Why any more superior species than 'man' evolved from ape?

Question

Why any more superior species than 'man' evolved from ape?

Answer 1

Icabod says it all well here. But one thing needs to be noted here before you read Icabod's info, which must be kept in mind while reading his response. Man did not evolve from apes. This is a very common, and way too common misconception. Man and apes have a common ancestor that both branched out from. But one did not come from the other. Think of it this way. White Tail Deer and Mule Deer are related. That's obvious. But they have a common ancestor too. One did not come from the other.

Answer 2

Humans are part of the hominid family. They are both part of and descended from them. The process of this development is called evolution. In brief, this means that new species develop and expand as they are better at dealing with their environment then others. See: http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/evo...

for a discussion of the evolution process.

The hominids include humans and the apes. They are part of the family Hominidae, of the order Primate. Humans did not "evlove from the apes" We share a common ancestor with them and are considered "cousins." Chimpanzees, our closest relative, share a 99% match in DNA. In protein sequencing, the match is closer, no differences at all.  When man's protein sequencing is compared to gorillas there is only two differences in the match with hemoglobin, red blood cells and amino acids. Lastly the antgen-antibody reaction for humans is 97% from chimpanzees compared to 50% for baboons. In other words we're related. DNA is today used to show how closely people are related (as in determining paternity) and to determine if people were at a crime scene (as a means to determine guilt or innocence). It also is used to determine how long ago species split off from each other.

The split from the apes is put at 8 million years ago. That's based both on the fossil remains and the know rate of change for DNA.

It appears our ancestors were part of an isolated population where evolution proceeded rapidly. The apes remained in the forests and evolved to fit their ecological niches. Given the number of mutations, changes due to chance and so on, it's unlikely any other hominids would evolve like humans.

Look at your education. Had you not been promoted in grades you'd not have been exposed to more material and wouldn't have been challenged to grow. Imagine you'd stayed at the 6th grade level with only minor changes in classes. While apes have evolved, their enviorment has remained fairly static. To get then to change you'd have to make major cjanges in their enviorment (cut down the forests) then wait millions of years.

Answer 3

Man probably killed them like in the book 'The Inheritors' process of evolution.