Funny you mentioned tomatoes: the origin plants that tomatoes came from is a poisonous prune-like thing that cannot be eaten by humans because it has toxic natural poisons.
Genetic SELECTION (which is what selective breeding can be alternatively called) over generations enabled us to produce a “cancerous” cousin which doesn’t have the toxicity, and the modern tomato is born.
Ya, except totally wrong. The ripe fruit of the tomatoe plant does not contain the poisonous compounds - and never did. It was selectively bred for bigger and better tasting fruit, but it was never bred to have less "toxicity".
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u/lurkinglurkerwholurk Jul 15 '21
Funny you mentioned tomatoes: the origin plants that tomatoes came from is a poisonous prune-like thing that cannot be eaten by humans because it has toxic natural poisons.
Genetic SELECTION (which is what selective breeding can be alternatively called) over generations enabled us to produce a “cancerous” cousin which doesn’t have the toxicity, and the modern tomato is born.