Which of the hominines is most closely related to modern humans?

Question

Which of the hominines is most closely related to modern humans?

Answer 1

One of the problems you face is the confusion often associated with the various terms hominid, hominoid, hominin, etc.  The definitions of these terms and how they apply are currently in flux as we learn more about the relationships and attempt to reclassify species.  The following is one set of explanations provided in a recent blog on Anthropology.net -  (http://anthropology.net/user/kambiz_kamr... ):

Hominoid - A hominoid is a member of the superfamily Hominoidea: extant members are the lesser apes (gibbons) and great apes.

Hominid - A hominid is a member of the family Hominidae: all of the great apes.

Hominine - A hominine is a member of the subfamily Homininae: gorillas, chimpanzees, humans.



Hominin - A hominin is a member of the tribe Hominini: chimpanzees and humans. A tribe —or infrafamily—is a rank between subfamily and genus,

Hominan - A hominan is a member of the sub-tribe Hominina: humans and their extinct relatives.

Humanoid - A humanoid is a vaguely human-shaped entity.

I suspect what you are actually asking is what species is most closely related to ours - the typically answer to that has been the Chimpanzee.  Studies have shown that the DNA of humans and Chimps are more than 98% the same.  

Likewise, the other African Apes (gorillas and bononbos or pygmy chimps) are more closley related (based on DNA) than the Asian Apes (Orangs and gibbons).  

Bonobos are a very intriguing group in that they culturally share many traits with Humans that even chimps do not, including using s*x as a way to distract from stressful sitiuations and face to face.

This is not to say that any living Ape is our direct ancestor.  What likely happened is that somewhere back many millions of years ago our long ago ancestors and those of chimps (and the other apes) diverged from a single parent species, that does not resemble any living species.  Over the millions of years each of these split descendant groups evolved in many ways, creating lots of variants along the way -with some branches dieing out, while others continued to evolve.  Today there are only 5 of these great Ape species (plus Humans) left, but in the Miocene period (20-8 Million years ago) we have evidence to suggest that there were many - maybe even hundreds - of ape variants that came and went.

In the "humanoid" line there is evidence to suggest that there bipedal apes as much as 8 million years ago (Orrorin tugonesis).  Perhaps the best known bipedal ape is Lucy - an Australopithecus afarensis that lived about 3.3 million years ago.  Other species along this trajectory inlcuded Australopithecus anamensis, A. africanus, and  A. robusts. Eventually the earlies Homo species devloped around 2 million years ago (Homo habilis) and we now know that there were several other varieties of Homo including H. ergaster and H. erectus.  Homo erectus appears to have been the most successful - surviving from somewhere around 1.8 million years ago to about 100,000 years ago (and some folks think even longer).  H.erectus also appears to have been the first to leave Africa and spread around the world, reaching from east Asia through western Europe.

Homo sapiens finally develops sometime around 200 -150,000  years ago.  The fossil and DNA evidence both suggest this happened in Africa (making us all descendants of African origin) and spread throughout the world from there.  There is a lot of debate over whether the earliest H. sapiens interbred with H. erectus, however much of the evidence suggests they did not.  Although these H. spapiens are considered modern, they were not exactly like us yet and are often referred to as Archaic or Anatomically Modern H. sapiens.

During this period some of these Archaic H. sapiens evolved into what we now call Neandertals.  Several theories exist as to why they evolved in a different directions, but two factors are probably most likely.  First, the return of an Ice Age put them in a very difficult environment, much colder and drier thatn other folks around the world.  Second, the advance of the glacies probably decreased their ability to interact (an interbreed) with other humans in warmer climates, creating one of the primary conditions needed for the creation of a new species (inability to share genes).  In the end it is not clear if Nenadertals died out or began to interbreed with other humans as the glaciers retreated and interaction became more likely (that is another whole topic to get into).

At around this time (50,000-40,000 years ago) humans took on their basically modern form in all aspects.  The earliest of these folks were called Cro-Mangnon man - based on the location of some of earliest skeletons found - but they are essentially modern humans.  It is also around this time that we see Cave Paintings and other evidence of an artistic expolsion in mankind, suggesting that something deep inside the mind was changing.  by 40,000 years ago some of these folks reached Australia, becoming the ancestors of the modern aborigines and by about 15,000 years ago it appears that some were reaching North American, becoming the ancestors of Native Americans.

Seems I have gone a bit beyond what you originally asked for, but I hope this helps you and addresses some of the other answers I see your recieved that were not quite correct.

DM

Answer 2

homo sapien better known as archaic man

Answer 3

The chimpanzee is the most closely related today of all living hominins. Neanderthals were very similar to modern humans but died off about 30,000 years ago.

Answer 4

You're going to have to spell your words correctly if you want a serious answer. What do you mean by hominines? There are hominids, hominoids, and there were several distinct species of homo before modern homo sapiens.

Answer 5

My guess is that you mean hominids. Cro Magnon is the closest to modern humans I believe.

LL

Answer 6

Homo neanderthalensis

Answer 7

Homo Sapiens they are considered oour diect ancestors. we are classififed as Homo Sapien Sapien