It would be interesting to look at the diets of cultures that do not include dairy as a staple in their diet, and compare their genetics to our own. For example, most east Asian dishes include very little milk or milk products, if any at all. I had never thought about this until I couple of years ago, when my family hosted a Thai student for a year. She was not lactose-intolerant, but if she ate the amount of milk or milk-products (cheese, ice cream, yoghurt) as her US peers, she would get sick. She told us she almost never ate dairy at home, because it wasn’t really a big part of her country’s diet. She was able to build up a tolerance, however, over the year that she spent with us, which I find interesting if most of our ability to process lactose is based on genetics.
I also wonder about the types of milk not from cows- how is our body affected by the milk and cheese from goats and llamas?

Her stealth and beauty were incredible. Loshy, powerful and graceful as he was, seemed almost clumsy by comparison. That time they decided to excavate the ice from the pond was hilarious! The time(s) they tangled with skunks – not so much.

It would be interesting to see if monkeys or other species of animals could be bred to develop or rely on their own technology and domesticates. I remember reading about dolphins developing and spreading new fishing techniques among themselves. I would be interested in seeing the results of any concerted effort to breed an animal for greater brain volume. http://phys.org/news/2011-08-ingenious-fishing-method-dolphins.html

I think that is a really interesting way to see the dependence we have on technology these days. While our brains have decreased we as a society continue to make breakthroughs everyday in science which is attributed to the technological era. I don’t encourage over dependency on technology because it does have negative effects but it is a incredibly beneficial resource and has helped human progress.

Since I have little background in any of this information I often too easily believe the theories we read about. It is nice to see someone who can critically examine the readings and make me realize that maybe I shouldn’t ingest it all too quickly. I like the idea of gene therapy as a weight loss program because of the high need for it today. We have become a very overweight population and people want an option to easily fix it.

Thanks for sharing this. Great to see pics of Alika and Losh Muffin. Alika was certainly a “dog” apart. There are two things that I especially remember about her. First, the incredibly sly way she would disappear. She would slowly make her way to the edge of the field, and it was clear what she was thinking, so you would watch her. But she watched us even more intently, and the second our attention was diverted, she would be gone. Could never quite figure out how she could disappear so totally in such a split second of time. The other thing was her levitating jumps above the high grass in the field, followed by precision three point landings to catch “meals on squeals.”

I remember a few amazing feats of Alika. We were on a walk and Loshi and Alika were both sprinting towards a pond, and there was a barbed wire fence in the way, and without breaking stride Loshi (German Shepard) ducked under the fence and Alika (wolf hybrid) at full canter jumped the three and a half foot barb wire fence. Once they got to the 1-2 inch ice covered pond, and broke through the ice, they both proceeded to pull huge chunks of ice on to the shore. It was amazing.

In response to your comments on human breast milk and the evolution of lactose tolerance, milk (of all animals) is indeed baby food. With milk comes a slew of nutrients and antibodies from the mother that both protect and nourish the child. As infants, humans have the enzyme lactase in abundance, to better digest the milk. However, as a child grows and becomes weaned off of breast milk, the activity levels associated with that enzyme drop significantly. Normally this is of no consequence, as a diet before the introduction of domesticated cattle would have no milk to digest post breast-feeding age. The evolutionary adaptation Dunn references deals with the genetic change that causes lactase production to remain high throughout life, letting us digest milk at any age.

I think you are on to something by reminding us that the “paleo diet” can’t be a one stop antidote for our contemporary dependence on processed food.
But setting aside the blame game (agriculture = bad) for a bit, what insights does Dunn offer about how domestication changes the biological makeup and social behavior of humans and cows?
P.S. I’m sure human breast milk is not part of Dunn’s critique.

Studies of stray / feral dog populations offer additional insight on how quickly the domestication process can be reversed and how many gradations there along the continuum of socialization with humans: Sternthal, S. (2010, Jan 16). A wolf in dog’s clothing. Financial Times. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.lib.vt.edu:8080/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/250253043?accountid=14826
(you’ll have to sign in on the proxy server to see the full text.) Also, I forgot to thank Corinne for mentioning my favorite subway riding dogs in Moscow. I posted about them last year here: http://blogs.lt.vt.edu/domesticate/dogs/moscow-strays/