The most amazing thing about fairies is this: They just refuse to go away. Through five centuries of advancing modern science and rigorous attempts to stamp out superstitions and the old belief systems, the fairy folk still make themselves known today. Modern science tells us confidently: Fairies do not exist. But there's a problem with this statement: People keep seeing and encountering fairies. This prompts the sceptics to trot out all the old explanations: The witness was mistaken or maybe saw something that only looked like a fairy; it's a hoax; the witness is lying or has an overactive imagination; the witness is suffering from mental illness. If multiple witnesses are involved, well, then it's time to bring out the time tested: Mass hysteria. And yet, a large number of the documented encounters with fairy entities belie all of these standard explanations. Most of the people who come face to face with fairies are completely normal people, mentally stable, not superstitious and very often not even religious. As we have seen, even men of hard science have encounters with little people at the most unexpected times and in the most unexpected situations. If fairies are real, the implications are astounding. For one thing, it means that we are not alone. That is, the human race is not the only species on the planet with higher-form, self-reflective intelligence. Indeed, it is an unnerving possibility for many people that the fairy folk may even represent a species that occupies an even higher plane of intelligence than our own. It may mean we are not the top species of earth. But others point out: If the fairy folk are superior to us in intelligence, why don't they rule and dominate the planet as does the human race? The answer is: Because they are different. The fairy population would appear to be not a technological race. They do not relate to their environment in the same way that we do. Rather than seeking to control and dominate nature, the fairy folk seem content to live in a kind of eternal harmony and balance with nature. They have ways to manipulate their environment which are so different from ours that it appears as magic to us. This difference between man and fairy has often put them at odds with each other. As the human race grows beyond seven billion people and our cities threaten to engulf every square mile of the planet, the fairy folk may cease to be the passive co-inhabitants of the earth they have always seemed to be. Will there be a limit? That is, is the day coming when those denizens of the fairy realm decide that they cannot let the human race swallow the entire planet with swarms of people that are consuming everything in sight? Or will the fairies just retreat further away into their own dimensions of existence, and leave the human race to its own fate? On the other hand, there is still hope. The human race may still find a way to live in harmony with the natural environment of the planet while, at the same time, continuing to be and do what human beings do - expand technologically and in knowledge, continue to explore and to grow the quality of our consciousness. The day may be coming when man and fairy find their mutual interests come full circle to support each other. Perhaps one day the human race and the fairy realm will come to know each other as fellow residents of the same planet, each species different and unique, but able to live together in cooperation in one world. A world where men, women and fairy folk all live in harmony on the same planet, each acknowledging the other's existence and accepting each other as natural - that would be a remarkable New World indeed.