NARRATOR: Highly advanced
humans living thousands
of years ago...
unidentified DNA in
the human genome...
and ancient chronicles
describing heavenly
interventions on Earth.
Did humans really evolve
from apes?
Or is our intelligence the
result of an otherworldly
design?
LINDA MOULTON HOWE: What
are humans made of?
Why do we evolve the way we do,
grow the way we do,
think the way we do?
PHIL IMBROGNO: There's no
explanation for human beings.
They shouldn't be here
on this planet.
NICK REDFERN: Science and the
world of history, even in
archeology, is still
scrambling around for answers.
GIORGIO TSOUKALOS: We should
finally come to grips with the
idea that extraterrestrials had
something to do with
our development.
NARRATOR: Millions of people
around the world believe we have
been visited in the past by
extraterrestrial beings.
What if it were true?
Did ancient aliens really help
to shape our history?
And if so, might evidence of
alien contact help to unlock the
mystery behind the
creation of man?
NARRATOR: South Africa.
25 miles northwest of
Johannesburg lie the
Malapa Caves.
Here, in August of 2008,
paleoanthropologist Lee Berger
and his nine-year-old son
Mathew discover several
fossilized skeletal remains of
two-million-year-old early
humans, including a female adult
and male child, perhaps a
mother and son.
The size and shape of the bones
indicate that the individuals
walked upright and had
modern hands.
Over the past several decades,
scientists have unearthed the
remains of nearly two dozen
different types of early human
ancestors, all known
as hominids.
LAN TATTERSALL: We have
an extremely good fossil record
of ancient hominids, and
I think the picture emerging
from it is pretty clear
that in earlier days,
before Homo sapiens came
along, there were typically many
different kinds of hominids
coexisting in the world.
CRAIG STANFORD: We have a
hard time getting our
minds around this now because,
of course, there's just one kind
of human on Earth today and
there's seven billion of us, but
at one time, within the last few
hundred-thousand years, you
could find two or even three
species of hominid living in
the same area at the same time.
NARRATOR: Most mainstream
scholars tell us hominids
evolved from an ape ancestor
nearly six million years ago
through what is referred to as
natural selection.
This theory of evolution was
first popularized by English
anthropologist Charles Darwin in
his 1859 book On the Origin
of Species.
TATTERSALL: Darwin's
mechanism of evolution was
natural selection.
That is to say a
long-term process whereby
better-adapted individuals
reproduce more successfully.
FIORELLA TERENZI: Darwin's
theory of evolution by natural
selection explain that organism
with certain traits, such as
mutation, turn out to be
actually beneficial, turn out to
be of advantage in the struggle
for reproduction.
So mutation allow
organism to survive and
to pass on to the next
generation these mutation.
NARRATOR: Darwin speculated
that over time, hominids walking
on two feet used their hands
to make tools.
This, in turn,
made them smarter.
Then, approximately 200,000
years ago, hominids evolved into
Homo sapiens... or modern man.
But many scholars dispute
Darwin's findings.
REDFERN: We don't see
dolphins building cars.
We don't see elephants
building houses.
That might sound trite, but it's
a fact that these animals just
simply haven't progressed and
advanced in the way we have.
And the big question is,
why is that?
Why should that happen?
Why should we be so unique?
STANFORD: Tool use doesn't
really come into play for
several million years after the
first earliest humans began to
walk upright.
And then brain size
doesn't really begin to
expand and really mushroom in
size until the last several
hundred thousand years.
So, actually six million years
of human evolution, there are
millions of years separating
each of those major features:
upright posture, tool use,
brain expansion.
So Darwin was wrong because he
couldn't possibly have known the
chronology in his day.
NARRATOR: In 1967, British
zoologist Desmond Morris argued
against Darwin's theories on
evolution in his book
The Naked Ape.
In it, Morris wrote that there
was no reason why man stood
alone from other species in
terms of his nudity.
TATTERSALL: Well, of course,
as Homo sapiens we still
continue to have a coating of
hair, but that hair is very
much reduced over most of our
bodies, and that reduction
probably goes back way beyond
Homo sapiens in time.
