They were made by removing rocks and pebbles from the ground, so that the earth beneath (a different color) was revealed to the sky. Erich von Däniken, of course, says that they're runways for some kind of ancient aircraft.