Remix.run Logo
doctoboggan 5 hours ago

A photosensitive patch of cells could be wired directly to motor cells/muscles on the opposite side, which would allow the organism to swim toward the light (maybe useful for feeding or migrating, etc.)

theodorejb 2 hours ago | parent [-]

How would the photosensitivity and wiring to muscles come about at the same time?

valleyer 41 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

As long as a mutation isn't strongly maladaptive, it can evolve prior to its being useful.

refulgentis 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

They didn't need to come about at the same time. Photosensitive proteins (opsins) and cellular motility both predate multicellular life entirely. Even single-celled euglena detect light and swim toward it with no nervous system at all. In early multicellular animals, cells were already chemically signaling their neighbors. A photosensitive cell releasing a signaling molecule near a contractile cell isn't a coordinated miracle. It is just two pre-existing cell types sitting next to each other in tissue, which is what bodies are. Natural selection then refines that crude coupling because even a tiny, noisy light response is better than none.

Each piece, light-sensitive proteins, cell-to-cell signaling, contractile cells, evolved independently and for other reasons long before being co-opted into anything resembling vision. The question "how could A and B arise simultaneously?" dissolves once neither A nor B was new.