Well, not really, but this was just too rich to pass up.  Over the weekend I found myself lying in bed wide awake at 3AM for no apparent reason.  I went downstairs and flipped through the channels until I found an episode of MegaDisasters on The History Channel.  Typically this show is far too anxiety provoking for me to watch, but this time I was drawn in despite myself.

The episode was called "Alien Infection," and proposed the theory of infection coming from outer space, borne on the tails of comets.  The tails lash our atmosphere as the planet drives through them, and all that cometary debris enters our upper atmosphere.  And WHAT IF THERE WERE GERMS?

This theory of disease from space is a funny outgrowth of the "panspermia" belief that life on Earth was seeded from space.  Panspermia was popular in the sixteenth century (Shakespeare's time), but has largely fallen by the wayside as humanity developed the tools to actually study space.  While there could well be bacterial or viral life on other planets, the likelihood that it would survive a trip through the vacuum, absolute zero temperatures, and unshielded radiation of a trip through outer space is, shall we say, low.

This hasn't stopped people from proposing that the flu virus specifically was brought here by a comet.  As this charmingly clumsy web page points out, Comet Encke swung past Earth on June 16, 1908 and October 27, 1914, and was at perihelion (its closest approach to the Earth) in 1918.  The theory is that migratory birds picked up the virus as it drifted down through the atmosphere, then passed it on to humans.

One problem with this theory is that the Spanish Flu outbreak began in the trenches of WWI, where there were precious few birds to be found.  Another problem with this theory is that it's completely absurd.  But when did a silly thing like absurdity ever stop anyone from believing something?

In 2005, a pair of "researchers" from a university in Wales doubled down on this craziness by putting forth the theory that solar winds act to push the viruses down from the upper atmosphere into the bit that we breathe.  A Stanford physicist interviewed by Space.com to comment on this theory said that "the authors have several factual errors, inconsistent and completely undeveloped theories, a distinct lack of logic, and an alarmist rather than scientific perspective."

Further eroding confidence in this theory is the statistic that on average, if you live 5,000 years, you will physically encounter one - one! - particle of comet dust.  Of course the doubters will say that it only takes one, if it's massively virulent and dangerous enough.  But seriously, people!  This is ridiculous.

The Welsh researchers noticed that periods of increased sunspot activity happened to coincide with periods of flu pandemics.  This is of course another example of the logical fallacy "correlation does not equal causation."  It may be true that most axe murderers prefer chocolate ice cream, but chocolate ice cream does not drive people to commit axe murders.

Meanwhile, back here on Earth, the best prevention against the flu continues to be a seasonal flu vaccination, and washing your hands.