Intelligent Design: Irreducible Complexity?

[John V]

How did photoperiodism and daily synchronization of circadian rhythms develop before eyespots came along?

So you ask a question about the development of the eye, and then when the answer is given your idea of a rebuttal is to ask me a question about things that happened before the development of eyes began, as though that has any bearing at all on the question you initially asked?

It does have bearing. The reason given is that the eyespots were beneficial in that they enhanced the functioning of photoperiodism and circadian rhythms. This begs the question of how those things developed without eyespots. However, if you'd like to move forward in the timeline, that's fine:

These complex optical systems started out as the multicellular eyepatch gradually depressed into a cup, which first granted the ability to discriminate brightness in directions, then in finer and finer directions as the pit deepened. While flat eyepatches were ineffective at determining the direction of light, as a beam of light would activate exactly the same patch of photo-sensitive cells regardless of its direction, the "cup" shape of the pit eyes allowed limited directional differentiation by changing which cells the lights would hit depending upon the light's angle.

First question is why a multicellular eyepatch developed. Next is why did it gradually depress into a cup. Then, how did the organism know what to do with directional information. What was the reproductive advantage of each of these stages?

Because it's not a problem: as demonstrated by the very thing you quoted, the eye is very clearly reducible. What's your contention here?

My contention is that "somehow" isn't an adequate explanation.

Yes, and if the light sensitive cell isn't also connected to an apparatus for interpreting the information it receives, then it doesn't confer a survival advantage, but it also doesn't confer a detriment, really. Which means it persists in the genome, until eventually it does find a connection to the rest. That's the whole idea of natural selection.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-intr...ology.html

Mutation creates new alleles. Each new allele enters the gene pool as a single copy amongst many. Most are lost from the gene pool, ...

Most neutral alleles are lost soon after they appear...

Most new mutants are lost, even beneficial ones.