Scientist ‘finds extra-terrestrial fossils in meteor fragment’

Scientist ‘finds extra-terrestrial fossils in meteor fragment’

Daily Times, Pakistan

A controversial British scientist claims to have found ‘proof’ that aliens exist - after cracking open a lump of rock which he believes fell to earth in a meteorite shower.

Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe, formerly of Cardiff University, claims the two-inch wide lump of space rock is pitted with microscopic seaweed fossils similar to those found on Earth.

‘These finds are crushing evidence that human life started from outside our Earth,’ said the professor, who is notorious for his theories that life on this planet was ‘seeded’ from outer space.

‘We are all aliens - we share a cosmic ancestry,’ he said. ‘Each time a new planetary system forms a few surviving microbes find their way into comets. ‘These then multiply and seed other planets. ‘These latest finds are just more evidence to point to the overwhelming fact that life on Earth began on other worlds.’ ‘Our provisional assessment is that it was part of a comet’, he told MailOnline.

‘The stones look extremely unusual, and have a porous structure, with a lower density than anything we have on Earth.’ Professor Wickramasinghe’s claims are outlined in a freely accessible paper on the website of the Journal of Cosmology. It says ‘a few percent carbon as revealed by analysis confirms the status of a carbonaceous meteorite.’

However, today he admitted key tests to prove it is an uncontaminated meteorite have not yet been carried out. ‘This was a rapid publication - we wanted to provoke interest, and we will be publishing in a peer reviewed journal, but we are not sure which yet one.

‘It is the facts that will prove this - and we hope to have conclusive proof within weeks.’ However, a string of experts have already lined up to dismiss his claims as ‘laughable’ and argue that the apparent extra-terrestrial fossils are clearly present as the result of contamination here on Earth. Another points out that it has yet to be proven that the rock is actually from space at all. ‘Describing it as laughable is a natural reaction, that is the traditional view, and until all of these tests are completed, these criticisms are out there,’ he said.

The research alleges that ‘microscopic fossilized diatoms (a basic form of algae) were found in the sample’, which fell in Sri Lanka in December last year. The finding, it suggests, is a ‘strong evidence to support the theory of cometary panspermia’ - the idea that life across planets is spread on rocks hurtling through space. The still-smoking meteorite fragments were picked up by villagers in central Sri Lanka after they crashed to Earth in a spectacular fireball, it is claimed.

They were analysed in a British laboratory where fossils of algae were apparently found.

It is claimed the finds are similar to micro-organisms found in fossil remains from the dinosaur age 55million years ago. A mathematician by training, Professor Wickramasinghe believes that life on Earth was seeded by comets and asteroids 3.8billion years ago. He also believes that pathogens like the SARS virus arrived here from deep space. He was head of Cardiff University’s Centre for Astrobiology until two years ago when funding for the department was withdrawn and he was dismissed from his post.

The controversial professor, the only scientist to testify against evolution in the famous 1981 creationist trial in Arkansas, has since carried on the project as a private company and charity. He said: ‘The algae organisms are similar to ones found in Earth fossils but the rock also has other organisms we have not identified.’ Astronomer and lecturer Phil Plait wrote in his blog on Slate that the chemical analysis presented in Wickramasinghe’s study ‘doesn’t prove it’s a carbonaceous chondrite, let alone a meteorite,’ and there is ‘no reason to trust that what they have is a meteorite.’

Plait also cited a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology Patrick Kociolek as saying that there was no sign that the diatoms illustrated in the study were ‘fossilized material’, and that most of them were species that represented ‘a clear case of contamination with freshwater’. Monica Grady, professor of Planetary Sciences at the Open University’s Faculty of Science, told MailOnline she finds the whole thing ‘laughable’. ‘There are serious inconsistencies with the data presented in the paper,’ she said.

‘The most important is that the rock they have found is yet to be proven to be a meteorite. ‘Until that is done, no credence can be placed on the findings presented, especially when they are published in a non-mainstream journal.’ Professor Wickramasinghe, 74, claims microbes from outer space arrived on our planet from comets which then ‘multiplied and seeded’ to form our life. The two-inch wide piece of meteorite was found near a village a few miles from the city of Polonnaruwa in Sri Lanka. The fragments were said to be still smoking when they were found by woman villagers. They were sent to Cardiff University’s School of Earth Sciences where they were examined under a scanning electron microscope.

Professor Wickramasinghe, who is originally from Sri Lanka, and his late colleague Sir Fred Hoyle championed the ‘life from outer space’ theory from the 1960s. He said: ‘Evidence from astronomy overwhelmingly supports the view that life did not start on Earth but was seeded from outside.’ daily times monitor

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