Deep Field / case

Cambrian Explosion

In a geologically narrow window, body plans proliferate under ecological and developmental possibility—not as a teleological ascent but as a burst of morphogenetic trials. What is priced is the bioelectric and developmental governance that can hold a form against noise. The Cambrian specimen pressures the conservative default: novelty is cheap only where prior closures have paid for a repertoire; where they have not, inventions abort into soft-bodied traces and extinctions.