THE METEORIC ORIGIN OF MAN.

Auckland Star, Volume II, Issue 557, 23 October 1871, Page 2

THE METEORIC ORIGIN OF MAN.

The British Association for the Advancement of Science is now holding its .ir.nnri! meeting iit Edinburgh, under the Hin-r-fion of Sir William Thompson, \U :■■< iv!j inaugurated President. Although not -■•• well known in America as his predecc-s ■ iv.c Chair, Prof; Huxley, he has a higl; iv ; . : us abi-oa !a; > physicist, and tlio. c-xp 'siikc, ■.*!' his opening address of the prog <« •■'■■'■ pros.-ota of modern science will uU.mcE • ileiijive nQmnja* pectful attention fro.v so) ■nUllc ;:ien througpout, the world. The President of the British Association is expected, on such an occasion, to tell his hearers not only what was been done during the year, but something of the possibilities which science waj soon develop into realities. Sh1 William Thompson has done this, and lie has done it in words likely to be the subject of much controversial comment. Nor is it in his own particular field of study that he advances a theory a3 remarkable a^ it ia new but rather in one with which Prof. Huxley's name is iudissolubly associated.

The evolution hypothesis, as is: well known, attributes the origin of all terrestrial life to a primal organic germ. Having gone thus far the interrogatory, whence came this primitive seed of life ? is at once suggested, and in thi3 final question all biological investigations ultimately terminate. To answer it, so far as the earth is concerned, is what Sir William Thompson has attempte I to do. He first denied the sulliciency of the lF*evlidence by which the theory of spontaneous generation is sought to be maintained. " Careful enough scrutiny," he says. " has in every case up to the present day discovered life as antecedent to life ;" and he adds, " I am ready to adopt as an article of scientific faith", true through all space and through 1 all time, that life proceeds from life, and from nothing but life."

Proceeding I:lien to ask how life originated upou the globe — whether in the completeness of full-grown forms, or merely as a seed that is sown—he tells us that every year 'countless myriads of meteors are being hurled through space, thousands and perhaps millions of which annually fall to the earth's surface. It is certain that some of these fragments are broken off from larger solid masses." As there can be no doubfc that if, from any cause, portions of the earth should now be forcibly detached and launched out into space, they would carry with them living seeds, animals and "plants, so it is exceedingly probable that these meteors | are seed-bearers. "If at the present moment," he says, "no life existed upon this earth, one such stone falling upon it might, by what we cull natural causes, lead, to its becoming covered with vegetation. The hypothesis that j life originated on this earth through moss-grown fragments from the ruins of another world may seem wild and visionary ; all that I maintain is, that it is not unscientific."

" This interesting theory fails, however," says a writer in the .-^Tew York Sun, " to bring us any nearer a solution of the great problem of the origin of life. If it is true, it is well for us to know that organic were .first brought to the etoih by meteoric messengers ; but the fact affords no n;w or additional light

which will aid our infiriea. The scientific question : Whence camthe primitive seed of life ? is as applicable tcpy other world whose ruins may be thus cont'ually coming to us as it is to the earth jilone. In connection with S William Thompson's: hypothesis, it would t interesting to kno\* whether organic matt has e?er been di#. covered in the compction of meteorite. If it ha?, we do not reme.ber ever to hare sees the fact stated. [i