this is a stupid question on crossing species?

Question

my cousin and i were discussing creation verses evolution and this question popped up and i dont know how to answer it. if man and ape (monkeys) share the same DNA and genes as humans and they say humans evolve from the ape. then can a human and ape create a cross species, it looks to me like if we were from the same gene pool it would be possible, but doing research i have found they they have tried and failed so this just make me believe that the whole human ape theory is wrong. if any one can explain this whole thing please do. the question is if we evolved from monkeys then why are there still monkeys today? and is it possible to cross species, take your time answering this ill will read all answers no matter how long they are. this is a serious question

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

there are so many great answers here ill never be able to chose. this is the first time i have gotten a lot of serious answers i am impressed with each one of you. what each of you are saying makes a lot of sense, i my self believe in creation and evolution and i think they can go hand in hand its just a matter of fitting the pieces of the puzzle together

your welcome secretsau im also giving every one a thumbs up

Answer 1

First, even between two humans, the process of fertilization needs to have a completely matched pairing of genes from the two parents or else the resulting fertilized egg will not survive. All it takes is one gene out of place for the result to be fatal.

So even though humans and chimps share 96% of their genes, that 4% difference is enough to make interbreeding completely impossible. Why? Because human DNA has about 25,000 genes, if you take 4% of 25,000, that's 800 different genes (and, again, it only takes 1 to be fatal).

As for your second question "if we evolved from monkeys, then why are there still monkeys today?" There are two parts to the answer. The first, as everybody is telling you ... we didn't "evolve from monkeys" (at least not the ones you see today), but instead modern man and modern monkeys shared a common ancestor that is NOT alive today. And the second part of the answer is that once a species A evolves from a species B, that doesn't mean that *all* members of species B must therefore evolve or go extinct. They are separate branches that can co-exist (although in the case of human ancestral species, it did go extinct).

I hope that answers your questions.

Oh ... and thank you for your pledge to actually read the answers. Too many people on here ask questions and then completely ignore the answers.

Answer 2

The reason there are still monkeys today is because when new species are created, they evolve from old ones. This doesn't necessarily mean that all the animals of the original species evolve as well. They still remain the same animal. Thus, there are still monkeys. It is possible to cross some species, however, not possible to cross apes with humans. This is due to prezygotic barriers, or things that prevent the forming of a zygote. A zygote is what is formed when sperm fertilizes an egg. Some of these barriers in humans and apes are mechanical isolation, or the reproductive organs don't really fit well with each other, plus the sperm of a human is also unable to penetrate the egg to an ape. And I would like to add that the definition of a species does not include the ability to form hybrids. The definition is simply a reproductive community of populations that occupy a specific niche in the environment. Many species can cross-breed and do have offspring, however, the offspring are not viable, meaning infertile, and therefore genetically useless and in a sense a waste of the parents time.

Answer 3

The human ape thing that you have is wrong.

No scientists thinks we evolved from the apes that are alive today. We share a common ancestor many many generations back. As time goes on we become more different and there is more variation between our genes.

Closer relatives can cross breed but you need to have more DNA in common than we have with apes today. Usually we say you are not a seperate species until you can no longer produce fertile offspring with the other. So if we didn't have that small difference in DNA we might be able to cross-breed with the apes but that would mean we were the same species. Things that can breed like types of dogs are the same species but different breeds.

The other question about why there are still monkeys has to do with what I just explained. We didn't evolve FROM monkeys, or apes (which don't have tails). We all share a common ancestor though (which would have been a little like all of us). As it migrated and conditions changed it adapted to this, we became specialized for living in the warm savanna and lost hair and stood upright, the ancestors that stayed in the jungle became more specialized for it and developed into apes.

Our closest "cousins" are the bonobos, only slightly closer than chimpanzees. This means that we shared an ancestor with them most recently. After monkeys branched off long ago, and after gorillas and orangutangs branched off later the chimps branched off, then the bonobos soon after and we continued to develope into humans.

more recent human evolution
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_evolution

evolution in a nutshell
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution
worth a read, it might clear some things up

Answer 4

Hi. OK, I can give you my opinion. First of all one of the determining factors of what constitutes a species is the ability to cross breed and produce a hybrid. Man and other primates, although we share a large number of DNA attributes, are NOT the same species. In human form, we have many different races but we are all the same species. Make sense? If you look just at other primates you will find MANY different species. Can you imagine a cross between a gorilla and a spider monkey? Will not happen. Same with humans. Theology aside, the long, long process of evolution (if that turns out to be true) involves many "forks" in the DNA road. Survival determines which fork is successful and passes it's DNA onto future generations. ALL surviving primates have been successful until now. But some are not long for this planet. Sadly the Orangutan is one of these. And I fear that humans (as we know them) will likely follow.

