Most historical figures would be short by our standards. Modern diets and easy availability of cheap nutrition have added multiple inches to the average height - several when compared to civilizations where famines were common (see pictures of the Korean DMZ with North Korean soldiers next to South Korean ones).
Not always, usually it’s an evolutionary arms race though. Recent paper I thought was really cool suggests the initial jump from single to multicellular happened because of a snowball Earth which changed the water temperature and therefore viscosity, making larger size equate to more efficient swimming.
Most historical figures would be short by our standards. Modern diets and easy availability of cheap nutrition have added multiple inches to the average height - several when compared to civilizations where famines were common (see pictures of the Korean DMZ with North Korean soldiers next to South Korean ones).
Isn’t it almost universal that as long as resources are plentiful, organisms drift toward larger sizes?
Not always, usually it’s an evolutionary arms race though. Recent paper I thought was really cool suggests the initial jump from single to multicellular happened because of a snowball Earth which changed the water temperature and therefore viscosity, making larger size equate to more efficient swimming.
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/716634