I caught this in the news a few days ago:
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/2008/02/01/141428/CIB-confirms.htm
A family in Taiwan, going back at least five generations, totally lacks ridges on their fingertips.
There’s also some concern about crime and security, as this mutation wreaks havoc on popular biometric techniques.
I think that’s an interesting example of a mutation that has a noticeable physionomical impact without being debilitating or even particularly negative.
They just have not encountered CSI’s “enhance” feature!
You mean the one that can zoom in on the eyes of a shooter 300 yards away, reflected in the eye of the victim, taken by a grainy B&W security camera a block-and-a-half down the streeet? :dubious:
Grissom: …but the print is just a smudgy blur.
Sidle: Ah…but I did a swab of the print and it contained a strange residue material that I ran through APHID. It matches the laminate that was only used by Mahjong tile artisans in an obscure rural province of Taiwan. I compared that to a list of all stolen vehicles in Las Vegas in the last 50 years and…
Grissom: (raises eyebrow)…you have a hit?
is all curious now–a bad sign, surely
But why did we (as a species) need the ridges or papillae in the first place? Climbing trees?
Improved grip - like the ridges on tires. (That’s what I was told, anyway).
Intelligent design - God knew we would eventually need something for CSI to do. That’s also why God invented semen and the various ridges on tires. 
Intelligent design - God knew we would eventually need something for CSI to do. That’s also why God invented semen and the various ridges on tires.
Of course, a fingerprintless family must mean that these things are no longer necessary Curiously, my tires are also bald. These are sure signs of the end times.
REPENT
Ahhh, I’m simulposting with myself. Make it stop.
Sorry
Well, when you only live in 3 dimensions that would tend to cause simulposts. 