TheSpiritualPilgrim Posted September 20, 2013 Share Posted September 20, 2013 Came across this article today: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2416761/Scientists-claim-evidence-ALIEN-LIFE-Balloon-sent-edge-atmosphere-picks-organisms-come-space.html Seems far fetched and yet to be proven but who knows? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Babylonian Dream Posted September 20, 2013 Share Posted September 20, 2013 What I would like to know, the article leaves out conveniently enough: Could it have been carried up by the balloon by accident? Was it living in the stratosphere? Has it been shown or proven to be related or not related to other life forms on this planet? Has its DNA been examined? If it had to have come from elsewhere, where would that elsewhere be? All of these must be asked and answered prior to concluding what they have concluded. I'm sure there are more questions that must come first, they're just what first pops to mind. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pandora Posted September 20, 2013 Share Posted September 20, 2013 Um, no. I won't swear to it, but I thought it was common for microscopic organisms to be caught up in rain and the atmosphere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thurisaz Posted September 20, 2013 Share Posted September 20, 2013 Until and unless strong evidence for extraterrestial origin is presented, I'll assume this is similar to the deep underground organisms that no one thought could possibly exist but nonetheless have been found miles-deep below the surface not too long ago. Never underestimate the capabilities and creativity, so to say, of our native lifeforms Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenstar Posted September 20, 2013 Share Posted September 20, 2013 Yes.. there are a lot of microbes, bacteria and other life in the atmosphere. That is old news. Now.. alien life? Don't know. Would it be distinctive genetically? Depends I guess on whether panspermia is real or not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thurisaz Posted September 20, 2013 Share Posted September 20, 2013 Something else to consider...: If these are alien microbes, I'd see no reason why they would pop up (pop down from space?) only now; if the claim was true I'd expect to see microbes of distinctly different genetic makeup, namely the "recent arrivals" vs "those who've been living and evolving here for a long time". If alien bugs are coming down from the sky they must have been here already for a long time. I'm not an expert on genetics but I haven't heard yet of any evidence for that... even with all the liars-for-money we call media these days I think we can be sure they would have exploited any such story to the max. It would have been plain impossible to miss it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Babylonian Dream Posted September 20, 2013 Share Posted September 20, 2013 My post disappeared. But the scientist is a creationist. Just as a side thought to ponder. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thought2Much Posted September 21, 2013 Share Posted September 21, 2013 Sigh. The guy making this claim is the same guy who was making the bogus claim that alien diatoms were found in a meteorite in India. He makes claims like this all the time but never has any real evidence to back them up. He will continue to make these claims and publish them in his bullshit "Journal of Cosmology" until he dies. Also, if the Daily Mail claims that the sky is blue or that water is wet, you'll probably want to go verify it to make sure they're correct. You can't believe a thing they publish about science. Ever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seeker001 Posted September 21, 2013 Share Posted September 21, 2013 He is already coming at it from a point of view that life on earth was seeded from comets http://asiantribune.com/?q=node/2788 Let's just say his prior hypothesis was correct, then how do we know for certain these are new alien life forms as opposed to the life forms already living and evolving on this planet? How long have they been living there? Seems much too early to claim, ALLLIIIEEEENNNNSSS, because there are so many other factors that need to be studied. I'm calling bs and another case of the media jumping onto something without confirmation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Voice Posted September 21, 2013 Share Posted September 21, 2013 Bugs don't fly between planets. Mold spores might float between planets. Microbes might be bound up in comets. We're really close to finding microbes in comets. I'm holding out for the squid's 200m relatives on the water-ice moons of our solar system's gas giants. I'm sure there are bugs waiting there too. Bugs adapted to those environments. Let's find those. Then I'll party. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Babylonian Dream Posted September 21, 2013 Share Posted September 21, 2013 Though because this came from the media outlets people love, people are going to run with this unfortunately. And as for us, we're part of the coverup supposedly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skepticalme Posted September 23, 2013 Share Posted September 23, 2013 They talked about this article on the Skeptics GUide to the Universe podcast. There are alot of proplems with claiming this as evidence of alien life. They say it is aquatic algae. OK, if it can be classified as something we have here on earth, it's not from space. An organism from space would be so vasty different from anything on Earth, you wouldn't be able to classify it. Many may say that, "Well life on Earth just evolved for it". A few problems with that. The idea of panspermia is that the life that arrived here is the common ancestor of all life that evolved from it. We know that aquatic algae is not the common ancestor of all life. Many organisms on Earth are more primative, but still related to algae through a more primative common ancestor. If life did arrive on Earth via panspermia, it would have been much more primative than algae. Occams razor can be applied here. If you can't explain how an organism traveled tens of thousands of feet into the air, don't jump to the conclusion that it must have traveled light years instead. If the former is improbable, the latter is many, many orders of magnitude more improbable. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheSpiritualPilgrim Posted September 24, 2013 Author Share Posted September 24, 2013 Interesting that this guy is known for making these types of bogus claims. I figured if it was reputable there would have/should have been a lot more media on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Babylonian Dream Posted September 24, 2013 Share Posted September 24, 2013 Interesting that this guy is known for making these types of bogus claims. I figured if it was reputable there would have/should have been a lot more media on it. And alot more thought put into the claims being made. I mean, I had to do a search to figure out the details because the people reporting on the claims clearly didn't get his nonsense, but wanted page views. So I just did the research, hence how I found out he was a scientist who, when not stating that amoebas are coming in from outerspace, is defending creationism as a courtroom scientist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bornagainathiest Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Just playing devil's advocate for a moment... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deinococcus_radiodurans http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reports_of_Streptococcus_mitis_on_the_moon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_interstellar_and_circumstellar_molecules http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interplanetary_dust_cloud http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martian_meteorite (It has recently been established that rocks from the surface of Venus and Mercury could also have made their way to Earth, via the same mechanism - asteroid/comet impacts on those particular planets.) http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.html I cite these links because I reckon there's plenty of potential for alien bugs to hitch a ride on dust particles, meteorites and other stuff. But do I buy into this particular claim? BAA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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