The existence of organic life in different worlds in the Universe is considered one of the basic principles of the Spiritist Doctrine. Commenting on the answer to question 55 of The Spirits' Book, Allan Kardec states:

God set living beings in several worlds and all of them concur for the ultimate purpose of Providence. To believe that these living beings only exist in our planet would be to doubt the wisdom of God, who has not done one useless thing. Certainly, He must have given these worlds a more serious destination than that of only delighting our sight. Moreover, there is nothing regarding the position, the volume, nor the physical constitution of the Earth that may lead us to think that it has the privilege of being inhabited to the exclusion of many billions of similar worlds.

This undoubted principle of Spiritism causes discussions and controversies mainly arising from psychic information, particularly about details of the physical characteristics and lifestyle outside our planet. At the time of our Encoder, some psychic messages, excessively imaginative, caused confusion on the subject. Subsequently, psychic messages dealing on the subject were criticized for going against scientific evidence.

In the edition of the newspaper Folha Espirita in August 1976 (text reproduced in the book Lessons of Wisdom) Chico Xavier was questioned as to the findings of spacecraft Viking 1 and 2 which showed that there is no life on Mars as informed by some psychic messages received by him. Our beloved Chico answered that such psychic messages probably referred to life in the spiritual dimension, intense in areas, which the physical man classifies as desolated. 

What Chico Xavier said about the matter - Questioned specifically about the message of the Spirit Humberto de Campos, received in 1939, in which the disembodied benefactor describes city organizations in Mars with sophisticated technology, Chico said:

Humberto de Campos, in the spiritual dimension, and from the very beginning of his messages sent through us, always showed a remarkable clear thinking. It is much more reasonable to assume that the error, if there was an error, should be attributed to my carelessness or incompetence in dealing with mediumship because, at the beginning of the psychic task, I was very much concerned about life on other planets.

Carrying on, Chico once again mentions the possibility that these descriptions refer to the spiritual dimension, where life exists in unfamiliar vibrations of science. And the medium concludes:

Nevertheless, being sure about this matter, I ask myself if in 1939, therefore, thirty-seven years ago when I began my work, I did not interfere in the psychographics of our distinguished writer, unconsciously changing names or situations, without the least intention to meddle in the messages coming from him.

Chico's remarkable answer shows nobleness and deep moral straightness and once again draws the attention of Spiritism scholars to the complex interaction Spirit/Medium. Therefore, all of us, we refer to the details of the possible cosmic biology we should be careful not to run the risk of becoming unrealistic and relaying misleading information. 

Evidence of life beyond Earth - What does Science say about this? Hernani L. S. Maia, a chemistry professor at the University of Minho in Portugal, through the book Origin of Life: Recent Contributions to a Scientific Model, recently gave an important contribution on this subject. Below we reproduce the main considerations of this work.

So far, no life was found in the solar system, excluding our orb. Soil fragments collected on the Moon and Mars found nothing. Pictures of different stars identified nothing. No scientist believes that there may be complex life forms, intelligent (an intelligence similar to humans), in the solar system, but they do not exclude the possibility of the existence of primitive, microscopic, life forms.

As for the evidence of organic life outside the solar system, there is nothing tangible. It is believed that a considerable number of planets may have the same physical characteristics of the Earth in terms of harboring life forms that may be similar to ours, but this is just a speculation, without any scientific evidence.

Which is the evidence collected about the solar system with its eight planets and some satellites?

They are as follows:

First - Organic molecules such as amino acids, sugars, and nitrogenous bases exist in comets and in interstellar space. That was one of the greatest discoveries in decades. Chemical compounds found in living things exist outside the Earth. About 140 organic molecules have been detected floating through interstellar space. Such findings led to the reappearance of the Cosmic Panspermia hypothesis, according to which life on Earth could have originated on other planets. 

The theory of Leslie Orgel and Francis Crick - The English astronomer Frederick Hoyle defended that "spores of life" are part of interstellar clouds and comets would be reservoirs of these spores, transporting them to the planets when they collide. The original microorganisms would have arrived to Earth aboard a comet.

In the mid-70s, Leslie Orgel and Francis Crick, two renowned scientists proposed that life appeared on Earth by means of spores carried by a spacecraft.

This ship was sent by intelligent aliens to colonize our planet. This idea caused many discussions and had a great impact among lovers of science fiction, at a time when there was much talk about UFOs and extraterrestrials. However, it was no more than mere speculation, because there was not and there is still not any evidence of the existence of intelligent life beyond Earth. These ideas obviously did not find acceptance in the scientific community, however the possibility that organic molecules brought by meteorites may be related to the emergence of the first living beings on Earth is being considered seriously. However, if there are organic molecules in space or circulating along with comets, life could have originated elsewhere. Interestingly the Superior Spirits, responding to the question number 45 of The Spirits' Book, said that organic elements, before the formation of the Earth, were, so to speak, in a state of fluid in space, in the midst of Spirits or in other planets awaiting the formation of the Earth to begin a new life in a new world. 

Second - The discovery of living beings, mainly bacteria, living in inhospitable conditions - called extremophiles. 

What is needed so there is Life - The discovery of extremophiles showed that life can exist outside of the conditions that heretofore were believed to be essential, as acidity close to neutrality (pH 7), temperatures of about 37°C, ionic strength similar to our blood, pressure of one atmosphere, the presence of oxygen and no radiation. 

The discovery of microorganisms able to violate this "belief" has shown that life can exist far from solar energy and in very different environments of those who were thought to be necessary for biological evolution.

Regarding this matter, we also found references in Kardec's work. In items 56 to 58 of The Spirits' Book, the Superior Spirits said that being different the physical constitution of the worlds, also the beings that inhabit these worlds must be different too. 

Third - There is strong evidence of the existence of water, primary condition for life, as we know it, in other stars. Scientists are pretty much convinced that there is water in the solid state on the Moon, on Mars and on Europe, one of Jupiter's satellites. In Europe, there is the possibility that water exists in the liquid state. If microorganisms living in such adverse conditions are found on Earth, it is quite possible that in places like the polar ice caps of Mars, the oceans of the icy moons of Jupiter or the possible ethanol and methane seas of Titan (Satellite of Saturn) can now be found as the habitat of extremophile species.

In conclusion, conventional science advances in its research and we, Spiritists, serenely look forward to the day in which they proclaim the existence of organic life forms outside our planet. We are convinced that this day will come.