“Prof Chandra Wickramasinghe and Dr Janaki Wickramasinghe claim Venus’s clouds contain chemicals that are consistent with the presence of micro organisms.”

These two are from Cardiff’s centre for Astrobiology and the elder of the two has singlehandedly given the field a bad name over the past twenty years.

The whole concept of this idea is that life form in clouds on Venus and blew to Earth on a wind. Why it isn’t simply to postulate it formed here and just stayed, I don’t know.

I once had a lecture from Chandra Wickramasinghe in which he drew scatterplot with two points on it and then joined them with a straight line. This, he said, was evidence of a trend. That was it for him and me.

BBC NEWS | Wales | South East Wales | Life from Venus blown to Earth?