It probably goes back to the
time when the very first early
bipedal hominids came out of the
forests in Africa into the
savannahs where they had more
sun and more thermal radiation
to cope with.
STANFORD: In places like
Europe, Northern Europe, why we
lost body hair is the chicken
and egg question.
Did we lose our body hair
because we began to wear
clothing to keep us warm or was
there some other factor at work
that caused us to lose
our body hair?
Perhaps women didn't find body
hair on men attractive, and so
it was lost because they didn't
choose those men as mates.
There's no way to ever answer
that question.
TSOUKALOS: if we were to
subscribe 100% to the idea of
survival of the fittest, isn't
it illogical to think that all
of a sudden we're completely
naked and we're losing all
of our fur?
I mean, that makes absolutely no
sense because right after we
shed our fur, we had to wear
furs to keep warm.
Had we not worn any furs, we
would have frozen to death,
we would have died.
So the whole idea that we shed
all of our hair in order to
survive because we were
stronger, logically makes
no sense.
NARRATOR: But if Darwin's
theory of natural selection
cannot account for the
appearance of intelligent
hairless Homo sapiens, what can?
Might the transition of hominids
to modern human beings have been
the result of an otherworldly
design, as ancient astronaut
theorists believe?
Alfred Russel Wallace, a
colleague of Darwin, called it
the intelligence evolution.
TATTERSALL: Darwin believed
that the human brain had
been driven into existence by
natural selection, but Wallace
couldn't quite see how this
could be so.
What Wallace perceived was that
the way that humans think, their
intellectual faculties are
qualitatively different from
anything that had preceded them,
and he couldn't quite see how
this enormous gap could be
bridged by natural selection.
So he invoked another
explanation for the evolution,
the arrival of modern human
cognitive abilities.
His choice was a spiritual
explanation.
DAVID CHILDRESS: Alfred
believed there was an unseen
creative spirit that was behind
all life on our planet.
And he believed that this unseen
creative spirit had interceded
three times in this planet.
The first was to create life
from inorganic matter.
And then the second time was
when animals achieved some kind
of consciousness.
And the third time was when
humans suddenly were able to
have the mental abilities that
we have today.
But he felt that it wasn't just
random selection like Charles
Darwin thought.
He believed that all of these
changes had a creative
intelligence behind it.
REDFERN: The view that I have
is that because the rest of
nature hasn't changed that much,
that arguably, we shouldn't.
So that suggests to me we're
seeing something potentially
that has gone against nature,
and if it's gone against nature,
maybe that means because
somebody has been manipulating
nature.
IMBROGNO: There's no
explanation for human beings.
They shouldn't be here on this
planet.
If we were evolved and changed
by an extraterrestrial source
from our early primate
ancestors, that's the only way
really you can account for the
human species, unless you of
course, put God in the equation.
And who knows who the gods may
have been.
GEORGE NOORY: Charles Darwin
might be rolling over in his
grave right now, but it's very
possible that mankind came about
because of extraterrestrial
intervention.
NARRATOR: Did the evolution
of modern humans really receive
a jump start by extraterrestrial
beings, as ancient astronaut
theorists believe?
And, if so, might there be
tangible evidence?
Some scientists believe proof
can be found... inside the human
brain.
NARRATOR: Chicago, Illinois.
December 2004.
Researchers at the Howard Hughes
Medical institute of the
University of Chicago publish
the results of a study that
claims the sophistication of the
human brain was the result of a
so-called special event.
They said mankind's intelligence
was not only the result of
evolution, and that around
50,000 years ago, the genes of
ancient humans went through an
intense amount of change in a
relatively short amount of
time... what some refer to as
the big bang of the brain.
IMBROGNO: No one really knows
how human beings developed so
fast in such a short period of
time.
I don't believe it was done
naturally.
TATTERSALL: it's very clear
that fully modern intellectual
function is a very recent
acquisition in our lineage.
It's not an improvement upon
what was there before.
It's a new kind of manipulation
of information in the mind.
HOWE: There's no other animal
creature on the planet that has
such a comparative point, and
that's why they call it the
Big Brain Event.
