Ward and Brownlee said in ‘Rare Earth’ that water is only one of several necessary conditions for the rise of complex lifeforms. They also believe in Global Warming, or Ward does anyway, so maybe their word isn’t final.
Yep... that’s the thing. As we find water in other environments... now we decide that it still happened here, but the theory of evolution through mutation only applies in the proper environment. What... that life can only mutate to a point? That it can’t really truly adapt to it’s environment and better itself? As the house of cards falls they look for other ways to prop it up. Some new ideas to keep the funding coming.