We evolved from apes, but evolutionists do not believe we ARE apes. We are primates and so are apes and gibbons, but we aren’t apes anymore. We did not evolve from monkeys, but monkeys and people have a common ancestor. When someone says “we’re apes” or “we come from monkeys” they’re joking around and they don’t mean it literally (unless they do and then you can correct them). Do you understand?
2007-01-19 08:33:26 · 24 answers · asked by Lilliana 5 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Yes. That's completely true. I have never heard that some scientists see us as evolved apes.
2007-01-19 08:39:26 · answer #1 · answered by A 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
It is a bit confusing because the term apes has often be used to exclude humans. This has more to do with thinking we should be special than any real scientific fact. Pure hubris. If you take the cladistic view of the animated world we are definitely classified as apes. Or put it in another way, great apes are like humans in the family hominidae. Together with chimpanzees and Gorillas we are in the subfamily Homininae. If you remove humans from that branch it is incomplete and incorrect. Consequently "evolutionists" do believe that we are apes. And if you correct somebody who says we are, well, then you are simply wrong. Sorry. You are completely correct, however, if you state we don't come from monkeys. We aren't monkeys either. Bravo!
2007-01-19 16:53:03 · answer #2 · answered by convictedidiot 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Evolution is is a theory to help understand the changes in lifeforms over time. It does not have anything to do with the original creation or manifestation of these lifeforms. Evolution does not mean a belief in random events or chaos.
Most people who accept this theory would tell you that humans did not come from apes, but rather humans and many apes seem to have a common ancestor (different branches of the same family tree).
Much of that difference in DNA between humans and apes is the genetic coding for the brain and how the brain is used. Just because humans have languages and logical thought patterns which can be taught from generation to generation does not mean that basically humans are not animals. To believe this might be considered the height of arrogance.
If you look carefully at human behavior in a mob or group expecting an immediate danger (large predator or fire, for example) you might find much less difference between your behavior and that of many of the great apes.
The simplest cases of change in a lifeforms over time deal with microbes. Humans know through study that some species have changed enough to now be considered a different species. This is more than just changes in antibiotic response or nutritional needs. These changes are associated with changes in DNA coding.
Please understand that some people are so set in their own dogma that they cannot begin to change their belief system no matter what evidence is presented to them. They have no method to begin to understand how a flu virus can change from year to year. Evolution does not have all the answers, especially if one is interested in the original creation of life. Evolution can, on the other-hand, help understand how life can change.
2007-01-19 16:52:32 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
I beg to differ. I mean it absolutely literally.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ape
Monkeys are not apes, they're two different divisions of primates. Gibbons are apes, specifically lesser apes. The Great Apes currently living are chimpanzees, gorillas, orang utangs and humans. Humans are the commonest and most widespread species of Great Ape.
BTW neither the Barbary "Ape" nor the Baboon are true apes - they're old world monkeys.
The traditional distinction between non human and human great apes makes no sense anatomically, genetically or taxonomically, and has been abandoned by taxonomists (classifcation specialists).
2007-01-19 16:42:05 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 0⤋
Apes, humans, monkeys all evolved from a previous primate common ancestor
2007-01-19 16:38:02 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
I understand that you believe that your ancesters swung in trees. Mine did not.If we evolved from apes, why are there still apes? Surely there should be some evidence of missing links instead of the fakes that have been "found" so far? Real missing links, not some pig's tooth that some deluded scientists used to construct a supposed missing link. Give me a break.
2007-01-19 16:42:05 · answer #6 · answered by wanda3s48 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋
We'd probably put chimpanzees in the genus Homo if we weren't so hubristic. LOL.
We do come from monkeys -- just not MODERN monkeys. Check out a picture of that common ancestor. Looks like a monkey to me!
2007-01-19 16:38:15 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Being of the family hominidae, I would actually consider humans as one of the great apes, but this is not the prescribed biological view. We are in the same category as apes, but we have not been called apes. However, I see no reason why not to extend the classification to homo sapien sapiens as well.
I guess I'm saying that biology doesn't specifically say we AREN'T apes.
2007-01-19 16:40:31 · answer #8 · answered by Phoenix, Wise Guru 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Any "common ancestor" would fit the descritption of an ape! To claim anything else is to mince words. I have no issue with this (in fact, I believe it to be the case), but it's the truth. When someone says we came from apes, we dids.
2007-01-19 16:41:02 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋
What's wrong with being an ape? Quite frankly, I have no problem seeing me and my fellow primates as an adapted form of apes. I like Gorillas, Chimpanzees, Bonobos, and Orangutans.
2007-01-19 16:40:33 · answer #10 · answered by NHBaritone 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