REDFERN: People talk about
the missing link.
Where is the link between going
from apes, monkeys, gorillas,
etcetera, to being able to
develop atomic weaponry and fly
in space?
PHILIP COPPENS: When we're
looking at the origins of man,
we realize that 50,000 years
ago, we really went where no
creature on Earth had gone
before.
We have become human.
NARRATOR: But what was the
spark that spurred human
intelligence?
Was it a genetic mutation
brought about by the natural
selection process of evolution,
as many mainstream scientists
contend?
Or could it have been a genetic
modification produced by
extraterrestrial beings, as
ancient astronaut theorists
believe?
STANFORD: There is the idea
that there was a gene or genes
that popped up sometime in our
ancestors randomly, that may
have given us the ability
to symbolically represent
objects in our environment or be
abstract.
Those are things that, for
instance, chimpanzees have a
great deal of trouble with, even
when they're taught language.
TATTERSALL: Homo sapiens
emerging from Africa started
to behave symbolically.
They started to manipulate
information in their mind in a
way in which their predecessors
had never done before.
They disassembled the world
around them into a vocabulary of
discreet symbols, and recombined
them so they could imagine new
kinds of worlds.
ERICH VON DANIKEN: Long, long
time ago, extraterrestrials
arrived on this planet.
They realized that the planet
was full of life, and one of
them was the most advanced form,
was one of our ancestors.
They took the DNA out, and then,
changed the basic information in
the DNA.
This is what our genetics are
doing every day.
Now the cell was changed.
The product you plant into the
womb of a female of the same
species.
This female will give birth to a
child approximately after nine
months, but because of this
artificial mutation, that's
different, because it was made
artificially by the
extraterrestrials.
BILL BIRNES: What if, as part
of the genetic updates human
beings were getting from
extraterrestrials, one of those
genetic updates involved a
software download, a biological
download to differentiate the
different hemispheres of the
brain to allow human society
toolmaking, fire, social
organization to be created, and
from that, that particular
species of hominid became the
human being we are today?
DR. LYLE ARMSTRONG: if alien
species out there could fly
across interstellar space, then
in all probability, they would
have similar DNA recombinant
technology.
Of course, it would depend on
their own genetic composition
being similar to ours.
But if they understood
sufficient chemistry and
physical principles from their
own experience of the physical
world model, then in all
probability, manipulating our
DNA would be simple.
NARRATOR: But if alien beings
created humans by genetically
altering our primitive
ancestors, might various
versions of hominids have been
the result of experiments at
creating intelligent life on
Earth, as ancient astronaut
theorists contend?
COPPENS: This is one of the
greatest unanswered questions.
The ancient records do not say
that we are part of a social
experiment.
The ancient records say that we
were bestowed upon this gift.
The gods gave us the gift of
intellect.
And it is for us to use it.
So yes, we might actually be
part of an experiment, but it
might be an experiment in
intelligence.
It might actually be a game, a
kind of the greatest reality TV
show, whereby the entire human
species is watched by ancient
aliens who have been watching
the show for maybe 50,000 years.
TSOUKALOS: Fox P2 is a gene
that was found in our
nucleotides, and it is something
that sets us completely apart
from any other animal.
And scientists have suggested
that that gene alone is
responsible for language.
And there is absolutely no
evidence of origin or that this
thing somehow mutated from the
animal kingdom towards us.
So this gene exists out of
nowhere without any origin.
So my question is, is it
possible that this gene was
given to us, or grafted into us,
by extraterrestrials in the
remote past?
And the answer is yes.
HOWE: Was it the same
nonhuman ancient aliens of so
many ancient settlements on this
planet deciding that they wanted
humans to be able to communicate
at a more sophisticated level?
I think that's the fundamental
angst today among people trying
to understand who are we in
relationship to
extraterrestrials that may have
been manipulating DNA on this
planet for thousands of years.
NARRATOR: Might the evidence
of our alien origins really have
been passed down to us implanted
in our genetic code, as ancient
astronaut theorists believe?
Perhaps further evidence can be
found, not by scientists, but
by religious scholars, that
claim Adam and Eve really did
exist.
