There are several theories about the origin of the seas, but no single theory explains all aspects of this puzzle. Many earth scientists agree with the hypothesis that both the atmosphere and the oceans have accumulated gradually through geologic time from some process of "degassing" of the Earth's interior. According to this theory, the ocean had its origin from the prolonged escape of water vapor and other gases from the molten igneous rocks of the Earth to the clouds surrounding the cooling Earth. After the Earth's surface had cooled to a temperature below the boiling point of water, rain began to fall and continued to fall for centuries. As the water drained into the great hollows in the Earth's surface, the primeval ocean came into existence. The forces of gravity prevented the water from leaving the planet.

The above text was taken from : http://www.palomar.edu/oceanography/salty_ocean.htm

It seems we are to take a lot 'on trust' that the 'degassing' process is an acceptable way in which the oceons formed. In reality the process is one which is actually impossible!

Why is it impossible? - Because of the way elements are formed in stars. You may recall stars are simply atomic furnaces changing elements into other elements by a fusion process. The process is NOT a one of making compounds. Water is a compound and cannot be made directly in a star through the fusion process.

So that poses the question - how was water in the Universe/solar system formed?

You may recall that a star is converting Hydrogen to all the other elements in turn by the fusion process. At any stage of the process, depending on the amount of material in the star, a 'critical-mass' might be achieved which would cause the whole system to explode in a Supernova. The elements would then be scattered in clumps throughout the universe.

One of the Suns in our system exploded at the point when most of the material had been converted to oxygen.

You may recall that a star is converting Hydrogen to all the other elements in turn by the fusion process. At any stage of the process, depending on the amount of material in the star, a 'critical-mass' would be achieved which would cause the whole system to explode into a Supernova. The elements would then be scattered in clumps throughout the universe.

One of the Suns in our system exploded at the point when most of the material had been converted to oxygen. This sun had reached its 'critical-mass' stage at the close of the Oxygen forming point because of the amount of material present. The more the material  - the greater the pressure and temperature - and faster the fusion reaction.

As this mass of white hot oxygen exploded some it passed though the present Sun - combined with some hydrogen and emerged out the other side as gaseous and solid water. This material then 'splattered' planet Earth, the Moon and many other planitary bodies in the Solar System.

So - many planitary bodies will have copious amounts of water present (either solid or liquid) and the rest will have virtually none. It all depended on its solar orbital position when the 'splatter' took place. If water did not cover the surface then oxygen would. Most of this gas however, would float away from the surface of any body eventually.

At this point our theory has taken us to the conclusion that there must have been at least three suns in our solar system.

a) The large 'mother-of our-planets' sun

b) The 'oxygen' sun

c) Our present hydrogen/helium Sun.

Was there a fourth?

There is one way to find out! Our current sun being present when the fourth sun exploded would be a receptacle for some of its debris. This would show up in the Sun's spectrum. But so would sun's a and b's materials show up also. All that one needs to do then is extract the spectrum of suns a and b from the current observed spectrum and you would be left with the composition of the fourth sun. A preponderance of a particular element would show you at what stage that sun exploded

Taking the argument a little further if there were more than one prominent 'peak' of one element in the spectrum not belonging to suns 'a' or 'b' then this might indicate that there had been more than four suns in the system.

Solar Elemental Abundances
Element	Number %	Mass %
Hydrogen	92.0	73.4
Helium	7.8	25.0
Carbon	0.02	0.20
Nitrogen	0.008	0.09
Oxygen	0.06	0.8
Neon	0.01	0.16
Magnesium	0.003	0.06
Silicon	0.004	0.09
Sulfur	0.002	0.05
Iron	0.003	0.14

The above data was taken from:  http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr162/lect/sun/composition.html

It can be seen clearly that Oxygen, at 0.8% of the Sun's mass, is by far the most abundant of the minor elements. This proves that there was a third Sun in our Solar System at one time but that Sun exploded when it reached the 'critical-mass' point when oxygen had been created.

 The argument goes like this : As the present Sun is only part-way through the atomic fusion process of converting Hydrogen to Helium then all the other elements observed must have arrived from without.