At 6:48 PM -0500 15/1/02, Stephen Feldman wrote:

>http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99991787
>ability to digest milk after weaning evolved along
>with dairy farming


Interesting... some selective quoting from the article:

>The discovery supports the theory that retaining the ability to digest
>milk evolved only in some peoples in the past ten thousand years, as
>an adaptation to dairy farming.

>The fact that the same variations occur in distantly related
>populations supports the theory that all humans were once lactose
>intolerant, and that "lactase persistence" evolved only after people
>domesticated animals and began drinking their milk.

>Lactase persistence also seems to be most common among peoples with a
>long tradition of dairy farming, such as northern Europeans, some
>groups in India and the Tutsis in central Africa. "I find it ironic
>that a so-called disease actually represents the original condition,"
>says Peltonen.

Surely this damages the claim that modern humans are genetically
identical to our 40,000 year old ancestors. Here we have a specific
adaptation to a food which has evolved independently in at least
three cultures.

This also reminds me of something else I saw once... a map of Europe
marked with incidence of celiac disease. There was an increase in the
disease as the distance from the Middle East increased. Seems to me
that this must be due to an adaptation to a grain-based diet.

Looks to me as if evolution moves a lot faster than some people give
it credit for.

 ...R.