Are octopuses aliens? Researchers raise curious possibility

Since the beginning of time, the origin of planet Earth has been a controversial subject that generates much discussion. Religious people believe that, at the beginning of everything, there was a Creator God who was responsible for creating all things and beings on Earth.

On the other hand, Science postulates several theories that say that life may have actually emerged from another part of the Universe and was formed by explosions, meteorites, algae and bacteria. Little by little, these beings reproduced until they became what we know today.

Regardless of any opinion or belief, we must agree that this is a subject that generates, at the very least, a great deal of curiosity. Understanding how it all began and where we came from gives us an overview of the possible reasons why we are here, in addition to being a very intriguing topic.

A curious study

An article was recently published containing information that has been widely discussed on social media. The article talks about nature and its approaches, and is entitled “Cause of the Cambrian Explosion – Terrestrial or Cosmic?”

Despite containing very rich references and being peer-reviewed, the text presents approaches that are somewhat different and distant from what is currently thought and understood.

Understand the article

Those responsible for writing and creating the article are the well-known and acclaimed scientists Stephen Fleischfresser, Edward Steele and Chandra Wickramasinghe.

Steele creates a theory he calls “metalamarckism.” For him, evolution, like the acquisition of genetic changes, is determined by the influence of the environment rather than just random mutations.

Wickramasinghe postulates and agrees with Fred Hoyle’s hypothesis about the production of organic carbon molecules from stardust.

The work relates to the biology of comets and also suggests that evolution was affected by the biochemistry of the formation of the first amino acids, as described, and did not occur on Earth.

Wickramasinghe mentions that:

“[…] Comets are the bearers and distributors of life in the cosmos, and life on Earth arose and developed as a result of the contributions of comets.”

However, his approach goes even further, as the scientist suggests that any virus and some cellular forms, such as a eukaryotic cell, could have reached Earth and, with more suitable conditions, managed to proliferate.

Traveling octopuses?

If you think that’s all there is to it, you’re very wrong! That’s because the scientists’ theory goes even further: it suggests that cephalopods, like octopusessquids and nautiluses, did not appear on planet Earth, but in other parts of the Universe.

Scientists believe it would not be possible for cephalopods to evolve so quickly, branching into so many species of different shapes and sizes in such a short space of time.

According to them, the genomes of this species would have arrived on planet Earth in what they describe as “icy fireballs several hundred million years ago”.

The theory then proposes that the origin of life may be outside our planet and that truly complex forms may have ended up here by pure “luck”.

The arguments in the article are valid, as are many others that already exist out there, and of course, just as there is a chance that the theory is correct, it may also be wrong on some points.

The article was published by the magazine Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology and it is already available in full, if you want to read it. Just type the name of the magazine into Google and go directly to the magazine’s own website.

So, tell us in the comments what your opinion is on the subject. After all, aren’t we alone in this vast Universe?