Back to the Russian fox experiment, whcih demonstrates the speed with which domestication can happen, and the likelihood that a train of incidental effects would fllow in the wake of selection for tameness. It is entirely probable that cattle, pigs, horses, sheep, goats, chickens, gees,e ducks and camels followed a course which was just as fast, and just as rich in unexpected side-effects. It also seems plausible that we ourselves evolved down a parallel road of domestication after the Agricultural Revolution, towards our own version of tameness and associated by-product traits.
In some cases, the story of our own domestication is clearly written in our genes. The classic example, meticulously documented by WIlliam Durham in his book Coevolution, is lactose tolerance…
[continued later on the page and then to 32]
...My generalization concerne dthe human species as a whole and, by implication, the wild Homo Sapiens fromn which we are all descended. It is as if I had said, ‘Wolves are big, fierce carnivores that hunt in packs and bay at the moon’, knowing full well that Pekineses and Yorkshire terriers belie it. The difference is that we have a seperate word, dog, for domestic wolf, but not for domestic human…
[continued pg 33]...
Is lactose tolerance just the tip of the iceberg? Are our genomes riddled with evidences of domestication, affecting not just our biochemistry but our minds? Like Belyaev’s domesticated foxes, and like the domesticated wolves that we call dogs, have we become tamer, more lovable, with the human equivalents of floppy ears, soppy faces and wagging tails? I leave you with that thought, and move hastily on.
-Dawkins, ‘The Ancestor’s Tale’
Cheers for that. I might just look it up when I have some time. Still skeptical but it seems more plausible after reading those quotes. The hypothesis of selection for lactose tolerance seems a good place to start.
Well, yes, on Pg. 31 of ‘The Ancestor’s Tale’,
Back to the Russian fox experiment, whcih demonstrates the speed with which domestication can happen, and the likelihood that a train of incidental effects would fllow in the wake of selection for tameness. It is entirely probable that cattle, pigs, horses, sheep, goats, chickens, gees,e ducks and camels followed a course which was just as fast, and just as rich in unexpected side-effects. It also seems plausible that we ourselves evolved down a parallel road of domestication after the Agricultural Revolution, towards our own version of tameness and associated by-product traits. In some cases, the story of our own domestication is clearly written in our genes. The classic example, meticulously documented by WIlliam Durham in his book Coevolution, is lactose tolerance… [continued later on the page and then to 32]
...My generalization concerne dthe human species as a whole and, by implication, the wild Homo Sapiens fromn which we are all descended. It is as if I had said, ‘Wolves are big, fierce carnivores that hunt in packs and bay at the moon’, knowing full well that Pekineses and Yorkshire terriers belie it. The difference is that we have a seperate word, dog, for domestic wolf, but not for domestic human… [continued pg 33]...
Is lactose tolerance just the tip of the iceberg? Are our genomes riddled with evidences of domestication, affecting not just our biochemistry but our minds? Like Belyaev’s domesticated foxes, and like the domesticated wolves that we call dogs, have we become tamer, more lovable, with the human equivalents of floppy ears, soppy faces and wagging tails? I leave you with that thought, and move hastily on. -Dawkins, ‘The Ancestor’s Tale’
For what its worth....
Cheers for that. I might just look it up when I have some time. Still skeptical but it seems more plausible after reading those quotes. The hypothesis of selection for lactose tolerance seems a good place to start.