Reply to post:

I find it thoroughly amusing that in the case any aliens ever actually find and retrieve the puzzling object they found in orbit around the Sun (assuming no other knowledge of us down here), the real explanation of what it is and how and why it got up there will eternally stay relegated to "crackpot conspiracy theory" territory - no sane alien archaeologist will ever subscribe to "purely because we can and because it's cool, no practical purpose whatsoever"...