NARRATOR: The Hebrew Bible.
In it, the Book of Genesis
describes how God created the
first two humans, Adam and Eve,
in the Garden of Eden and told
them to "go forth and multiply."
For centuries, scientists and
theologians have debated whether
this story of the Creation of
Man was mere myth or historical
fact.
JONATHAN YOUNG: The Torah
mentions that humanity is made
out of the dust of the Earth,
and that God breathed life into
this to make us animated.
Here is the breath of soul,
the breath of vitality, the
divine breath, which suggests
that the spark, the life force
that makes a human body tick is
divine in its nature.
NARRATOR: In 1987, scholarly
disagreements over the Origin of
Man intensified with the
discovery that the genetic
lineage of every living person
could be traced back to a single
woman who once lived in Africa.
TATTERSALL: it is pretty well
established by now, particularly
from the molecular, the DNA
record, that Homo sapiens did
originate at one place in Africa
and after having become fully
modern in the sense of
intellectually modern, spread
out to occupy Europe, to occupy
eastern Asia and the old world
in general.
STANFORD: it's sometimes
called the Eve model, not
meaning that we're all descended
from the same woman, but it does
mean that there was a woman in
that early human population
migrating out of Africa, who was
the only female who ultimately
left her genes in every modern
person.
NARRATOR: But is it possible
that mainstream science, and
the Book of Genesis, are both
pointing to the same moment
in ancient time, when modern man
first appeared on Earth?
NOORY: The myth of Adam and
Eve, I think, is not a myth.
I think it's a true story.
I think Adam and Eve were on
this planet.
They were the first human beings
that we know of.
And they helped populate this
planet.
What is the Garden of Eden?
I think it just happened to be
the area that the genetically
manipulated human being, Adam
and Eve, were placed.
That's where they lived.
That's where they started to
breed.
And that's where the populations
of the planet started to grow.
NARRATOR: if Adam and Eve
actually had existed, as
described in the Hebrew Bible,
might this also mean that a
serpent really did tempt them to
eat from the Tree of Knowledge?
And, if so, might this account
have been an effort to describe
the sudden awakening of the
modern human mind, when man
first became an intelligent
being?
PETER FIEBAG (translated): In
the Bible it says that if you
eat from this tree you will be
like God.
Satan, in the form of a snake,
tempts Adam and Eve and promises
them that they will be like God.
The knowledge that Adam and Eve
acquire, as well as humanity in
general, gives man the ability
to eventually carry out genetic
manipulations.
CHILDRESS: So what was this
Tree of Knowledge?
Is the Tree of Knowledge in fact
the helical DNA sequencing in
our own bodies... that was
genetically engineered
by extraterrestrials 50,000
years ago, so that we would have
the abilities that we have
today?
In my mind, it's our DNA itself
that is the Tree of Knowledge.
But why was this suddenly a bad
thing?
It would seem that the aliens...
some of them wanted us to have
this knowledge, to be like the
gods, but others said no, no.
Man is not to have all of this
knowledge.
This is also the same story of
the Greek god Prometheus, who,
against the orders of the other
gods, comes down to Earth and
gives mankind the knowledge of
fire.
But because of this gift to
mankind, he himself, as a god,
is, like Satan, he's
banished from the Earth.
And why?
Because he helped mankind to
have greater knowledge.
TSOUKALOS: The whole idea or
concept of Satan is based on a
misunderstood visit by
extraterrestrials in the remote
past.
According to the ancient
astronaut theory, the reason why
we have the idea of a Satan
today is because there might
have been some type of a mutiny
between good and bad
extraterrestrial factions in the
remote past.
And so the mutineers were cast
out by the commander and they
became known as the evil fallen
angels, which they never were.
NARRATOR: if, as ancient
astronaut theorists believe,
extraterrestrials were
responsible for providing humans
with intelligence, might they
have also given man the ability
to speak?
IMBROGNO: Our voice box, our
larynx is so different than the
apes... even the chimpanzee who's
our closest cousin... that we're
able to produce sounds and
produce language.
