Spontaneous generation

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Spontaneous generation was once believed to be the mechanism by which organisms could originate directly from non-living matter. The process is also known as abiogenesis, from the Greek roots a-, not, bio-, life, and genesis, origin.

Early examples of this theory included the generation of maggots from rotting meat, mice from dirty hay, and lice from sweat. However, these examples were disproven by scientists like Francisco Redi (1668), Lazarro Spallanzani (1858), and Louis Pasteur (1860), whose experiments form the basis of the law of biogenesis.

However, even if all living organisms in the present era are descendants of earlier living organisms, it is assumed by many scientists that the earliest organisms to evolve were generated from organic, but non-living, substances. This situation was a type of abiogenesis, but not the type called 'spontaneous generation' that was once posited as the source of fully-formed maggots, mice and lice.