The question of how intelligent life arose on Earth has worried mankind throughout its history. The surviving ancient records, right up to the rock paintings, indicate that people are constantly thinking about this issue. Today, there are several stable theories that offer a wide variety of solutions to this issue. All these theories can be roughly divided into two groups: scientific and non-scientific. Non-scientific theories have a close connection with religion, and, in most cases, run counter to the scientific understanding of the world around us. Recently, more and more adherents are winning the theory of panspermia, or the theory that it was an extraterrestrial virus that created man on earth.
Scientific or non-scientific theory
As far as the theory of panspermia is scientific, each reader will decide for himself. We will only note the fact that the theory that an extraterrestrial virus created a person has much in common with a number of clearly unscientific theories. Judge for yourself, the theory of creation, according to which all living and nonliving was created by a higher mind, called God, is somewhat similar. Both theories say that life was brought to Earth from outside, and only then independently developed into what we have today. The adherents of both theories speak of a possible higher intelligence, which could consciously bring to earth the rudiments of intelligent life. The question is how we call this mind - God or an alien.
Thorium panspermia
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For the first time, a scientist and researcher from Germany G. E. Richter spoke about such a variant of settling our planet in 1865. According to his theory, life on earth originated through the delivery of living organisms to our planet in the form of spores or microorganisms that could get to us on a meteorite or were specially brought in by alien intelligent beings. Over time, other researchers and scientists, such as Kelvin, Helmholtz, joined him. And the famous scientist Vladimir Ivanovich Vernadsky considered panspermia as a contextual possibility of his theory of human origin.
Although this theory has been criticized, especially with the discovery of radiation and cosmic rays, at some point it got the ground for development. Many researchers again turned their eyes towards the theory of panspermia after the APOLON mission, which was engaged in space exploration, discovered living organisms of terrestrial origin in outer space. This happened in the process of examining Surveyor, the device launched to the moon. It was on its surface that terrestrial microorganisms were found, which again inspired the adherents of the theory of panspermia.
The adherents' arguments
What are the arguments of the adherents of panspermia, and is this really a scientific theory? The main reasoning for this theory is based on the study of various fossils. For example, a study of some meteorites that fell at different times on the surface of our planet showed the presence of fossilized bacteria or the remains of the simplest filamentous organisms on their surface. This theory was indirectly confirmed in 2014 after the completion of the experiment - the ground-based apparatus FOTON-M4 was investigated, on which 11 surviving bacteria and 4 spore-forming bacteria were found.