What i can't understand about evolution....

Percy you are reading my mind... i had this same thought recently (well not exactly the same, i dont know how hard one would be to produce but surely it wouldnt be impossible) why dont you boys n girls get your heads together and come up with an evolutionary tree...that would be awesome and i would love to see it.

subbie,im sorry but i dont understand what is meant by daughter population.Is it like the first generation of offspring,

ok, i think i need to rephrase my ape question just so everyone knows what i was askingthe 'lower' apes....lets change that to the 'earlier'and the 'higher' apes...lets change to homo sapien type apesas in the evolution pictures of gorillas to manthe earlier apes (gorillas/monkeys etc) are still here today, but the evolved species (hominoids/neanderthal ect) have become extinctfirstly, if the earlier ape types are still here, then as was said, they are perfectly adapted to their environment hence they are not extinctbut if they were perfectly adapted to their environment, why did some evolve into homosapient types, and others stay the same?

First Monkeys are not apes. 2nd Gorillas aren't earlier apes, they are modern apes. Humans, chimps, gorillas & gibbons are all "modern apes" to use your word. The "earlier" apes are all extinct, that being the common ancestors and any intermediate species between the common ancestors & the current species. Edited by bluescat48, : accidental

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There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969

This doesn't need a reply but please read.Just one small point Peg. I'm sure lots of people will cover the main body of the post and I'm not trying to nit pick but I would say this is fairly important. You use the phrase 'perfectly adapted to their environment' which gets used a lot when talking about diversity and evolution.There has never been a 'perfectly' adapted organism for three reasons.Firstly enviroments change so characteristics which were selected for in a previous generation may be a hinderance to the next generation if the enviroment changes.Secondly the variation within a species at any given time limited. Natural selection can only work on what is there so being perfectly adapated is probably outside the possibilities of evolution.Finally many features of organisms are inevitable by products of other features. Not every feature is an adapation conferring evolutionary benefits.If you want me to explain any of these points just ask. I'd say understanding this is critical to understanding evolution as if all organisms were always perfectly adapated to their enviroment there would be no extinction or speciation events and we would have to look elsewhere to explain the diversity of life.Edited by helper, : No reason given.Edited by helper, : No reason given.

Only some evolutionists are atheists. Many evolutionists are like me and believe in God.If your problems with evolution stem from a belief that it somehow rules out God then you're mistaken. Evolution itself doesn't address the issue of God at all.However, evolution does make it pretty clear that a literal interpretation of the Biblical accounts in Genesis 1 and 2 as telling us that all life was created just 6000 years ago, and that there was a flood that wiped most life 4500 years ago, is not supported by any evidence, and is contradicted by most evidence.If for you belief in God also requires belief in a literal interpretation of Genesis 1 and 2, then obviously you'll have problems with a lot of science, not just evolution. True, but we cannot rule out aliens or magic, either. In science it is never a case of, "That which we cannot rule out must be true."Science is about finding evidence for your hypotheses. Unfortunately for intelligent design, it has no scientific evidence.--Percy

They did evolve. You have a bad habit of not reading previous posts. If you earnestly are asking questions to seek answers you are doing a poor job at showing this. Otherwise it seems that you are just using the "post and hide" technique that many creationists and ID'ers on this board utilize in attempt to distract people from the evidence and logic the scientistific community provides that evolution has and continues to occur.I am not trying to be mean here but in essense you are disrespecting everyone here trying to provide answers to your questions. Here is a list of previous posts on this very forum that have answered this question: Message 329
Message 323
Message 322
Message 321
Message 320
Message 313
Message 308BTW, many of these also answer your questions as why these ape species still exist alongside humans. Go back and read than you can ask more questions to clarify. Also, go to the library and pick up a couple of books on the evolution of humans. Analyze the data and evidence and see if it makes sense. If not ask to your hearts content, that of course is our scientific duty.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

Here are some human/ape evolutionary trees I could find off the bat. I am not sure if it is the latest one agreed upon by human/primate paleontologists but it is the best one I could find: Hope this helps. Any experts in the field let me know if this is inaccurate.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by Admin, : Reduce image width.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

I disagree with Huntard's answer. The think it very likely that gorillas and orangutans (Wikipedia says there are two species of each) most certainly did evolve. For example, gorillas and humans diverged from a common ancestor around 5 to 10 million years ago, and our genes differ by about 1.6% today. After the passage of so much time, both gorillas and humans have evolved a great deal from the common ancestor. There's no way to know at this time whether gorillas or humans evolved more. I know we'd like to assume that humans evolved more, but we don't have evidence for that assumption.Like a fancy automobile autopilot of the future that keeps you driving down the middle of the road, evolution serves like an autopilot that keeps a species in or near the sweet spot of adaptation to its environment. When the road curves your car's autopilot will make adjustments that keep you going along the new road direction. In the same way, when environments change, evolution will make genetic adjustments (through mutation, allele remixing and natural selection) that keep a species adapted to the environment.Just as an autopilot would make very few adjustments on a straight road, evolution would make very few adaptations in a stable environment.But on a very curvy road your autopilot would have to make many adjustments, and in the same way, in a continuously changing environment evolution would have to create many new adaptations, else the organism would go extinct, analogous to your car going off the road.In other words, it is changing environments that cause significant evolutionary change. What Huntard was saying was that if gorillas and orangutans haven't evolved much, then it would be because their environments were stable. However, I don't think the African environment has been that stable when considered over the past 5 to 10 million years, and I think it likely that both gorillas and orangutans have experienced significant evolution over that period.--Percy

