Revelation, Rationality, Knowledge & Truth — Page 551
THE BLIND WATCHMAKER' WHO IS ALSO DEAF AND DUMB the elaborate software necessary to decode a world of echoes in real time. Their faces are often distorted into gargoyle shapes that appear hideous to us until we see them for what they are, exquisitely fashioned instruments for beaming ultrasound in desired directions. '³. So ably does he sum up the mystery. Further enlarging upon it, he pays the unique compliment to the bat's ability of being a past master on sonar. He states: 'When a little brown bat detects an insect and starts to move in on an interception course, its click rate goes up. Faster than a machine gun, it can reach peak rates of 200 pulses per second as the bat finally closes in on the moving target. . Having raised the questions, 54 'If bats are capable of boosting their sampling rates to 200 pulses per second, why don't they keep this up all the time? Since they evidently have a rate control 'knob' on their 'stroboscope', why don't they turn it permanently to maximum, thereby keeping their perception of the world at its most acute, all the time, to meet any emergency?"4 he answers, informing the readers, 'One reason is that these high rates are suitable only for near targets. If a pulse follows too hard on the heels of its predecessor it gets mixed up with the echo of its predecessor returning from a distant target. ,5. He goes on to speak of amazing wonders about the bats' aeronautical and sonar potentials, and concludes by affirming: “. . . we can only understand it at a level of artificial instrumentation, and mathematical calculations on 517