Convergence to a Lamarckian Model of Cosmic Biology

Abstract

This paper is our evaluation of the astrobiological significance of recent findings secured using the James Webb Telescope on the “biomarker” composition in the atmosphere of the Earth-like exoplanet, K2 18b. Thus, to put this finding in perspective, we briefly review a wide range of recent studies these past 45 - 50 years from astronomy, space research and biology that converge towards the validity of a cosmic model for the origin and evolution of life—involving biological processes more akin to acquired Lamarckian rapid adaptation genetic processes. These also include Horizontal Gene Transfers rather than the traditionally understood (and ponderous) Darwinian natural selection processes. Indeed, there is extensive evidence for extant rapid Lamarckian and Lamarckian-like acquired inheritance processes in the biosphere of our planet Earth. Further, an important astronomical and astrobiological finding that puts the K2 18b discovery in context is the early 1980s discovery that the extinction spectrum of intact living bacterial cells in the large interstellar dust clouds detected from an emitting electromagnetic source near the centre of our galaxy (GC-IRS7, 23 K light years) over the mid infrared wavelength range 3 - 4 u. That key finding and many others combined to put in perspective the recent discoveries of life-associated products dimethyl sulphide and dimethyl disulphide in the atmosphere of K2-18b (120 light-years). These data add to the body of work of the new perspectives on a cosmos likely to be teeming with life in many cosmic niches.