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To: Dataman

No, if malaria is the primary cause of premature death in a human population in a given environment (premature death = death occurring before reproduction), then a mutation that causes premature death in homozygous individuals, but prevents premature death iin heterozygous individuals would be beneficial if the mutated allele were present in the proper frequency. Ie. common enough to make it likely that an individual would have one copy of the allele, but not so common that the individual would be likely to have two copies. Again, what is beneficial depends on environmental factors. A beneficial trait in one environment might be neutral or harmful in a different one.


104 posted on 02/11/2005 11:00:36 AM PST by stremba
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To: stremba

All of which begs the question, for what possible purpose would a designer give a human population a gene which is lethal in homozygous individuals? Why would there be any lethal genes at all if humans were designed? I have read that all humans have several hundred genes that are potentially lethal in homozygous individuals. (sorry I can't remember where I saw this so I can't provide a source) Why would a designer put them there?


106 posted on 02/11/2005 11:03:43 AM PST by stremba
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To: stremba
A beneficial trait in one environment might be neutral or harmful in a different one.

Not to mention, it has to confer survival long enough for you to propagate the genes; if it only keeps you alive until age 8, that's not much use; if it confers superior survival ability when you are normally food for your species' dominant predators, so that you compete for food with the younger members of your species, that causes problems in the other direction.

This tends to be a statistical phenomenon, right? So maybe it's not as finely-tuned a process as some people think...

Cheers!

143 posted on 02/11/2005 4:49:54 PM PST by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
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