The Zebra Hypothesis

The following is inspired and based loosely on a personal correspondance between Philip K. Dick and his editor, which I read in a book that is a collection of his work. I don't still have the book, and I can find absolutely nothing about this idea online. I believe it was from one of the "Selected Letters of Philip K. Dick" series. I am not trying to relay his theory.

The Zebra Hypothesis

It is concievable that the earth is inhabited by macro-organisms which are imperceptable to human beings.

Human beings have influenced or infiltrated nearly every habitat on earth other than the oceans. We tend to destroy what is not useful to us in an effort to take advantage of the space that that thing takes up, which is useful to us. Our cities and suburbs cover thousands of square miles, and our roads and farms and waste either occupies or effects thousands more. Our influence on our environment is mostly indescriminant. There is a subtle effort in the developed world to proceed with caution when it comes to taking advantage resources and land, but the vast majority of the world does not concern itself with preservation when they seek to expand. We expand exponentially and belligerently into any useful habitat.

Because of this, we effect or occupy nearly every land habitat. This means that we effect or displace a tremendous quantity and variety of plants and animals. Usually the way the that we effect them is negative. They have to move, or die. We have no tolerance for pests, and larger animals have no tolerance for us. Therefore their necessarily exists a tremendous selective pressure favoring and promoting plants and animals that have one of two properties.

This first possible property is for that plant or animals to be desirable to humans. If you can't beat them join them. Cows, corn, chickens, grapes... things are organisms who's population is drastically inflated due to the fact that we use them. Dogs and cats too; we propagate organisms which we want around for one reason or another. The fact that these organisms are favored by us means that they have an evolutionary advantage. They can now evolve and propagate by only increasing one trate: their desirability by us. We feed them, protect them from the environment and predators, and breed them. They don't have to do anything but make us want to have them around, and we will take care of the rest, we will make sure that the organism is successful in the sense that their numbers are high. The flip side of this is that they less desirable an organism the more likely we are to try very hard to exterminate is; for example misquitoes, weeds, ect.

The other possible advantageous property is to become undetectable by us. We do exert a tremendous effect on our environment, but if we were ignorant of an organism that lived among us, we wouldn't be able to mess with it. In fact it could thrive; human habitats are generally free of natural predators, and cities are crammed with food and water which is wasted by us. The fact that an organism capable of this would be so successful means that necessarily any organisms with this property would propagate, and be evolutionarily favored by selective pressures.

So, is it only a matter of time before these organisms come into existance? Or has it already happened? Well, I submit that we would not know. Many organisms are evolved very specifically to be imperceptable by and organism which eats them. These adaptations are generally very successful. Given enough time, natural selection will devlope an organism that cannot be detected by its predator. Because this phenomenon is common in nature, I propose that any organism evolving to be imperceptable to humans would be equally successful. I agree that this would be a tremendous technical challenge, becoming invisible to humans. However, we know that evolution is highly capable of technically difficult achievements; ie. three dimensional vision, brains, flight, echo location... ect. Visual invisibilty would be difficult but not impossible, as evidenced by the remarkable feats of camoflage in nature.

So, I believe that there is opportunity(evolution is capable) and motivation(humans being destructive) for such an organism to come into being. Therefore, I believe that it has or will.

What is particularily interesting is to consider, "what if they came into being a long time ago?" We know that during the evolution of early man, a species of sapiens evolved with larger brains than us, but that we are the ones here today. Perhaps it is because we were physically more powerful. But perhaps they just disappeared, literally.

I submit that such an orgasm, a "zebra," could explain ghosts and UFOs. This explanation for ghosts and UFOs kills two birds(ghosts1 and ufos2) with one stone, it avoids the metaphysical difficulties of spirts with ghosts, and the physical difficulties with intergalactic travel for UFOs. Furthermore, I submit that no evidence exists that would prefer any other explanation for UFOs and ghosts over this explanation. I believe that sufficient evidence exists to say that there are some unknown phenomena which cause people to report seeing ghosts and UFOs, but I have no reason to explain ghosts as spirits and UFOs as ETs. Now, I have an alternative explanation. Valid?

Evolution is a forced change. For instance we will see no evolution in a grape or a cow because there is no need to change.

Change is the result of the need to adapt to one's environment. So once the disappearing organism's had evolved into undetectability they would no longer need to change as the force that drives that change is no longer there.

So a dogs fur will grow thicker in a cold climate. But once the change has become sufficient the change stops. Until we are able to detect these "organisms" or ghosts or UFO's your theory although interesting falls into the same catagory as those in which you are trying to explain.

Valid?