To a scientist today that's
almost like it was genetically
designed so that we can say
words and sing.
REDFERN: There really isn't
anything more advanced than the
human language... so many
different cultures, dialects,
languages around the world.
And the very fact that we can
communicate on such a deep,
extensive level... that really
sets us apart from all other
animals.
Who invented language?
Where did that come from?
Was that something instilled in
us?
I think these are mysteries
that, to a large degree, science
and the world of history, even
in archeology, are still
scrambling around for answers.
Maybe we shouldn't be looking
down here for answers.
Maybe we should be looking up
there.
COPPENS: We are told, in the
Bible, that we are made into the
image of God.
What does that mean?
Does it mean that we were made
physically in somebody's image?
And so therefore, the question
namely whether we are
descended from apes and other
creatures on this planet, or
whether we truly have been
engineered, can be answered by
mythology.
Mythology is able to say that we
are not descending from the ape,
but that something happened on
this Earth and an alien
intervention came and we were
the end result of this.
ERICH VON DANIKEN: In my
opinion, the extraterrestrials,
by an artificial mutation, they
created the intelligence of
humans.
Then the extraterrestrial
disappeared.
And some of our ancestors had,
again, sex with their ancestor,
with ape-like beings.
And that was called into
mythology, "original sin."
Then they return again,
the gods, they realized what
happened...
(thunder booming)
...and they decided to destroy
the whole race by a great flood,
and to restart the experiment
again with what we call
in mythology, Noah.
That's all text.
That's the way it is.
CHILDRESS: it would appear
that extraterrestrials came
here, used great apes, other
early hominids, created what
would be Neanderthal man, or
Homo erectus, somebody similar
to us, and then refined that
hominid until they came up with
Homo sapien...
and then the other early
hominids were destroyed.
NARRATOR: Might the biblical
account of Adam and Eve and
Noah's Ark really be the
retelling of extraterrestrial
events, as ancient astronaut
theorists believe?
Perhaps further evidence can be
found in the archeological
remnants and eyewitness
accounts from man's earliest
known civilization.
NARRATOR: Northern Iraq.
Along the east bank of the
Tigris River, opposite the city
of Mosul, lie the ruins of the
ancient city of Nineveh, a
place originally inhabited
by the Sumerians of Mesopotamia.
Here, in 1842, British
archaeologist Austen Henry
Layard unearthed the ruins of
the great library of
Assurbanipal, a royal archive
containing thousands of clay
tablets with cuneiform
inscriptions.
Dating to 3000 BC, the messages
carved into stone are considered
to be the world's first written
accounts.
IMBROGNO: Sumerian tablets
are probably one of the oldest
form of a written record that
we have.
They've been translated, and
they tell exciting stories about
how gods intermingled with human
beings and actually had a hand
in the creation of human beings.
Whether or not it's just
mythology or if it's fact,
no one really knows.
NARRATOR: According to
interpretations of the Sumerian
tablets, the gods were called
the Anunnaki.
JASON MARTELL: What we're
looking at here is a Sumerian
tablet that actually shows the
Tree of Life flanked by
divine beings.
You can see here the Anunnaki
on each side.
We also see the winged disc,
a symbolic reference that the
Anunnaki had the power of
flight.
They actually had necklaces with
astronomical references...
a moon, a star, various symbols,
which even could be symbolized
as a wristwatch...
technology being used 6,000
years ago.
NARRATOR: The written
accounts etched into stone
suggest the Annunaki were
giant beings, standing eight
feet tall, who came to Earth in
search of gold for
their home planet.
MARTELL: When the Sumerian
gods, the Anunnaki, realized the
toll it was taking to mine the
gold themselves, they decided
to fashion a worker being, a
slave to mine the gold for them.
And they explain in the Sumerian
creation tales that this was an
arduous process.
So it's very possible that our
genetic evolution was a process
done by the Anunnaki to create
us in their image and
after their likeness.
NOORY: They created man
according to the Sumerian texts.
They created Adam and Eve.
How interesting that the Bible
will echo the story... but talk
about it in terms of God.
REDFERN: it's almost like
these highly advanced creatures
were acting as teachers.
