Can Someone Explain to me, Why Monkeys Arent Evolving Anymore?

Question

I just heard from my monkey friend at the san diego zoo, and he asked me to go on yahoo answers and inquire as to why, monkeys arent evolving and havent evolved in so many years. He also wants to know, why there are even monkeys , apes, chimps, and the likes shouldnt they have all evolved. If you believe Evolution is true

Answer 1

Your friend has been misinformed. Monkeys, like all organisms, are continuing to evolve. It just very slow, so he probably hasn't noticed. You can only detect it as a trend after many, many generations.

Answer 2

It is a common misconception that evolution is working towards a goal. It isn't. This is why there can be monkeys and apes and chimps and the like all at the same time. Evolution doesn't go in a straight line. It is influenced by the environment that the organism lives in. Some monkeys may have traits that make the more apt at surviving in a different environment. For an extreme example let's say that there is monkey who can photosynthesize like a plant. Assuming that there is nothing visually different about the monkey, we might never know that such monkeys exist as they are not in a better position for survival than there non-photosynthesizing counterparts when there is ample food around. But if all of the plant matter are earth suddenly died, then the monkeys that could photosynthesize would have a distinct advantage and live to breed. If after some amount of time has passed, the photosynthesizing monkeys may not be able to breed with the original monkeys and they would be a new species. Evolution can go the other way to (something which from our point of view we would consider regressing). If it was no longer advantageous to have eyes (say if the earth went black) then creatures with nonfunctioning eyes may evolve. The other thing to remember is that the it generally takes a long time for a new species to develop.

As for humans, I tend to think that we are not evolving as much as we could be as there is no distinct phenotype that has survival advantage in our society. Failing any accidents, by and large every phenotype that is compatible with life survives and they all generally live long enough to produce heirs and pass on our their own genes.

Answer 3

Oh, you've got to be kidding. Life on earth doesn't just stop evolving just because humans popped in on the scene and started poking around with the scientific method. Evolution moves on.

I'll give you an analogy. Go out on any clear night and look up at the stars. You'll see constellations that were first described at the dawn of civilization, by Arabs and Greeks and who knows who else. In the intervening five or so thousand years, the sky doesn't appear to have changed all that much. Constellations look nearly the same as they did back then.

But do you know what? All the stars in the galaxy (the ones that make up the constellations we know and love) are moving! Yes, they're moving, even today, at phenomenal speeds! All orbiting the center of the galaxy...they didn't stop moving just because humankind showed up and started pointing telescopes at the sky.

The only reason the stars don't SEEM to move...and the only reason that we can't look around and SEE evolution going on...is that a few thousand years is really only a drop in the bucket of cosmological time. We just haven't had time to see anything interesting happen; the processes are too slow (or in the cases of stars, the galaxy is just so big). Evolution hasn't stopped any more than the stars have--

--But just wait around a few million years. Both the stars--and the animals and plants on this planet--will almost certainly look quite a bit different than they do now.

Answer 4

Every animal is still evolving. It occurs when a cosmic ray destroys a gene and produces a mutation. This mutation may or may not be better in his environment. He / it might not be a mutation that is more compatible with his surroundings and puts him at a disadvantage.

Also, most animals fight to own the harem of females. Usually the strongest one wins and his genes go on into the offspring, better known as "survival of the the fittest". That is also why children bear some resemblance to their parents, because they carry the same line of genes.

Religion should not take issue with it, if you keep going against science eventually you will have too many contradictions that can't be resolved.

Answer 5

Your friend works at a zoo & doesn't know the answer? Remind me not to go to that zoo, I feel for those animals. Evolution is not a progression, evolution is about environment & what it requires of us. Evolution is not constantly moving forward creating superhumans, it could very well regress. It depends on what nature demands. That is why many specialist groups go extinct, the cannot adapt to change. Look at pigmy elephants, they are a perfect example of how evolution works with environment. Evolution creates the perfect specimens for that environment.

Answer 6

Every species living today is evolving. Evolution is a natural aspect of biological life. You can't have one without the other.

Answer 7

Maybe if we had 5 million years to observe them we would find that they WERE evolving. Evolution doesn't happen overnight. It takes a long, looooooonnnnnng time....
PS -- I am also a beliver (there's room for both..)

Answer 8

I can't explain why they aren't evolving anymore because they are in fact still evolving, everything on earth is evolving all of time.

evolution does not mean everything becomes human like

Answer 9

They are evolving. Evolution is change in allele freqency over time, on a generational timescale.

Answer 10

Because there's no need for them to evolve. They are quite content living in trees and eating bananas. Most humans however are not contented with their lot, and never have been - hence their need to evolve.