Here is a more extensive illustration of the order of primates including humans: The Phylogeny of Hominidae based on sequences of mitochondrial COII genes (breakdown of seperate species/genus/tribe of apes through mitochondrial DNA analysis of these different species/genus): Timeline of hominins (human and human-like ancestorial species): If you want to see more evidence for human-ape evolution here is a good link: Evolution textbook.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

Scientists refusing to accept something for which there is no evidence! Oh, horror!You know why theologians cannot explain why a beneficent Christian God lets bad things happen to good people? Because they refuse to accept that the Flying Spaghetti monster is actually the one true God.Makes just as much sense, Peg.--Percy

There is no one place, that scientists start studying evolution. Biologists study the effects of evolution all the way from bacteria and slime mold to homo sapiens and everything in between. Biochemists and molecular biologists study the molecular components of cellular life and the effects of evolution on that small scale. Paleontologists study the fossils of ancient animals, plants, and huminoids and trace the lineage of evolutionary decent through natural history.The study of evolution doesn't start at the top or the bottom but at all scales both micro and macro and on every continent of our planet from Australia to Antartica as well as deep in the ocean. They study organisms living in some of the most remote places on Earth and subject to some of the most strange conditions like along the deep ocean rifts where bacterial life can exist in over 140 degree water or in deep lakes underneath the ice of antartica bacterial matts exist. Whereever there is life, scientists are observing evolution occur.As we find more and more evidence we start plugging in the holes where a lack of knowledge exists. That is why "missing links" are such an idiotic misnomer. Of course there are missing links. There are litteraly millions of missing links since trillions of organisms have existed and evolved on this planet for billions of years. If there were no missing links than I would probably have to agree that instantaneous creation would be the most probably hypothesis.As to what was the first organism that existed? We may never find out. Does that mean we throw out the tons of evidence that evolution occurs because we are missing one piece of the puzzle?Who knows, maybe God put the first organism on the planet and God set the mechanism of evolution to create the diversity of life on this planet. This does not negate that evolution hasn't occurred in the past or is not occurring now. However this proposal is religious/philosophical and is not a scientific hypothesis that can be tested with science since the intervention of God is a supernatural miraculous event that science by definition cannot explain. It doesn't mean it isn't true it just means that we cannot "prove" it with science. However, the burden of proof lies with Creationists/IDers/etc in justifying the existence of this supreme supernatural being to exist in the first place, not with science.BTW, there are many scientists that believe in God that conduct science in the evolutionary fields (i.e. Dr. Kenneth Miller) and they have no problem marrying these two ideas. It is only when Creationists try to prove a pseudoscientific proposition using pseudoscientific means that problems arise.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

Scientists have come up with tons of these evolutionary trees over the years, continually refining and improving them as evidence accumulates, and I see that DevilsAdvocate has provided a few. The problem with them, and the reason I didn't provide one, is that the evidence is not yet sufficient to create a final version for the human portion of ape evolution. We only know enough to create plausible evolutionary trees, which means that different evolutionary trees can be composed to fit the available evidence.--Percy

I agree with you Percy, this is still a very young field of science (it has only been seriously studied in just the past 50 years) and thus there are many things we have yet to learn about our own evolution. I think it is helpful to show where our current understanding is, but to caveat that this understanding is subject to change. The precise relationship between many of these hominin species is still speculative, as well as the exact path of our evolution. So take these illustrations as you would of creating and developing your own family tree from scratch. In other words, it is a work in progress.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

Hey Peg, Notice that your picture comes from a creationist site, detectingdesign.com, one that has created a strawman version of evolution. This kind of thinking was popular in the Victorian Era, full of prejudice and pride in the achievements of the English Empire and all that what what. I won't claim that evolutionary biologists never thought this way, just point out that it is old, outdated, and invalid.The hardest thing for creationist to do, it seems, is to wean their thinking from false concepts and discarded ideas from previous ages. Let me show you a picture of a speciation event to see if this helps: Why do Notharctus venticolus exist if Notharctus nunienus exist (and vice-versa)? We see a continuing trend in the evolution of Notharctus venticolus from Pelycodus ralstoni, and we see a branch from Pelycodus jarrovii to Notharctus nunienus.They both exist because each is adapted to their particular ecology, and they have divided from a parent population that overlapped each ecology.

quote:

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When two similar species compete, it is not uncommon that one fairly quickly becomes different - in this case, smaller. This presumably reduces the competition between the species.

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Or they inhabit mutually exclusive ecologies, such as trees and open spaces, for gathering food and mating (they can live in the same area and eat different food).The smaller size likely enabled Notharctus nunienus to reach food that Notharctus venticolus was unable to reach, while Notharctus venticolus was able to outcompete Notharctus nunienus for food that they could reach.Does that help?Enjoy.

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