If people evolved from apes, why are there still apes?

Question

If people evolved from apes, why are there still apes?

Answer 1

As Damiana (above) says, it is most likely that we evolved alongside modern day apes.

But evolution is far more complex than you allow.  Species do not just evolve into one another in a linear chain.  Species also diverge if part of the population becomes physically isloted under different environmental conditions.  Therefore, even if we were hypothetically descended from chimpanzees, it would be plausible that we could still be living alonhside our ancestors.

Answer 2

Better question; where are the apes that are in the stages evolving into humans?

Answer 3

Thats a great question....but sorry I don't know,...id like to know though

Answer 4

If you are really interested, the reason is speciation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speciation

It is little understood by those who don't understand evolution but it isn't really rocket science.  It is the process where one species turns to two species.  If you didn't care to read the attached thread, then just think of a population where a portion migrates.  Now there are two populations.  One population enters a habitat that changes and favors particular characteristics and they form two separate population of different animals over time

Answer 5

Evolution is like a tree.  From the small seed to the mighty tree with many many branches. some grew in shady places some in sunny, cold or hot, all trees all different,

Answer 6

That is a logical conclusion.  Try to convince someone who has little logic of that fact.  It may be a lost cause.

Answer 7

Don't believe all this creationist rubbish, do you?  A common ancestor species evolved over many, many generations into the high primates, us among them.  Unfortunately, we became too big for our boots and have ruined eveything for all other life on this poor little planet,

This is a discussion better suited to Religion and Spirituality, where there are strong feelings on both sides of this debate!  Go and have a look - bet it makes you swear! (whichever side you are on!)

Answer 8

Because those are apes that didn't evolve into humans.

Answer 9

If we evolved, which I very much doubt, then we would have evolved with apes, and not from them. There is plenty of evidence for man to have been walking the earth for tens, and even hundreds of millions of years.

Answer 10

The premise of the question is wrong. Humans did not evolve from modern apes, apes and humans share ancestors.  The most recent of those ancestors would be classified as apes.

Each lineage went its own way. Or, to put it more explicitly, there have been a number of splits in lineage containing apes and humans in the last 15-odd million years (the lineage containing apes and humans split from the lineages leading to monkeys much earlier):

One split separated the lineage leading to today's "lesser apes" (gibbons, etc.) from the lineage leading to today's "Great apes".

One split separated the lineage leading to today's orangutans from the lineage leading to today's African "Great Apes"

Another split separated the lineage leading to today's Gorillas from the lineage leading to today's Chimpanzees and Humans.

Finally, a further split separated the lineage leading to today's Chimpanzees from the lineage leading to today's Humans. (note here that some might add a further split between bonobos ["Pygmy Chimpanzees") and humans).

Hominids were apes adapted to living in open savanna or broken woodlands, as opposed to all other apes, which live in forest/jungle.

As a result, hominids adaptations include:

Bipedal locomotion

Relatively larger teeth, with thicker enamel, allowing them to eat the harder foods in the open environment.

One group of hominids, started scavenging meat, and using tools to a greater extent than the others, and this is the group that led to humans

A final observation: Our problem here is our lack of objectivity when we look at ourselves. An Extra-Terrestrial Zoologist would say that all those above are apes.

wl

Answer 11

Because evolution is an unproven theory that everyone passes off as fact.  Every person on YA says the same thing that evolution's evidence is so overwhelming that they don't need to give any specific proof.  Yet not one person has given a specific evidence based proof.  Because there isn't any.  Evolution occurs when a species is faced with death and must change to survive.  No, we didn't evolve from apes.

Answer 12

Because all living things only reproduce after their own kind.

That is why there has never been any cross specie skeletons found. There should be millions on display in some museum. If Dino bones can last 200 million years, why aren't their cross specie human ancestor skeletons found?????

