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Politics : Should God be replaced? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Solon who wrote (3240)	11/9/2000 10:52:11 AM
From: cosmicforce	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 28931

I'm pretty sure that as hominids specialized and developed intelligence that in general, with our optical system, that acuity of vision depends entirely upon the working distance. Someone who has 20/15 (like me with correction) has added working distance. Working with tools requires a shortened working distance. I believe that further specialization occurred and that every member in the tribe continued to specialize. There were tool makers and hunters. They were probably different families within the tribe as time went on. I have tool and die makers (or inventors) on both sides of my families. There are entire nations of myopics (like the Japanese). The genes for nearsightedness are not adaptive unless they are coupled with other abilities. For example myopic idiots with club feet would not be highly adaptive. Some combinations of genes are more successful than others. But as culture developed, the ability of people to have keen distance vision was sacrificed for the ability to comfortably work up close. Clearly the skills necessary for the creation of cloth, pots and crafts could be traded for distance vision and since these skills were commonly handed down from parent to child, there was a tendency for these traits to concentrate. It doesn't seem that controversial to me but when you mention genetics and intelligence some people start getting really upset (I'm not saying you are). The amount of overlap across races exceeds the genetic differences between races. That is well known. But that fact does not erase familial trait concentrations within races.