This seems like you're really reaching. There are plenty of organisms that are undesirable to Man that flourish anyway. (IE: Rats, Raccoons, Cockroaches) They just develop some less paranormal trait such as increased resourcefulness or prodigious breeding that makes it impossible to get rid of them.

reply to post by OnceReturned

do you believe Natural Selection is the Most Divine and Powerful Force?

reply to post by masonicon


So do you think that these "Invisible people" are some sort of supernatural creatures? Can you back up that assertion at all?

Perhaps the djinns fit this description, kind of.

They're supposedly invisible and solve the problems of ghosts, ufos, demons and possessions.

Originally posted by spearhead
Evolution is a forced change. For instance we will see no evolution in a grape or a cow because there is no need to change.

Change is the result of the need to adapt to one's environment. So once the disappearing organism's had evolved into undetectability they would no longer need to change as the force that drives that change is no longer there.

Directed evolution is in response to change. Whichever genetic characteristics are most successful at passing themselves on to the next generation(in terms of quantity) will propagate. I think that domestic/desirable organisms are evolutionarily successful because of their numbers, which is what I percieve as the "point" of evolution: to propagate numbers of a specific species.

I agree that these animals will not evolve much, because they are not pressured to change. Perhaps becoming desirable to humans is some critical evolutionary threshold, beyond which no more change will occur because it is unnecessary. Once we like them, we will take care of them and maintain their numbers.

So a dogs fur will grow thicker in a cold climate. But once the change has become sufficient the change stops. Until we are able to detect these "organisms" or ghosts or UFO's your theory although interesting falls into the same catagory as those in which you are trying to explain.

Valid?

Yes. I agree. Except that I think that the phenomena themselves fall into the catagory of "definitely real." Real in the sense that some real phenomenon - for which conventional explanations do not suffice - exists which causes people to report UFOs and ghosts. What falls into the catagory of pure speculation are all explanations for these phenomena. So my explanation is in that catagory; pure speculation. But because I believe there is not sufficient evidence to pick out any possible explanation from the several that exist, I believe that my explanation is just as valid as the spirit explanation and the ET explanation.

Originally posted by warpcrafter
This seems like you're really reaching. There are plenty of organisms that are undesirable to Man that flourish anyway. (IE: Rats, Raccoons, Cockroaches) They just develop some less paranormal trait such as increased resourcefulness or prodigious breeding that makes it impossible to get rid of them.

Impossible to get rid of yes, and I agree that they flourish. However, clearly their numbers are substantially reduced by humans efforts to eliminate them; they are not as successful as they would be if we could not detect them. Therefore any of them who do devlope that characteristic of undetectability will have an evolutionary advantage, and will propagate this trait by thriving to a greater extent than the pests without this trait. Furthermore, the trait is not paranormal, many organisms in nature are undetectable by their predators.

Camouflaged animals:
mail.colonial.net...

static.howstuffworks.com...

domhyde.files.wordpress.com...

coolest one: www.sciencedaily.com...

Originally posted by masonicon
reply to post by OnceReturned

 

do you believe Natural Selection is the Most Divine and Powerful Force?

I don't believe that natural selection is divine. I believe that a complete and consistent explanation of this phenomenon can be given using only science. We know these facts:
1) In the process of DNA copying, random mutations occer.
2) DNA determines the characteristics of the organism which has the DNA.
3) The random mutations tranlate into novel characteristics of the organism.
4) The characteristics of an organism determine its ability to reproduc; to pass on its genetic code.

Therefore those characteristic which are more successful in propagating will be more prevent in the next generation than they are in the preceeding generation. Additionally, novel traits intoduced by random mutation which are successful will be propagated. The processes of evoluton as we understand it is a logical and necessary consequence of these premises, which are proven facts.

As far as whether or not I believe it is the most powerful force, I am not really sure how to answer that. What do you mean by powerful? I am not sure that there is a good metric for this term in the sense that you are using it. The sun is powerful, and evolution is powerful I guess, but I they are not doing the same thing, so I'm not sure I can try to say which one is "more powerful." Are you asking me if I believe in god?

Originally posted by warpcrafter
reply to post by masonicon

 

So do you think that these "Invisible people" are some sort of supernatural creatures? Can you back up that assertion at all?

I don't believe in the supernatural. I think that everything has a natural explanation, so no, I don't believe that they are supernatural creatures. I believe that the evidence for ghosts cannot be ignore. There can be no doubt that there is some real phenomenon which is causin people to report ghosts. The only question is what that phenomenon is, and I don't think that it is spirits. That would be a supernatural explanation, and I don't believe in the supernatural. Because I believe in ghosts, but I don't believe the supernatural explanation, I have to find a natural one, and I think that's what I have here.

reply to post by Frakkerface


Could be. There has to be something that explains these apparently "paranormal" phenomena. I would like to be able to explain them without having to appeal to the supernatural.