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I can't see how the article justifies its title. Did the (comparatively) lower level of adult lactose intolerance in the West have social, cultural, economic or other effects significant enough to be described as a change in the course of civilisation? If so, what were those changes?

EDIT: s/tolerance/intolerance/

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See http://www.nature.com/news/archaeology-the-milk-revolution-1.... Lacose tolerance apparently allowed middle-eastern nomads to wipe out and replace the native european hunter-gatherers, and set up an agricultural society in their place.

"In a 2004 study, researchers estimated that people with the mutation would have produced up to 19% more fertile offspring than those who lacked it. The researchers called that degree of selection “among the strongest yet seen for any gene in the genome”."

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