How come there are still apes around even though they have 'evolved' into humans?

Question

people say that we originated from monkeys but how come there are still apes around?

Answer 1

Because evolution is not just species A evolving "into" B with A's all disappearing. (That would be a silly theory, because logically, there would only be one species on the planet.)

Instead, A sometimes *branches* into two populations B and C, which go on to become two *species* B and C (i.e. they lost the ability to interbreed) which are at first very similar, but then continue to evolve to become two very different species B and C.

Why does this branching happen? Many ways ... but the most common way is when two subpopulations of species A get geographically isolated from each other. A river cuts through a valley, a mountain pass becomes unpassable, a long migration loses contact between populations, a bad winter, flood, famine, or drought wipes out much of the population into small isolated populations ... many, many reasons. If these populations are isolated from each other, they will eventually lose the ability to interbreed (i.e. become diffferent species), and then continue to evolve into very different organisms.

The second thing to understand is that you can't point to two *existing* species and say that one is the ancestor of the other. Evolution doesn't work that way. By definition, two existing species are the result of exactly the same length of time of evolution.

So apes and monkeys are not "unevolved humans". They are fully evolved apes and monkeys.

(And yes, don't use 'apes' and 'monkeys' interchangeably ... they are two different branches of the primates (e.g. apes have no tails). We are part of the ape branch.)

Answer 2

The only people that say man evolved from monkeys are the dumb ones. Scientists and other informed people say that man and apes evolved from a common ancestor. Please, before you post a question, do a search for it. This question has been asked way too many times, which is scary, because that means people are very, very dumb. Why don't you try to learn something about evolution before you refute it? It will make it much less annoying to the rest of us who can think.

Answer 3

I the evolution process, the branching takes place, from the main origin. Apes formed a branch, out of which further branching process took place to be called as Humans of present day. Leaving behind the Monkeys and Ape,s. where they were.

Answer 4

This question has been asked many, many times before on Yahoo Answers. Hundreds of times, in fact.

Here are some concepts of evolution that will help you understand the process better. Common ancestor. Branching pattern of evolution. No living organism today is our ancestor - living apes today are fully modern apes, living humans today are fully modern humans. The website below is a good place to read about these further. In fact, your question is one of the very questions that the website answers. Feel free to follow up with more questions.

Answer 5

That's a very common misunderstanding: when someone says "B evolved from A", that does not mean that A somehow turned into B. Your parents, if I may use an imperfect analogy, did not turn into you. If you were born with an extra toe on each foot, say, and none of your siblings did, but all your children did, and their children and etc., in a while there would be a group of people with 6-toed feet. Yet, the people with 5-toed feet would still be around. 6-toed-feet people would have evolved from 5-toed-feet people, but they would not necessarily replace them. I'm leaving out the critical stuff about speciation and selective pressure, but that's the general idea about evolution as 'descent with modification'

Answer 6

We split off millions of years ago. The monkeys and apes around today are of a different species.

Answer 7

That like asking why your cousins are around even though you were born. Or demanding that your parents die upon your birth, since you are here to replace them.

Your question presupposes a model of evolution in which a new species "replaces" an old one. Stop thinking of evolution as a ladder, and see it as a branching bush. The formation of a new twig doesn't stop future branching, nor does it cause the death of all twigs that came before it!

Answer 8

No, both humans and apes will continue to evolve into different life forms (barring an extinction event)

Answer 9

Only people that have no understanding of evolution would say anything like that.

Primates share a common ancestor. That's what evolution says. It does not say humans came from apes nor vis versa. It is that simple. I am amazed that people still get it wrong.

Answer 10

We did not evolve from the monkeys that exist right now. We share the same ancestor as them, and we branched off.