Is there only one form of life? Has there been a blind spot to the possibility of ‘alien’ life on Earth?
Paul Davies an acclaimed cosmologist and theoretical physicist at Arizona State University raised this interesting point at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Chicago on Feb 15 in his lecture titled “Shadow Life: Life As We Don’t Yet Know It”.
Davies said, “It’s entirely feasible that we’ll find a shadow biosphere … Our search for life has been based on our assumptions of life as we know it … Weird life and normal life could be intermingled, and filtering out the things we understand about life as we know it from the things we don’t understand is tricky.”
“Life as we know it appears to have had a single common ancestor, yet, could life on Earth have started many times? Might it exist on Earth today in extreme environments and remain undetected because our techniques are customized to the biochemistry of known life?” asks Davies
Davies also pointed out that if we were to discover exotic life on earth it might of not actually developed here. It may have originated elsewhere in the Universe and hitch hiked a ride to Earth by piggybacking on a meteorite. Whats even more interesting as Davies notes “If it’s happened more than once in the Solar System, then the Universe will be teeming with life”
Famous for thinking “outside the box” some of Paul Davies most famous books include “How to Build a Time Machine” and “The Mind of God“. He is one of the few physicists I actually find interesting.
Maybe there is a whole alien civilization growing in my shoe cabinet. A scary thought.
Regards
Danny
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