No body knows. Don't let anyone convince you otherwise. They're just appropriating primacy. All we know is that we all got here somehow... Everything is just a story trying to explain that fact. Aliens, like humans, invoke either creationary, evolutionary or other originary narratives. Aliens are "real" in the sense that we are "real" for about 120 years... Without us, no one would care if there were aliens. The question of aliens, be they angels, demons, lifeforms, sonic resonances, intergalatic plasma pulses or pysionic emanations from multiple dimensions... these ALL have no meaning without humans. This gives you a clue. It's all in our heads until we manifest it outwardly... and then they will just be us! The desire to reconnect with the creator or the originator or whatever we emmanated from is what drives humanity to imagine spindly space species. In a very real sense, your parents and all of their parents before them are the true aliens... raised in another time and dimension that we cannot comprehend except through poorly rehearsed screenplays. First contact is when they cradle you at birth and last contact is when you lay them in the ground. Intergalactic communication sucks and we are no good at even trying to improve our universal translators... Live long and prosper! \\//_