On Mon, 28 Jul 1997, John C. Pavao wrote:

> How could a population be adapted to a situation that hadn't yet occurred?

Whoa!  Remember that mutations are *random*.  If a mutation
occurs that isn't overly disadvantageous, there won't be that
much selection pressure against it, and it will be transmitted to
progeny.  If and when the environment changes in the right way,
that mutation becomes advantageous.  It is quite possible that
some strains of humans now are pre-adapted to a future
environment that we don't know a thing about yet.

> I don't think you'll find that evidence, because the appearance of
> agriculture and civilzation more or less did away with natural selection,
> no?

Hardly.  As long as there are genetically influenced differences
in reproductive rates there is natural selection.

Todd Moody
[log in to unmask]