[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by richlevy

I always assumed that after 200,000 years of evolution as ominvores, the majority of us would have cleared up issues related to what we can safely eat.

Omnivores, yes. We've eaten vegetables and fruits for hundreds of thousands of years. But all the cultivated grains we eat today have been around less than 10,000 years.

There are 8 major cereal grains which are consumed by modern man (wheat, rye, barley, oats, corn, rice, sorghum, and millet) [Harlan 1992]. Each of these grains were derived from wild precursors whose original ranges were quite localized [Harlan 1992]. Wheat and barley were domesticated only ~10,000 years ago in the Near East; rice was domesticated approximately 7,000 years ago in China, India, and southeast Asia; corn was domesticated 7,000 years ago in Central and South America; millets were domesticated in Africa 5,000-6,000 years ago; sorghum was domesticated in East Africa 5,000-6,000 years ago; rye was domesticated ~5,000 years ago in southwest Asia; and oats were domesticated ~3,000 years ago in Europe.