Alien Identity In Michael Crichton's Sphere

Some time ago, I read a novel titled Sphere by Michael Crichton, a book about a team of people that descend deep underwater to investigate a spaceship buried under coral on the floor of the Pacific and believed to be of alien origin. They discover the spaceship is actually of human origin, and from the future, but there is an extraterrestrial object aboard that the team dubs “the sphere”. As the story progresses, members of the team individually enter this sphere and begin to exhibit strange behavior, until it is revealed that entering the sphere gives one the ability to bring their thoughts to life. Throughout the novel, they struggle to figure out exactly “what” they are up against. They assume it is an alien, but they discuss that the alien probably is nothing like what anyone
When a car passes me on the road going 20mph over the speed limit, I don’t automatically assume the driver to simply be an idiot and unsafe, but I instead consider that it is possible the person is rushing to the hospital to see their mother or father for the last time. This book also taught me about how I fit into the events around me. At the end of the book, the team sits in a room and considers what the purpose of the sphere really is. First they consider that it might be a test, to see who could survive with the near omnipotent abilities, but then they compare it to an ant wandering through a space station. The ant wanders into flames and thinks “Oh no, I’ve failed the test”, even though he wasn’t actually being tested. Through this, I’ve learned that not everything that happens to me happens because of me. I may simply be in the wrong place at the wrong time, or I may be a part of someone else’s story. This novel was an incredible piece of literature, it gripped me right up until the end, but it gave me more than just the story, it gave me these