Answer 5

It is a common misperception (often gleefully and deliberately repeated by creationists) that humans evolved from monkeys or apes. We did not. Rather, we have a common hominid ancestor.

The definition of a species is that its members have a substantially different DNA genome from anything not in that group. So to answer your question, at some point in the past there was a hominid species which, over time, branched out into different species having different DNA genomes.

Natural selection favors those genomes which produce beings most well-suited to the environment they're in. Monkeys are very well-suited to living in trees; humans are not. As an animal expands the types of environments it can live in, eventually some members become more specialized (through natural selection) at living in one of these environments while others become more specialized at living in another environment. These sub-groups will drift apart over time, and given a very long period of time eventually their genetic DNA will differ so much that they can no longer breed with members of a different sub-group. At that time they will have differentiated into new species. This is a gradual process, however, and there will be a transitional period where they are still able to interbreed. You can see this with some closely-related species, like wolves & dogs, plumbs & apricots, or humans & neanderthals. But as far as I know, humans are too far genetically removed to be able to interbreed with any ape or monkey species.

The short answer to your question, why are there still monkeys today, is that monkeys are well-suited for the environment they live in (trees). Tarzan excluded, we humans suck at tree-life.

Answer 6

Although humans and monkeys do have similar DNA, it does not mean that they bond perfectly. In such a case, both the human/monkey body will reject the fetus as an infection and terminate the pregnancy. In fact, if such a pregnancy were to occur, the child would no doubt have some serious gene problems due to the few differences in our DNA and monkeys DNA.

Answer 7

One important consideration is to look at the chromosomal changes- humans have 23 pairs, all other great apes have 24 pairs. This difference has been sequenced, and found that the divergence occurred at a region that is highly similar to telomeric (ends of the chromosome) sequences, thus making a break not improbable, but a fusion event even more probable.

Answer 8

This is very interesting and I hope you follow through to get as many facts as possible on the subject.

I believe in creation and the Genealogy of Jesus as the 62nd person from Adam. Matt.1:1-17; I believe the 10 persons before the flood, and after the flood Abraham is the 20th person, then 14 to David, 14 to Babylon an 14 to Jesus is born in Rome the sixth Empire in this world from Eden. John 17:3,5.24; Jesus was with God before the world was. Job 38:4-7; Angels saw earth and world come to be.

The Evolved and Created subjects are going to be around a long time and we may as well do a thorough study of both. There is an extinct Race Gen.6:2,4,10-13;

APES IN THE BIBLE

1K1.10:22 For the king had at sea a navy of Tharshish with the navy of Hiram: once in three years came the navy of Tharshish, bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks. 2Chr.9:20 And all the drinking vessels of king Solomon were of gold, and all the vessels of the house of the forest of Lebanon were of pure gold: none were of silver; it was not any thing accounted of in the days of Solomon. 2Chr.9:21 For the king's ships went to Tarshish with the servants of Huram: every three years once came the ships of Tarshish bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks. 2Chr.9:22 And king Solomon passed all the kings of the earth in riches and wisdom. Solomon was born year 3000 to die at age 69 in year 3069 from Eden.
Solomon dies 997 before Christ will be born in Rome.

Answer 9

The darwinian evolution theroy is really neat but lacks a great many solid facts. Just because we " look " like apes, means little, and there are HUGE problems with the whole theory....
the gaps in our history are bigger than the information that we do have, so that a great deal of info must be gathered and new modifications made.
As one ANSWERER just stated on another question, we are a genetically designed animal for aliens that used us as labour thousands of years ago. We have been wandering this rock since, looking for answers... Massive changes have happened to this rock that are un documented ( or the documents were destroyed by fanatics of whatever invading army that destroyed whatever civilization over and over ).... we really are quite pathetic, all told...

Answer 10

Different sub-species can hybridize, but man and ape are totally different species altogether. One would have to seriously splice genes to incorporate ape DNA into our own.
Apes are still around because they have adapted to avoid predators and their food supply is adaquate. We exist because we too have learned to avoid predators etc.
I have my own beliefs that explain both creationism AND evolution. I think I'll post them in the philosophy section.