[keiferski]

Why does it need to be a competition? I think both "typical materialist atheism" and traditional Christianity are self-centered views of the universe. Hence my comment. Modern atheist movements/positions in the West are themselves heavily in debt to Christian metaphysics and psychology in the first place, so it is not really surprising that they have similar structures.

And the idea isn't so much about aliens, more powerful beings in the universe, etc. rather that (I think) we can't understand or know a lot of fundamental things about reality; therefore, it seems logical to me that there is some higher form of intelligence or creative being beyond human understanding. Otherwise it implies that humans are the end-all, which I think is self-centered.