Don’t you want me, baby?
Since I am a layperson and have no constraints of professionalism, I can postulate about science without sacrificing my integrity. It is inconceivable to me, no matter how long such a process took, that a plant could evolve to sexually attract an insect by either natural selection or mere trial and error on the part of the plant. Therefore, as I entertain the idea of multi-level selection, which includes the struggle for survival of groups, I have to reach a little higher into the void to include a “group” which has, as of yet, to be discovered by science. I’ll call it a panel for argument’s sake. It appears to me that this panel possesses a collection of accumulated knowledge acquired from the results of both natural selection and trial and error. This panel continually acquires, maintains, updates and utilizes this information to affect the outcome of evolution. While the mechanism of operation is invisible, the results are not. It is also interesting that this panel employs deception in accomplishing its subjective goals. This panel has over eons found a way to genetically alter a species or an entire generation while still “in the womb”, therefore, the level of selection may still be within the gene but the gene itself may be altered in route.
This might explain why it is so difficult to ascertain with a single theory or even a combination of theories to any certainty how life has evolved. This nomenon is not akin to a virgin birth but is more like life itself becoming self-knowing and experimentally self-corrrecting through this panel of knowledge. No longer either a nomenon or a phenomenon, “genetic engineering has been altering the genetic makeup of an organism using techniques that introduce heritable material prepared outside the organism either directly into the host or into a cell that is then fused or hybridized with the host.”. (wikipedia) How is it that we could suppose that our collective knowledge as humans would exceed the capabilities of this unseen panel whose library must be extensive beyond all we can now phathom? And why is it so far-fetched that such a panel could exist without our superstitiously attributing to it deity or omniscience or omnipotence? Why could it not simply be a work in progress?
As humans atop the evolutionary totem pole, we might reflect on the idea of like father, like son - even in the arena of sexual deception. But there are many other deceptions that enhance our chances of survival – the bird with the broken wing, the bark without the bite, the lie under oath.
The only unpardonable sin is self-deception, for therein we block all reception, all perception, all inception of knowledge. I don’t know much more than when I started here but I do find myself in the Life is Awesome camp and I’m happy to be a part of that group with thanks to all those who work so tirelessly to explain it.
1 comments:
Hi, Silver-
Thanks for the comment. It isn't so much the long times involved, but the stupidity of wasps that would be the issue here. If their search image for mating partners is pretty simple, (as one might imagine), and if a plant accidentally looked just a little bit like one, then presto, we are off to the races.
Even in the optimized state of the current orchid, it hardly looks very much like a wasp, so there probably isn't much going on upstairs in this male. But not much harm done, either!
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