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8 BCE
ANCIENT ROMANS
Communication is the way to say or to inform about things. In those times, communication was only verbal, creating confusions between the church and society. The people in churches were the only people in the society who knew how to read or to write, so all the information was created and explained by priests. People must believe what priests were saying even if it was not true, and that’s what happened with the theory of spontaneous generation. -
SCORPIONS EXPERIMENT
This experiment from the scientist Helmont consisted of getting a brick and carving an indentation into it. Then, he filled it with crushed basil, and he covered the brick with another brick, so that the indentation is completely sealed. Finally, he put the two bricks in a place where there was sunlight. The results were surprising, and at first, no one could explain them. There was a scorpion next to the bricks. -
REDI’S EXPERIMENT
Redi’s experiment consisted of putting in three jars some meat. Redi’s hypothesis was that worms were born from eggs laid by flies, and he proved this by closing or opening the tasks. The first one he maintained open, the second one closed but with a fine tissue and finally, the third one that to close the flask he put a thick tissue. What happened is that in the first, egg laids were in the meat, in the second, nothing happened and in the third one, egg laids were on the tissue. -
NEEDHAM’S REBUTTAL
Needham wanted to prove the experiment of Redi. What he did was to boil a liquid with microorganisms to kill them and to see if it was false the spontaneous generation.
He observed how microorganisms disappear during the boiling process but, after this process, they appear again. So he concluded that the spontaneous generation was true. -
CRITICISM FROM SPALLANZANI
Spallanzani did not agree with Needham’s conclusions, so he did another related experiment. Spallanzani poured a flask with a cup on it, so he didn’t allow microorganisms to enter inside the flask. This difference was very important because Spallanzani didn’t see any trace of life. After that, he opens the flask and microorganisms enter again into the liquid, making it visible. Finally and thanks to this experiment, Spallanzani concluded that the experiment from Needham was incorrect. -
Spontaneous generation end of the theory
During this century, scientists proved that spontaneouos generation it was false, that everything happened for a reason. -
PASTEUR PUTS SPONTANEOUS GENERATION TO REST
Louis Pasteur wanted to do an experiment about spontaneous generation and leave the system open to air. He subsequently designed flasks with S-curved necks downward. He observed during 1 year that no life was created there because no bacterias or microorganisms could enter into the flasks. Finally, Pasteur reasoned that the contamination came from life forms in the air, so that it wasn’t true the “life force”.