Paleontologist Gays

[dilla]

But don't you wonder what inhibits them that didn't inhibit us? Again, I'm all for evolution. But science has a lot of mysteries. To me, this is one of them. If it isn't a mystery to someone else, please educate me.

 

[dilla]

I keep making the same mistake she made. I mean apes, not monkeys.

Edit: What? Yahoo! Answers has legit answers instead of trolls? http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100925092002AA2BWRk

I am at peace with myself now.

 

[Da_Funk]

Yeah. I understand the environment has a lot to do with it, how it influences evolution, but it's a question I don't think was answered in the biology classes that I have taken so far. Well, only one actually dealt with issues that this question would pertain to, the rest was microbiology and even genetics didn't quite delve into apes too often.

She asked a good question, but it couldn't serve as proof against evolution.

It isn't a good question and infact the answer is simple. We didn't evolve from apes or monkeys or whatever you'd like to call them. We evolved from a species very closely related to them

 

[dilla]

I found a more intelligent answer. Thanks anyway.

 

[Chronic]

I can't tell you much as I'm fairly ignorant on the subject but one part of evolution that a lot of people seem to misunderstood is how animals 'adapt'. It's not as if giraffes needed to reach the leaves and then evolved to have longer necks, rather the ones with necks long enough didn't die and were able to reproduce. If the entire world flooded we wouldn't just develop flippers or gills if we waited long enough. There is no reason why "monkeys" would evolve into people so like Duke said the question is completely inane. Not to mention the small amount of millions of years for it to happen.

Correct me if I'm wrong yee of more knowledges.

 

[ARon]

I don't have all the answers to this but I'm going to make a simple comment.

I thought everyone would know reasons why her questions is stupid and it would be pretty simple to understand, obviously this isn't the case. These elections scare me, too many religious people are bringing their religious beliefs to the mainstream and people are buying in to it, it's disheartening.

 

[dilla]

According to the link I posted the primates we evolved from branched. So modern world primates share a common descendant. We didn't evolve from the apes we see today; instead we share the same ancestor. This said ancestor no longer exists today and instead humans and apes today continue on from them. I think that's it.

I really should have paid more attention in Organismal Bio.

 

[S O F I]

You should have paid more attention in your bible studies.

 

[dilla]

Yeah, if I was Christian.

 

[Sebastian]

If you want to take a look, watch the part between the third and 8th minute.

 

[Jokerman]

You also have to understand that evolution has no goal in itself. It's not trying to make higher, more intelligent life forms. Biologically, the word "evolve" doesn't mean better or smarter or more advanced, and we could "evolve" one day to more ape-like creatures if conditions select for it. So it's not correct to say that we are more evolved than chimpanzees. In the 7 or so million years since chimps and us branched off from a common ancestor, their branch has also been evolving to what they are today. Chimps are more evolved than us when it comes to living in their habitat. And we are more evolved for...shopping in malls.

 

[Duke]

^ Just a little sidestep, but I think it's interesting to note how humans have adapted much of the environment to them instead of the other way around.

 

[dilla]

We've kinda played God for ourselves as well as other animals

 

[masta247]

I can't tell you much as I'm fairly ignorant on the subject but one part of evolution that a lot of people seem to misunderstood is how animals 'adapt'. It's not as if giraffes needed to reach the leaves and then evolved to have longer necks, rather the ones with necks long enough didn't die and were able to reproduce. If the entire world flooded we wouldn't just develop flippers or gills if we waited long enough.

So how would there be giraffes with long necks in the first place?
I think that evolution takes both factors into account. The best suited and healthiest could survive and reproduce creating similar offspring which in the long run could shape the species but on the other hand there was also accommodation to their surrounding environment that contributed to the fact that we have so many different species in the first place. For example giraffes had to reach higher and higher so over few hundred thousand of years their necks could systematically "grow".
I might be ignorant too but I think that if we separated a species of "basketball players" and for a few thousand years we told them to play basketball they would probably evolve to do it better, be taller etc.
Not because "evolution knows it" but because every generation would work towards it.