^^This is an excellent example of how desperately we, as biologists, attempt to ascribe adaptive significance to all characteristics of the natural world. We see traits that appear perfectly matched to their environments and we come to the Panglossian conclusion that they are undoubtedly the result of natural selection.
For example, we might see long tongues on foraging giraffes and immediately assume they are necessary for reaching and grasping foliage in the tops of trees. We neglect to consider that they may simply be the result of stochastic processes or phylogenetic or physical constraints. Perhaps these ungulates are only long-tongued because they had long-tongued ancestors that used those tongues for completely different purposes. Perhaps their long-tongued-ness is simply the result of genetic drift, a bottle-neck or a founder event. Or perhaps the tongues are long because they are constrained by traits elsewhere on the body (e.g. the length of the neck and esophagus). This adaptationist perspective makes us blind to alternative hypotheses.
As a functional morphologist, I see the world through a completely different lens than an evolutionary biologist or an ecologist might. Where ecologists see structure created by competition and evolutionists see order generated by natural selection, I see physics. I would hypothesize that “crown shyness” is simply a result of wind-generated collisions between trees. This mechanical explanation requires no complex chemical conversations between adjacent trees, it implies no benefit or detriment to either plant – it is simply the result of physical interactions caused by swaying in the breeze.
For more information on the “adaptationist paradigm” check out Gould and Lewontin’s seminal commentary on the spandrels of San Marco.
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