And certainly, Sumerian culture
and mythology is full of stories
of, you know, receiving
visitations from these
mysterious higher entities that,
you know, bestowed wisdom, and
fantastic ideas and concepts.
And, you know, you have to
wonder... is this just down to
myth, or was somebody coming
down and really trying to give
us a push, if you like?
NARRATOR: Ancient chronicles
of sky beings creating human
life are common in early
cultures found all over
the world.
But while mainstream scholars
often dismiss this evidence,
might such tangible historical
accounts provide proof of alien
intervention in man's evolution,
as ancient astronaut theorists
believe?
TSOUKALOS: The Sumerians are
not the only culture that talks
about this.
Also in the Koran, it says that
language was given to us by
Allah, or God.
The Maya Popol Vuh says that
language was given to us
by the gods.
The ancient Egyptian texts are
saying the exact same thing.
It doesn't matter what ancient
culture we look at, they all say
the same, that language was a
gift from the gods.
We should finally come to grips
with the idea that
extraterrestrials had something
to do with our development.
NARRATOR: Prior to the use of
early systems of writing,
ancient people carved symbolic
communication into stone.
Called petroglyphs, the oldest
date to about 10,000 to 12,000
years ago.
According to ancient astronaut
theorists, petroglyphs located
in the American Southwest link
the prehistoric ancestors of the
Zuni and Hopi tribes with
star beings.
FIEBAG (translated): The
first graphic expressions by
humans were petroglyphs.
That means symbols or figures
scratched into stone.
The Hopi Indians, for example,
scratched petroglyphs into their
rock faces that show people with
radiating wreaths, gods that
descend from the sky.
The Hopi Indians say that these
beings are Kachinas...
beings from space who came to
Earth in aircraft, who were not
gods, but who brought them
knowledge from another planet.
We have the same phenomenon in
Europe, in Valcamonica.
We have it in Asia.
We have it in Brazil.
REDFERN: When we look at the
fact that all around the world
we hear similar legends of
people from the stars coming
down and having a profound
impact on the people of this
country or that particular
culture, all embroiled in
similar time frames, you know,
we're seeing a pattern
developing, and it's difficult
to dismiss that that pattern is
suggestive.
In our ancient past, creatures
came down, interacted with us,
and maybe manipulated us to
become the people we are today.
NOORY: Why are so many past
civilizations all saying similar
things?
I think the simple answer is,
is that the same thing happened
and they know the story.
And the story is that
extraterrestrials came to this
planet, genetically made and
manipulated whatever creatures
were here at the time, and
helped jump-start society.
The bottom line is, every
civilization talks about
the existence of man through the
eyes of a god, and if you think
of the eyes of the god as
ETs, it all makes sense.
REDFERN: Back then, this was
the way they communicated events
that were significant to them.
And so when we have this imagery
of the so-called star people on
petroglyphs and things like
that, they're clearly
chronicling something real, to
my mind at least, that occurred
in their history.
The big question is, what?
NARRATOR: But while the
evidence of contact between
alien beings and early humans is
compelling, what if life did not
begin here on Earth, but
arrived from somewhere else?
NARRATOR: Huntsville,
Alabama.
NASA's Marshall Space Flight
Center.
Here, in March of 2011,
astrobiologist Richard Hoover
reports the extraordinary news
that he found microfossil
organisms... or ancient
bacteria... inside rare
meteorites that are more than
four billion years old, dating
back to the birth of our solar
system.
Until recently, scientists did
not believe life could survive
the rigors of space travel.
But Hoover's finding suggests
that live bacteria made it to
Earth and may have even taken
root here.
TERENZI: Microorganism
trapped inside comets can
survive the travel through
interplanetary space and
interstellar space.
And the reason is that the
microorganism are trapped in the
rocky core.
Around, you have a thick shield
of icy material.
And on top, you have a
stratification of dust.
Dust is highly effective in
shielding the microorganism from
ultraviolet light.
So comet are an excellent
vehicle to transport
microorganism, single-cell life,
amino acid in the vastness
of space.
