"... But, long before that development (of good primate eyesight), the
earliest mammals seem almost to have abandoned sight for smell. All mammalian
eyes are degenerate in comparison with those of birds and reptiles; perfectly
good mechanisms for accommodation have somehow been lost, and replaced later
by much less adequate substitutes. ...."
(Mary Midgley, _Beast_and_Man:_The_Roots_of_Human_Nature_, revised edition
1995 (original 1979), p.161)
This was part of Midgley's general argument that the "bush analogy" of
evolution is more correct than the "ladder" or "tree" analogy, and that
argument was a small part of her book, which deals with how our ideas of
morality, freedom, culture, individuality, and meaning are enhanced and
strengthened by an accurate understanding of scientific discoveries since
Darwin. She is certainly not in the "selfish gene" camp, and many of her
writings criticise Dawkins, Wilson, and other evolutionists who make
unwarranted metaphysical claims based on their scientific discoveries.
Anyway, I wanted to hear reaction to the quote along two lines:
1) Is this information still accepted? Things might have changed since 1979.
Are there other books that look at the evolution of the eye in more detail?
2) Assuming it is accurate, how do various people on the listserv fit this into
their philosophies? I don't see any problem for TE, but for advocates of PC it
looks like a problem: mammals apparently have suboptimal eyes for no other
reason than the fact that their ancestors didn't need good eyes. On the
surface, at least, it does not seems like an "intelligent" way for our eyes to
be designed. Two ideas have floated around here recently: that of supernatural
insertion of genetic information into the DNA of organisms at crucial points in
their evolution, and that of supernaturally inserted genes remaining dormant
for a long time and being expressed only when needed to jump a crucial gap. To
me, it looks as if neither event happened here even though it would have been
a useful place for such an event to happen. But let me know what you think.
Thanks,
Nick
P.S. I guess a third question is how the bush analogy in general fits into
ideas of PC and intelligent design. Do they conflict? If yes, which one is
more correct?