3 ms·
Considering how we all seem to be the product of millions of years of hit-or-miss natural selection, it feels almost natural that our advancements have also had
by vacuity 3y ago
Considering how we all seem to be the product of millions of years of hit-or-miss natural selection, it feels almost natural that our advancements have also had a great deal of luck/improbability.
- hinkley 3y agoSome homebrewers will wax nostalgic about how the human sense of smell/taste can detect almost all of the ways that fermentation can go wrong and make it toxic. But we also keep pushing back earliest dates for precursors to civilization, I start to wonder if maybe there aren't graveyards of people who couldn't distinguish thymol from ethanol and selected themselves out of human history via acute liver failure.
- sudosysgen 3y agoAnimals do eat fermented food, through fallen/rotting fruits, so perhaps the thymol sensitivity predates hominids.
- thfuran 3y agoYeah, the ability to detect toxins likely to appear in the food supply seems evolutionarily important.
- kfarr 3y agoYeah exactly this is not just random, it’s “guided search” as commented by a sibling