Evolution at work - if humans were eliminated from the planet, would monkeys ever be able to land on the moon?

Question

for example, assume that a virus were to kill off all humans but monkeys were immune, would a certain species of monkeys eventually (over millions of years) figure out the technology to have one of their species land on the moon?

Answer 1

Unknown.  Intelligence is not the goal of evolution.  IF a non human species were to develop their own civilization and advance into higher technology, then sure they could explore space.  No reason not to.  There is no guarantee that any other primate will advance to our level of intelligence under any circumstances.  There is also no reason to limit intellectual advancement to primates.  If humans vanished and another species filled our niche, it could be hyenas, or meerkats, or parrots, etc.

Answer 2

Their descendants maybe, but only after evolving into a superior species.It happened once, it could happen again. Still, the chances for this to happen are the same with the chances of other species evolving to form something smart and creative enough to fly to the Moon.

By the way, in the future, Earth will eventually loose it's Moon. So, if evolution doesn't happen on time, there will be nowhere to go. Thought, by that time, all intelligent life would had perished from our planet, because of the deadly effect of the loosing Moon catastrophe.

Answer 3

There is absolutely nothing that indicates that any species has to become sentient.

As far as we can tell, only one species ever has, and it's only been around for half a million years or so (more if you include other species of Homo).

Sentience is not the be all and end all of evolution, in fact our own example is showing that it might not even be a very good strategy for long term survival of a species.

If our own sentient species ever does go extinct, there's nothing to say that another sentient species will ever develop from any lineage.

If it did, it would depend on the chain of circumstances that happened to select for a population of some organism that was smarter than average, and rewarded that cleverness with reproductive success.

It might be a species of monkey or other primate that follows this path to sentience.

It could be dolphins, orca or porpoises.  Some would argue that they're close or already there as it is.  It's unlikely that these species would ever develop a technological society that could land on the moon, however.  

It could be some other clever, manually dextrous, curious species - like raccoons, yapok, or octopus.

Answer 4

Probably not.  If you are one of the many that assume humans evolved from monkeys, then your basic premise starts with a serious flaw.  We humans shared a common ancestor with all other primates, but monkeys did not evolved in to humans.

Evolution occurs post Earth changing events.  Asteroid impact, massive earthquakes with volcanoes, etc etc.  These events cause a major sudden and long lasting change to Earths biosphere.  This resulted in the extinction or near extinction of all life forms.  The life that managed to rise from the ashes was very different than that which went to ashes.  This is the foundation for new evolution.  Evolution has occurred many times on Earth.  More than likely it will occur again.  Perhaps the next great cataclysmic event will be human caused.  Whatever, nobody knows what the next evolution of life will bring.

Answer 5

One can only hope!

Answer 6

If "a certain species of monkeys eventually (over millions of years) figure out the technology to have one of their species land on the moon," then somewhere along the way, they would have ceased being monkeys and would have become a new species belonging, almost certainly, to a new taxonomic family and genus.

So the answer is no, monkeys will never make it to the moon, but yes, as a part of the Haplorrhini clade (that includes humans), certain monkeys might evolve into a more advanced species given the proper environment, with enough time and luck (after all, we did). Or they might not (after all, not all human species advanced very far).

Answer 7

Just to correct Jim; evolution is happening all the time, not just after 'Earth changing events'.

And to answer your question, maybe.