Although it's a common topic in the likes of Star Trek or Wars, it's now got some basis in reality - aliens may actually look like humans.

Professor Simon Conway Morris of Cambridge University is a proponent of convergence theory with regards to alien life.

Simply put, the theory is that human life originated not through random patterns but through a specific and rigid law that allowed life to flourish on Earth.

"I would argue that in any habitable zone that doesn’t boil or freeze, intelligent life is going to emerge, because intelligence is convergent," Professor Morris said.

The palaeontologist speculates that, because of this theory, alien life on planets that are capable of sustaining human life most likely look like us, bar one or two minor differences.

"One can say with reasonable confidence that the likelihood of something analogous to a human evolving is really pretty high. Given the number of potential planets that we now have good reason to think exist, even if the dice only come up the right way every one in 100 throws, that still leads to a very large number of intelligences scattered around, that are likely to be similar to us."

That being said, Professor Morris has some interesting views down through the years and clashed with the likes of Richard Dawkins over how humans evolved on Earth.

Morris' new book, The Runes of Evolution, explain his theory in greater detail but all we're getting from this is that Spock might actually be real and we can meet him.

 

Via Independent.co.uk