Arizona outlaws abortions based on race and sex

[Neil]

AC has allowed a significant population migration from the northern US to the south.

The southern US has been pretty heavily populated for a very long time.  I think you're crazy again.

[Valmy]

AC has allowed a significant population migration from the northern US to the south.

The southern US has been pretty heavily populated for a very long time.  I think you're crazy again.

Heh not like it is now.  I think Tim is absolutely right but it goes even more for Arizona.

[Martinus]

I think the right wingers should outlaw abortions for same sex couples, to really stick it up to the gays.

[Martinus]

AC has allowed a significant population migration from the northern US to the south. Population transfers cause different populations to breed together that didn't before. This causes a change the likelyhood of certain genes being passed on. This is evolution.

I think you are overestimating the genetic differences between people in the Northern and the Southern US. 

People still largely marry within the same race. A descendant of Irish immigrants living in Chicago has a better chance of mixing different gene pools if he marries a descendant of German immigrants living in Chicago than a descendant of Irish immigrants living in Houston.

[grumbler]

We've had extensive air conditioning for what, 50 or 60 years? Way too early to be discussing AC in this context.

  Are you saying that AC takes longer than 50 or 60 years to alter the environment in which it is installed?  I disagree.  My AC alters the environment in a matter of minutes.

Changes to human society & technology are happening at a faster rate now than ever before. These can affect the gene pool in various ways. Still, one would hardly expect to be able to see evolutionary change over a single lifetime. That doesn't mean it's stopped.

If one argues (as Timmay's link does) that 'evolution" is merely a changes in allele frequencies, then, yes, humans and all other species are evolving all the time, because allele frequencies are never constant.  That kind of defeats the purpose of having the word 'evolution," though, since it is then meaningless.

If we mean by evolution the sequence of events involved in the physical development of a species, then we are not evolving, because the mechanisms for evolution have been halted.  We are not talking about a lifetime.  We are talking about Cro Magnon skeletons being indistinguishable from modern man's.

[grumbler]

The removal of need to adapt to physical environment is precisely the driver for evolution. 

Got a cite for this?  It stands existing evolutionary history on its head, and I haven't run across the hypothesis that evolution occurs when environment does not force adaptation. Must be new stuff, and I admit that I haven't been keeping up.  It is pretty revolutionary if it is as absolute ("precise") as you make it.

[Caliga]

The southern US has been pretty heavily populated for a very long time.  I think you're crazy again.

AC did have a significant impact on the development of Florida, though.

[Valmy]

AC did have a significant impact on the development of Florida, though.

No way a hot humid hell like central Texas is one of the fastest growing parts of the country without it.  Don't forget Arizona either.

[Caliga]

I think also the draining of wetlands and skeeter spraying helped.  Not only is Florida hot and muggy as hell but it used to have malaria, yeller fever, etc.