A very brief post for a beautiful Sunday morning, tendrils of spring warmth drifting on breezes.
An interesting question regarding genetics. What if every single human (homo sapiens) who ever lived had at least one child, who in turn survived to have at least one child, and so on? In other words, what if all genomes that ever existed contributed to our current population?
Since the beginning of human history, a significant percentage of people died before reproducing. (Infant and child mortality, for example, were astonishingly high in most eras and places.) So, in essence, many, if not most, genomes ended. Never contributed to the overall gene pool.
There is no answer to the question, either through scientific evaluation or even imagination. And yet it is a fascinating thought. What would the world population look like? Be like? How might society and societies be different? What traits might have existed that died out long ago, or are now so rare as to be outliers? Were there traits that would be highly useful now in current times, but weren’t useful throughout earlier history, and so weren’t selected and thus disappeared? So many questions leading from that one question. These are just a very few. Makes a person wonder…
A really good link is provided here: https://medlineplus.gov/genetics/understanding/inheritance/inheritancepatterns/
In short, I would think that normal distribution of the various dominant and recessive traits would ensure the passing on of the characteristics.
However, I'm a lay person and truly don't know the answer. It's a great question though and, as most great questions do, generates more great questions.
Jim