We could have evolved from aliens: new research suggests that life is unlikely to start on earth

We could have evolved from aliens: new research suggests that life is unlikely to start on earth
We could have evolved from aliens: new research suggests that life is unlikely to start on earth


This is what you will learn in this story:

  • A new study used mathematical formulas and showed that life began on earth.

  • Instead, the researcher points to Panspermia, a theory that life or ingredients for life reached the land of other parts of the universe.

  • The theory is very controversial among experts that seem to be agreed if any branch of the theory is a logical explanation of how life evolved.


In the second century. Lucian de Samosata, a satirical, wrote an interplanetary, extraterrestrial and spatial war history. Its history is often considered Aliens’s first written mention, and for centuries since he wrote it, humans have had their eyes in heaven, but what happens if us In fact, do you descend from extraterrestrial life?

Panspermia is the controversial theory that life evolved in other parts of the universe and, in some way or another, made it here, where it became the diversity we see on earth today. Perhaps the version of the most exciting theory (and science fiction), called directed panspermia, suggests the life of intentionally planted aliens on earth; In other words, aliens brought life here. Another version of resilient forms of life, such as bacteria, could have traveled through space in debris, accidentally colliding with the earth and propagated. However, a third version suggests that the basic components of life, such as amino acids, could come from other parts of the universe, and eventually evolve to life in our small blue point. It is not necessary to say that experts cannot agree on which line of thought is the most legitimate, or if there are reasons to believe in any of the theories at all, but a recent article provides new evidence to support that life on earth could have been extraterrestrial all the time.

Robert Endres, PHD, author of the document and professor of Imperial College London, is trying to understand the probability that the first cell, or a protocel, form spontaneously on Earth, a process known as abiogenesis. You don’t have to say that it is very unlikely. As described in a new paper Published in the Arxiv online Preprimpression platform, Endres tested several complex mathematical models to discover how long it would take to evolve life. He showed that the molecules would have to merge into microbial ways of impossible microbials because they degrade so quickly on their own. In other words, the molecules that make up life would have to be in the right place, at the right time, in the correct concentrations. Think about it how to try to solve a puzzle throwing the pieces in the air and waiting for them to get together as they fall to the floor, it is a very unreliable system.

According to the article, an important barrier for life that forms spontaneously is entropy. Also known as the second law of thermodynamics, establishes that all systems, when their own devices are left, will pass from one order to another. Therefore, it is unlikely that a disorderly “soup”, as described by Endres, would spontaneously become something as complex as a living cell. But just because something is unlikely It does not mean that it is impossible. You may throw that puzzles an inconceivable number of times, maybe it approaches perfectly at some point. Endres’s work does not rule out the possibility. However, the researcher also points to Panspermia as a “speculative but logically open alternative” to explain how the life of primordial chaos arose.

“Today, humans seriously contemplate Terraft Mars or Venus in scientific journals,” writes Endres. “If there are advanced civilizations, it is not unlikely that they can attempt similar interventions: curiosity, necessity or design.”

While the possibility sounds exciting, Endres notices that the idea of ​​the directed panspermia violates the Affair razor of Occam, or the principle that favors the simplest explanations on which many possibilities are required. It is also important to keep in mind that, no matter how “logically open” be the theory of Panspermia, it is not without criticism of other experts.

“I believe that deliberate Panspermia is a beautiful idea of ​​science fiction, but unfortunately unlikely,” says Simon George, PhD, a researcher at the Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute (SETI) that studies the origins of life and life in extreme conditions.

Other studyPosted in the magazine Scientific advances In August, he affirms that the earth may have needed additional help to begin life, although it does not prove the aliens for the habitability of the planet. The analysis of the team of samples of meteorites and terrestrial rocks suggests that the primary land was originally dry and rocky. The researchers believe that the Earth crashed with an object of Mars size called Theia, which introduced all the elements that made life possible here, including water.

“The Earth owes its vital news to a continuous development,” Klaus Mezger, PHD, co -author of the Scientific advances Document and professor of geochemistry at the University of Bern, he said in a Press release“But probably to a casual event: the late impact of a foreign body rich in water.”

For George, the idea that life evolved under the correct planetary conditions, instead of due to a casual event, as the Panspermia would suggest, is more attractive. He says that the earth has received a “chemical impulse”, but questions why “we need these molecules to be made in space”, emphasizing that the planetary conditions were very different when life began.

Among other experts, a universal criticism of Panspermia is that it does not address exactly because Life began, simply pushes it to another heavenly world. Along the same lines, Panspermia complicates the search for humanity of extraterrestrial life in a broader sense, because panspermia could have worked backwards; The spatial adventures of the Earth could have led their lives to other parts of the cosmos.

“Is it possible that the earth is or has been a source of Panspermia?” George Question. “If we discover evidence of life in other parts of the Solar System, resolve if (ha) sowing the life of the earth will be an important challenge.”

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(Tagstotranslate) Life on Earth

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