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Greta oto
Posted on: April 8, 2007 - 9:14pm
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Greta oto
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasswing_butterfly
I've been given this fascinating little bug as an argument in favor of intelligent design. I'm not particularly scientifically minded, so I'm at a loss for an evolutionary benefit for the see-through wings.
Any help would be great.
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One word - Camouflge.
That's what I thought, but then why the bright white on the top of the wings?
They seem counter to each other.
My guess would be it happens to blend in somehow in the environment that butterfly lives in.
Possibly. I'm going to look around the net a bit more. I don't know why, but this little bug is quite fascinating to me...
the see threw part of the wings hide the wings near the more importent organs, the part at the end make the birds go for that insted of the body, a butterfly can still fly just as well with a bit of the end of a wing bitten off.
Obvious Poe is obvious.
stitches_bbk's suggestion is very possible and probably largely correct, but I think I can extend it into more detail, but this is just a suggestion, and could easily wrong.
If we consider a butterfly species that was having real problems with a predator, and it was evolutionarily beneficial for it to have see through wings for camouflage. Then maybe the threat of the predator decreased or maybe the butterflies found it hard to find each other, making mating a problem. So it became beneficial to have some colour on the wings, and so sexual selection took over and produced colour on part of the mostly see through wings. Then natural selection would favor the butterflies that had the colorful part of there wings at the tips, for the reason that stitches_bbk suggested.
So very simple step by step for any creationists:
1. Wing becomes see through as camouflage, predators cant find it to kill it, so it survives.
2. Wing gains some colour, this makes it a slightly more visible target for preadators, but also greatly increases it chances of mating.
3. The partial wing colouring is only at the tip, so any predators that do notice the colour are directed away from the butterflies vital organs.
I can almost imagine a bunch of biologists sitting around in a room, (maybe under the influence of a mild drug) playing a game of "Darwinian function" where they, just for fun I should add, look at all the crazy shit species have developed, and use a little bit of common sense to figure out a possible reason to why.
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I'll get back to you when I think of something worthwhile to say.