Human evolution in the last 12,000 years, in PNAS

My loose impression is that, not so long ago, scholars of human evolution discounted recent changes in the human genome, pointing out that maybe the frequency of lactose intolerance had been altered by the domestication of cattle, goats, and sheep, but suggesting that recent changes (i.e. since the invention of agriculture) were rare. This may have been an anti-racism perspective, or it may be that new data have changed this view, but indeed it seems to have changed.

Gene changes in recent milennia offer a window on how human patterns of interaction, regarding food acquisition and preparation, and communal living, may even cause changes in human biology.  

Here's a special feature on the subject, at the PNAS:

Special Feature: The Past 12,000 Years of Behavior, Adaptation, and Evolution Shaped Who We Are Today

"The authors of this Special Feature focus on challenges pertaining to dietary and nutritional quality and adequacy, resource inequality, interpersonal conflict and warfare, climate change, population trends, demographic transitions, migration, mobility, infectious disease and the rise of novel pathogens, and the transformative circumstances of human biology over the last 12,000 years.

• INTRODUCTIONJANUARY 17, 2023

  The past 12,000 years of behavior, adaptation, population, and evolution shaped who we are today

  • Clark Spencer Larsen and
   

  "Based on the study of human remains from Holocene settings and the associated contexts of diet, behavior, and lifestyle, this set of Perspectives and Research Articles provides readers with new and emerging insights into the human condition and what has shaped human biology, health, and lifestyle over the course of the last 10 or so millennia. This record makes clear that human evolution and biological change, adaptation, exposure to long-standing and newly emerging infectious diseases, population demography, and warfare have continued in important ways over the course of the last 10 millennia, leading to the conditions associated with overpopulation, undernutrition, violence, and other circumstances we face globally today."
• PERSPECTIVEJANUARY 17, 2023

  Climate change, human health, and resilience in the Holocene

  • Gwen Robbins Schug,
   
  • Jane E. Buikstra,
   
  • [...]
  • Sonia R. Zakrzewski,
   
• PERSPECTIVEJANUARY 17, 2023

  Genomic perspectives on human dispersals during the Holocene

  • Mark Stoneking,
   
  • Leonardo Arias,
   
  • [...]
  • Jae Joseph Russell B. Rodriguez,
   
• PERSPECTIVEJANUARY 17, 2023

  Ancient pathogens provide a window into health and well-being

  • Cecil M. Lewis,
   
  • Mercy Y. Akinyi,
   
  • [...]
  • Anne C. Stone,
   
• RESEARCH ARTICLEJANUARY 17, 2023

  Conflict, violence, and warfare among early farmers in Northwestern Europe

  • Linda Fibiger,
   
  • Torbjörn Ahlström,
   
  • [...]
  • Martin Smith,
   
• RESEARCH ARTICLEJANUARY 17, 2023

  Population trends and the transition to agriculture: Global processes as seen from North America

  • George R. Milner,
   
  • Jesper L. Boldsen,
   
• RESEARCH ARTICLEJANUARY 17, 2023

  Mobility and kinship in the world’s first village societies

  • Jessica Pearson,
   
  • Jane Evans,
   
  • [...]
  • Eva Fernández-Domínguez,
   
• RESEARCH ARTICLEJANUARY 17, 2023

  Long-term trends in human body size track regional variation in subsistence transitions and growth acceleration linked to dairying

  • Jay T. Stock,
   
  • Emma Pomeroy,
   
  • [...]
  • Jonathan C. K. Wells,