Our Evoulution

[JonRB]

I was trying to explain evolution to my son the other day and i was explaining that Man evolved from the Ape. After i had done (trying !!) to explain evolution my son asked (and i was impressed !!) "so why do Apes still exist if we evolved from them"

Good question i thought...... some c'mon help me out, if we evolved from Apes then why do Apes still exist? If this is a daft question then please tell me, i won't mind, i'll just blame it on my son !!! lol !!! Cheers.

[Lonnie]

Hi JonRB, I agree with In A Pickle to a certain extent, and its a good link, but to make it a little more confusing, Evolution never stops, eg, we know that Apes have the capacity to learn by watching, as we do, evolution is such a slow process, we don't notice it.

It only takes one creature of a species to be born even slightly different to the rest, and that gene to be passed on, for a new species to evolve, a bit like the Chicken and Egg.

[james_m246]

I agree with what you said Lonnie but I don't quite know how you associated it with the chicken and the egg. The chicken and the egg is a completely different predicament about which came first, not evolution???

[mycats]

I always say but we didnt evolve from the apes exactly, we evolved from "ape- like creatures"

[Noweia]

mycats is right - Apes still exist because we didn't evolve from them - Apes and humans both share a common ancestor, which we both evolved from.

Hope this helps!

[aka estie]

Hi Jon.

This is a very good question, and it is the source of a lot of misunderstanding, some of which is displayed in the answers above.

As mycatis said, we did not evolve from apes. We evolved from an ape-like ancestor. Apes and humans share a recent common ancestor. That is why our DNA is so similar. Humans and monkeys also share a common ancestor, just a little less recently than the one we share with apes. And so on for all of the animals, and plants, and bacteria. We all share common ancestors, just some much more recent than others.

I hope I haven't caused you further confusion with my answer - just wanted to make sure you got the correct information :)

And P.S. - apes are in no way a genetic dead end (unless they all die out without leaving descendants). The only genetic dead ends are those species in the tree of life that went extinct without anything else evolving from them.

[Lonnie]

Hi james, to explain, the Chicken had to evolve from a like bird, the only way that could have happened, is if the change happened with the egg, the bird itself couldn't evolve, if you like, its a bit like us, if we have a defective gene, the only way we can pass it on,(evolution)?, is through either our sperm, or the egg it fertilises.

[NACL]

creation