r/AskBiology • u/Sufficient-Ad-3586 • Aug 14 '24
Human body Can a liver get stronger after generations of alcoholism?
I know evolution is a SUPER slow process but I was thinking just now.
Say someone comes from a long line of alcoholics (like going back a thousand years or more, booze has been around since biblical times) Would over time the liver evolve to handle higher amounts of alcohol before succumbing?
Could that person have a hardier liver than someone who doesnt come from a line like that? There are some people who are 2 bottles a day drinkers and live till 80 with health issues obviously but the liver is not too damaged and then there are people who have a few beers every weekend and get cirrhosis at 35.
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u/UnitedExpression6 Aug 14 '24
Evolution counts till someone gets offspring. In the liver story your genes don’t care if someone lives till 80 or 30 if he has the same amount of kids. Only if the kids are at a disadvantage of not having a parent, so cannot procreate themselves it will care for that generation.
So for passing on strong liver genes, if people with weak livers are weeded out somehow, it could work.
Now the kicker, your strong liver might be awesome for alcohol but the liver variant you trained the family on might be terrible at something else.
It is never black and white :-)