Domestication of Plants and Animals

When early farmers saved the largest seeds from their best plants and replanted them the following season, they were doing something unprecedented in the history of life on Earth. They were directing evolution. Not consciously, since no one understood genetics for another 11,000 years, but effectively. Generation by generation, they reshaped wild species into something new, something that could never have existed without human intervention.

This process, The human-directed process of breeding plants or animals for desired traits, such as larger seeds, docile temperament, or higher milk production. Unlike natural selection, which favors traits that aid survival in the wild, artificial selection favors traits that are useful to humans — often at the expense of the organism's ability to survive on its own., is one of the most powerful forces humans have ever wielded. It preceded every other technology. Before the wheel, before bronze, before writing, there was selective breeding. Its consequences are still unfolding.

The transformation of wild plants into crops was not instantaneous. It took hundreds, sometimes thousands of generations. But the changes were dramatic.