REDFERN: instead of aliens
coming to the Earth in UFOs in
classic Hollywood terms, a
microbial piece of life comes to
the Earth, say on a meteorite,
survives entry into our
atmosphere, crashes on the
planet and begins to thrive.
NARRATOR: The theory that
life on Earth began with alien
organisms landing here from
other parts of the universe is
controversial.
Called panspermia, one of the
most vocal proponents of this
theory was Sir Francis Crick, a
British scientist who
codiscovered DNA in 1953.
FIEBAG (translated): Francis
Crick, codiscoverer of the
double helix in cells, said that
all this can't happen by chance,
but has to have been engineered.
One of his arguments is that the
rotation of the DNA is in the
same direction for all living
things.
Had DNA developed on Earth, it
would probably have had a 50-50
distribution, and that's exactly
what we don't have.
NOORY: One of the reasons why
I think the theory of panspermia
is so incredible is that it
tells you that there's life
throughout the universe.
If panspermia is correct, life
came here on comets or
meteorites, and we're being
seeded, not only on this planet,
but other planets as well.
And it could be part of the
great design.
BIRNES: it is the
intentional... the deliberate...
colonization of other planets,
other worlds, by an intelligent
race of beings using not flying
saucers landing in the desert
somewhere or in the middle of a
city, but the best way to
colonize a planet... you colonize
it with your own DNA and let the
DNA sprout into your own
species.
REDFERN: In terms of our
science and technology today, we
have the ability to extract
cells and DNA at a genetic level
and save them.
That's how we have so-called
test tube babies for couples
who can't have babies.
We preserve the materials for
when they need it.
And the day may well come when
we send into outer space the
equivalent of, like, Noah's Ark,
but instead of sending literal
animals, we send their essence...
their DNA, their genetic makeup.
I don't rule out the idea that
we could seed a whole new world.
NARRATOR: Today, scientists
know that only about five
percent of the DNA contained in
our genes is used to reproduce
human beings.
The remainder is an
undecipherable code, once
referred to as junk DNA.
But is it really possible that
so much of our DNA is
unnecessary?
Or might the majority of our DNA
be decoded sometime in the
future?
And when it is, what might our
DNA reveal about the origin of
modern man?
TSOUKALOS: Just because we
cannot decipher 95% of our
genetic material doesn't
necessarily mean that that 95%
is, in fact, useless.
Nature is extremely efficient.
DNA is the most powerful storage
device in the universe.
Not even with all the
supercomputers combined in the
world could we store as much
information as we could store
on DNA.
So I'm suggesting that the
ultimate proof of
extraterrestrial life will not
be found in a crashed spaceship
or in a text, but it will be
found within our own genes.
CHILDRESS: We have so much
to learn from studying our
own DNA.
We're only just now beginning to
decode the human DNA sequence.
And as we do that, what we may
discover is that
extraterrestrial DNA is built
into our own genetics.
NOORY: Whatever is out there
created the universe, this
planet, and other planets
and life.
And I strongly believe that this
tie-in with whether gods and ETs
were one of the same might very
well be the case.
It does not take away from the
fact that there's a god, that
there's a higher power, that
there's some creation out there
that made the ETs, but I think
that layer between God and man
is right in the middle,
and that's extraterrestrials
from other planets.
VON DANIKEN: We have to learn
that most of our knowledge in
religion is wrong, except one
thing: there is creation.
There is what we call God in
all respect.
And we have to learn by religion
we are very teeny, little beings
in this gigantic universe and
why God is absolutely
unexpressible.
It's so gigantic.
It's so wonderful.
So we would never lose God when
we continue to think of
extraterrestrials.
God becomes bigger.
NARRATOR: Is it really
possible that humans evolved
from bacteria growing in some
sort of primordial ooze?
Or were we intelligently
designed by a higher power...
of extraterrestrial origin...
as ancient astronaut theorists
believe?
Perhaps the answer lies within
the very essence of what makes
us human.
And with this knowledge, we may
yet discover our rightful place
in the universe.
Captioning sponsored by
A&E TELEVISION NETWORKS
Captioned by
Media Access Group at WGBH
access.wgbh.org