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The Eye of the Trilobite

created by rk2001

(thing) by rk2001 (4.5 mon) (print)   ?   I like it! Fri Mar 23 2001 at 0:15:56

The trilobites that are also apparent in the Cambrian period have an extremely complex eye structure. Consisting of millions of honeycomb-shaped tiny particles and a double-lens system, this eye "has an optimal design which would require a well-trained and imaginative optical engineer to develop today" in the words of David Raup, a professor of geology.

This eye emerged (in fossil records) 530 million years ago in a perfect state. The sudden appearance of such a wondrous design cannot be explained by evolution, since it has the feauture of "irreducible complexity".

Moreover, the honeycomb eye structure of the trilobite has survived to our own day without a single change. Some insects such as bees and dragon flies have the same eye structure as did the trilobite.

R.L.Gregory, Eye and Brain: The Physiology of seeing
Oxford University Press, 1995,p.31

WOooooooah.. easy on there Gritchka, Where did I get it?.. as rubbish as you may think it is, (lol and actually admittedly it ain't great) look again - it's quoted!.

As for getting a life - working on that, I'm still (micro) evolving.

(idea) by Gritchka (2.3 y) (print)   ?   1 C! I like it! Fri Mar 23 2001 at 0:39:19

What on earth is this ignorant rubbish? Where do you get it?

Eyes have evolved forty to sixty times in the animal kingdom, independently on many different principles. There are pinhole cameras, there are curved mirrors, there are compound eyes, there are simple amplified photosensitive cells... every variation of every physically workable arrangement has been hit on by evolution, over and over and over again.

Computer simulations show that even with very slow rates of evolution, complex eyes will blossom in what are geologically negligible periods. Improvements in vision are such a palpably great advantage that selection pressure will pick them up in quick order. So complex trilobite eyes evolve over the Cambrian. Earlier fossils don't show them, but earlier fossils are only preserving the eye sockets anyway. We can't precisely see all the gradual accommodations to ever better optical resolution.

All eyes are complex. They're complex because they evolved. That's what evolution is good at: picking up and running with increasingly better designs. Improvements keep happening, and good ideas get picked up very early.

So eyes are perfect. So no-one wears glasses? Get a life.


printable version
chaos

How'd evolution produce THAT? Titty bar Cambrian Explosion Trilobite
Eye of the Tiger Argentinosaurus Black Widow Spider Stephen Jay Gould
Burgess Shale DMCA Evolution honeycomb
Quotes from sleeping people focaccia A (Possible) Evolution of the Eye Dragonfly
Foggy Graptolite Snake fossil
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