3 ms·

> Should it though? Seems like we've survived Someone survived - but for the mutations to have a selection benefit strong enough to dominate that gene pool the

• nradov 5y ago
  Not necessarily. Even a virus with a low infection fatality rate could have caused significant evolutionary changes if it was endemic across many generations.
• robocat 5y ago
  > but for the mutations to have a selection benefit strong enough to dominate that gene pool there would have to be more people who didn’t survive than did. To be pedantic: the gene pool is mostly influenced by anything that prevents reproduction, i.e. if you have your kids, and then die that doesn't affect the gene pool to a first approximation (there are selection pressures of becoming an orphan, but they are likely usually very weak. If being an orphan makes it more likely one will have kids or more likely to have more kids than one would have otherwise, then the selection pressure will select for death, which is inverted from what is naively thought! Edit: And if you are older and have never had kids and die, there is very little chance for selection pressure.).