Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!tdatirv!sarima
From: sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Paranormal phenomena and evolution
Message-ID: <104@tdatirv.UUCP>
Date: 26 Jan 91 00:42:55 GMT
References: <2523.2796bb60@verifone.com> <72753@bu.edu.bu.edu> <1435@gtx.com> <6735@harrier.ukc.ac.uk>
Reply-To: sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen)
Organization: Teradata Corp., Irvine
Lines: 38

In article <6735@harrier.ukc.ac.uk> sss3@ukc.ac.uk (S.S.Sturrock) writes:
>Man, as is now, has been around say 2,000,000 years.  Not long is it?

Not really, the earliest members of the Hominidae appeared 2-3 million
years ago.  This form was essentially an semi-terrestrial, bipedal
ape, not very different from a modern chimpanzee.

The earliest Homo sapiens appeared about 100,000 to 300,000 years ago,
and 'modern' Homo sapiens appeared even more recently than that!

Of course this just strengthens your argument, this miniscule span of time
is unnoticable on evolutionary time scales.

>Evolution takes a long time, but wait, I am 6'3" tall, much taller than
>people were 500 years ago, you try walking around in a Medieval house
>without stooping.  The average height is much greater than it was then,
>so that is evolution is it not?

No it is not.  Evolution (in the biological sense) implies *genetic* change.
The change in height from Medieval times is essentially a purely nutritional
matter (with perhaps a fair dollop of general improvement in child health
care).  No genetic change has been implicated in this shift.

However there is some indication of evolution in humans on a ~10,000 year
time scale.  The natives of India are much darker skinned than the natives
of Scandinavia, despite both groups being 'aryans' (that is descendents of
the original speakers of Indo-European).  And this difference most assuredly
is genetic, since it is inherited in all environments.

In fact this difference is an adaption to the difference amount of sunlight
in the two regions.  In subtropical India, there is much sunlight, and
excess exposure to UV is a problem, so darker skin reduces the cancer rate.
In subarctic Scandinavia there is very little sunlight, and insufficient
vitamin D production is a problem, which unusually light skin helps to
alleviate.
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uunet!tdatirv!sarima				(Stanley Friesen)