There are
many different types of eye in the living world. We are accustomed
to the camera-type eye found in vertebrates. This structure
works on the principle of the refraction of light, which falls
onto the lens and is focused on a point behind the lens inside
the interior of the eye.
However, the eyes possessed by other creatures
work by very different methods. One example is the lobster.
A lobster's eye works on a principle of reflection,
rather than that of refraction.
The most outstanding characteristic
of the lobster eye is its surface, which is composed of numerous
squares. As shown in the picture, these squares are positioned
most precisely. As one astronomer commented in Science:
"The lobster is the most unrectangular animal I've ever seen.
But under the microscope a lobster's eye looks like perfect
graph paper."356
These well-arranged squares are in fact the ends
of tiny square tubes forming a structure resembling a honeycomb.
At first glance, the honeycomb appears to be made up of hexagons,
although these are actually the front faces of hexagonal prisms.
In the lobster's eye, there are the squares in place of hexagons.
Even more intriguing is that the sides of each
one of these square tubes are like mirrors that reflect the
incoming light. This reflected light is focused onto the retina
flawlessly. The sides of the tubes inside the eye are lodged
at such perfect angles that they all focus onto a single point.
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The lobster eye is composed
of numerous squares. These well-arranged squares
are in fact the ends of tiny square tubes. The
sides of each one of these square tubes are like
mirrors that reflect the incoming light. This
reflected light is focused onto the retina flawlessly.
The sides of the tubes inside the eye are lodged
at such perfect angles that they all focus onto
a single point. |
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The extraordinary nature of the design of this
system is quite indisputable. All of these perfect square
tubes have a layer that works just like a mirror. Furthermore,
each one of these cells is sited by means of precise geometrical
alignments, so that they all focus the light at a single point.
Michael Land, a scientist
and researcher at the University of Sussex in England, was
the first to examine the lobster eye structure in detail.
Land stated that the eye structure had a most surprising design.357
It is obvious that the design in the lobster
eye presents a great difficulty for the theory of evolution.
Most importantly, it exemplifies the concept of "irreducible
complexity." If even one of its features-such as
the facets of the eye, which are perfect squares, the mirrored
sides of each unit, or the retina layer at the back-were eliminated,
the eye could never function. Therefore, it is impossible
to maintain that the eye evolved step-by-step. It is scientifically
unjustifiable to argue that such a perfect design as this
could have come about haphazardly. It is quite clear that
the lobster eye was created as a miraculous system.
One can find further traits in the lobster's
eye that nullify the assertions of evolutionists. An interesting
fact emerges when one looks at creatures with similar eye
structures. The reflecting eye, of which
the lobster's eye is one example, is found in only
one group of crustaceans, the so-called long-bodied
decapods. This family includes the lobsters, the prawns
and shrimp.
The other members of the Crustacea class
display "the refracting type eye structure," which works on
completely different principles from those of the reflecting
type. Here, the eye is made up of hundreds of cells like a
honeycomb. Unlike the square cells in a lobster eye, these
cells are either hexagonal or round. Furthermore, instead
of reflecting light, small lenses in the cells refract the
light onto the focus on the retina.
The majority of crustaceans have the refracting
eye structure. According to evolutionist assumptions, all
the creatures within the class Crustacea should have
evolved from the same ancestor. Therefore, evolutionists claim
that refracting eye evolved from a refracting eye, which is
far more common among the crustacea and of a fundamentally
simpler design.
However, such reasoning is impossible, because
both eye structures function perfectly within their own systems
and have no room for any "transitional" phase. A crustacean
would be left sightless and would be eliminated by natural
selection if the refracting lens in its eye were to diminish
and be replaced by reflecting mirrored surfaces.
It is, therefore, certain that both of these
eye structures were designed and created separately. There
is such superb geometric precision in these eyes that entertaining
the possibility of "chance" is simply ludicrious.
 
356 J. R. P.
Angel, "Lobster Eyes as X-ray Telescopes," Astrophysical
Journal, 1979, No. 233, pp. 364-373. See also B. K. Hartline
(1980), "Lobster-Eye X-ray Telescope Envisioned," Science,
No. 207, p. 47, cited in Michael Denton, Nature's Destiny,
The Free Press, 1998, p. 354.
357 M. F. Land, "Superposition Images are
Formed by Reflection in the Eyes of Some Oceanic Decapod Crustacea,"
Nature, 1976, vol. 263, pp. 764-765.  |