Answer 13

Actually humans are a type of ape, rather if humans evolved from gorillas or chimpanzees, why are there still gorillas and chimpanzees? Well, Humans and Chimpanzees share a common ancestor, and that species shares a common ancestor with gorillas.  Also, gorillas, chimpanzees, and humans are belong to different species.  Humans belong to the homo family, chimpanzees belong to the pan family, and gorrillas belong to the Gorrilla family.  The common ancestor of all three would belong to the Homininae family.

Answer 14

those are the people that didnt fully develope and get the capabilities of humans...

Answer 15

They are waiting till you reach marriageable age.

Answer 16

::Sigh:: Because humans are apes....we all evolved from a common ape-ancestor...we didn't evolve from chimps, we evolved alongside them.

Answer 17

You’re also asking “If dogs are descended from wolves, why are there still wolves?

From the National Academy of Sciences:

"If humans evolved from apes, why are there still apes?

     Humans did not evolve from modern apes, but humans and modern apes shared a common ancestor, a species that no longer exists. Because we share a recent common ancestor with chimpanzees and gorillas, we have many anatomical, genetic, biochemical, and even behavioral similarities with these African great apes. We are less similar to the Asian apes--orangutans and gibbons--and even less similar to monkeys, because we share common ancestors with these groups in the more distant past.

     Evolution is a branching or splitting process in which populations split off from one another and gradually become different. As the two groups become isolated from each other, they stop sharing genes, and eventually genetic differences increase until members of the groups can no longer interbreed. At this point, they have become separate species. Through time, these two species might give rise to new species, and so on through millennia. "

http://www.nap.edu/html/creationism/appe...

Frankly the "evolved from apes" question is perpetrated by creationists as a red herring. It's got nothing to do with evolution.

From Straight Dope:

Why isn't this argument used against evolution? Well, it is--it's just used incorrectly. Let's start with a quote from the recently re-released publication, Science and Creationism: A View from the National Academy of Sciences (Second Edition).   In the section on "Human Evolution," the publication notes, "today there is no significant scientific doubt about the close evolutionary relationships among all primates, including humans."

Evolution doesn't work as a simple find-and-replace function. Have you ever seen the evolutionary "tree" diagrams in a science book?  Those trees show how different species branch off and go in different evolutionary directions. That doesn't necessarily mean everything else dies. As the National Academy of Sciences document notes, archaeological finds "reveal a well-branched tree, parts of which trace a general evolutionary sequence leading from ape-like forms to modern humans."

The NAS publication actually answers your question directly in its Appendix of Frequently Asked Questions. It says:

"Humans did not evolve from modern apes, but humans and modern apes shared a common ancestor, a species that no longer exists. Because we share a recent common ancestor with chimpanzees and gorillas, we have many anatomical, genetic, biochemical, and even behavioral similarities with these African great apes. We are less similar to the Asian apes orangutans and gibbons and even less similar to monkeys, because we share common ancestors with these groups in the more distant past.

"Evolution is a branching or splitting process in which populations split off from one another and gradually become different. As the two groups become isolated from each other, they stop sharing genes, and eventually genetic differences increase until members of the groups can no longer interbreed. At this point, they have become separate species. Through time, these two species might give rise to new species, and so on through millennia."

In other words, the "ape-like" animals that eventually gave rise to humans split up into several branches, all of which evolved in different directions. Some of those lines became become extinct; others survived. One of the surviving groups includes you and me (and in theory P.E. teachers, although one wonders). Other survivors include the various species of monkeys and apes we find today.

So, John, I've convinced you, right? Attaboy--always nice to have another ally in the fight against ignorance. Incidentally, you can find the NAS publication on the web at http://books.nap.edu/html/creationism/. Lots of good info in there!

http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mevo...

Answer 18

For the same reason that if we all came from Adam and Eve, or later, from Noah, we have Blacks, Whites, Asians, and other races.

Not every ape evolved.

Answer 19

AAARGH hoot hoot hoot !

see there are still other primate species?

There is more than one species of ape so why should there NOT still be other surviving apes!

Answer 20

We had a common ancestor.  Some groups branched off to continue on as updated versions of apes, and others went their own way to become assorted versions of humans.

Answer 21

cause we didnt