There is a certain similarity between the idea of a human/chimp hybrid with that of the mule since, as in the former, the latter has parent species that have only a difference of one pair of chromosomes in addition to being closely related, genetically speaking.
If they were (are?) possible, which species would it most likely take after? Would it retain human intelligence or the ability to speak? Assuming they would, what would the societal implications be for a small population of them existing? Say, a thousand or so.
I don’t think anyone has any way of knowing one way or the other. Assuming that the hybridization process were possible (and no one has ever tried it and published anything about it so far) it’s not even clear that all the individuals would have the same lack of or retention of specific human traits. And the manifestation of certain species-specific traits might also depend on whether the offspring were a humanzee or a chuman (which species was the mother and which was the father). I know that in some, cross-species hybridization, certain traits that show up in the offspring depend on which species is the mother and which is the father. I would expect that to be true of human/chimp hybrids as well.
If the hybrids were fertile then we would have a situation analogous to the antebellum slave laws. Presumably if these things exhibited near-human intelligence they would be classified as human, albeit potentially retarded humans and prevented form full citizenship privileges for that reason. However with a hydridisation spectrum at some point we would need to either conclude the individual was an animal with no human rights or else declare that all chimps are human with full legal protection.
Deeming chimps to be human doesn’t seem particularly tenable to me, but that may just be because of the world I’ve grown up in. I’m sure many antebellum southerners thought it was ridiculous to grant human rights to blacks too.
The other alternative however is to adopt either a ‘one drop’ policy, where one drop of human ancestry qualifies the individual as human even if they are no more intelligent than a chimp, or else to do something like what was done under apartheid where a range of defining characteristics were used to define race. Both those options seem equally untenable.
The other interesting thing to see would be the reaction from hardline creationists.
Very good points. If the offspring were fertile, that would truely blur the line between the species. It wouldn’t be just the hardline creationist who would be thrown for a loop. How about the concept of a soul-- central to mainstream Christianity? Would the hybrids be concidered to have souls?
Seems like one way to get some data on this without getting involved in the ethical issues would be to determine if chimp/bonobo and chimp/gorilla hybrids are possible. Although the latter have the same chromosome count, they actually are more distantly related, genetically, than are chimps and humans.
Goodness, Aes. Put you and Kat together in the same house and you never know what arguments will ensue!
But, why just limit it to Man and Ape (ish)? If we were able to somehow leap past the chromosonal problems, we should probably try all sorts of different combinations.
As posted above, a lot would depend on the characteristics of the hybrids.
One would be intelligence: would the hybrids be the equivalent of severely retarded humans (no possibility of living without constant care and supervision), or would they be able to function in human society at some level? Could they speak, even if only at a “dog’s intelligence crossed with parrot’s vocal ability” level?
Another issue besides their intelligence level would be their behavior. Could they be raised/ trained/ conditioned to behave in socially acceptable ways? A chimp is smarter than a dog, but a LOT less amenable to living with humans. Could a chiman/ humpanzee be taught that it can’t simply attack people it’s angry at? Would the females have periods of estrus where they’d behave in embarassing ways?
A HUGE issue would be whether the hybrid were fertile. If that was the case, then you’d have the issue of chimpanzee genes mixing into the human genome. And if you think there’s been controversy over racial mixing, that would pale before the hue and cry over preserving “species purity”. If 19th century British aristocrats could look down their noses at the “lower classes” as “debased”, how about a situation where there were populations of anthropoids that were provably less intelligent and/or less moral than pure humans?
Religion- probably there would be splits between factions that believed the hybrids had souls, and those that didn’t. If the hybrids could speak and be taught to parrot the mainstream religion at an imbecile’s Sunday school level, they’d be as spiritual as any number of humans. It might prove interesting if the hybrids lacked the capacity for abstraction: if they only believed in what they could see and experience, and were incapable of believing, for example that someone who is now a dead rotting corpse still “exists” in some incorporeal sense.
-I think a case that would raise many of the same social/ethical problems and is perhaps more likely is that of an early homonid cloned from preserved DNA. These would have some ape and some human characteristics, and certainly be able to reproduce. Also, Neanderthals have larger brains, and thus might actually end up being supperior to us.
-The Catholic Church has been increasingly willing to accept evolution, one wonders wether they already have a doctorine on the souls of proto-humans.
I think there’s a simpler slave analogy to be made, though. Manpanzees that looked like people would probably be able to “pass” as humans, much as some light-skinned slaves were able to. It would probably be even easier for the manpanzees to pass because there would more than likely be far fewer people who would have known the cirumstances surounding their birth than those of their neighbor’s slaves. Are you going to accuse your neighbor’s wife of having an affair with a chimp or demand to see a DNA test on the kid they just adopted?
Of course, 20 years after the first hybrids were created, there would be " Is Jamie Lee Curtis’s adopted daughter a Manpanzee?" threads at the straight dope.
I know it’s wrong, but there’s just something so ***cool * ** about the idea of human/____ hybrids.
Though the idea is repulsive, I think it’s highly likely humans have copulated with chimps or gorillas on many occasions. Given the widespread and apparently frequent incidences of bestiality with farm animals, and considering how long great apes have been kept in human captivity, it’s entirely plausible. If human copulation with great apes has been frequent enough, the odds that such activity took place while the ape was in estrus would also be great. Given the absense of any extant human/ape hybrids born through natural insemination and gestation, I’m inclince to think that such a hybrid is not possible.
Loopy: I think you are grossly overestimating the receptiveness of a female chimp in heat to the sexual advances of a human. I suspect that the most common result of such an encounter would be that the female chimp would rip off the guys private parts.
Wild and unrestrained, you are probably quite right. But while subdued? And if the chimp has been raised in captivity with humans, would she be as prone to object? I’ve seen humans and great apes in very intimate (though not sexual, of course) contact, and nobody was getting dismembered.
Of course, there’s no way to know for sure, it would seem. But given the prevalence of human perversion, coupled with centuries of ape captivity in circuses, zoos, for scientific research, etc., I think it’s quite likely humans have copulated with apes, perhaps hundreds or even thousands of times throught history.
The best evidence we have so far indicates that Neanderthals did not contribute their DNA to the human gene pool. Thile the mtDNA evidence does not rule out human+Neanderthal interbreeding, the possibility seems to be increasingly unlikely. Given that humans and Neanderthals cohabitated large areas of Europe and the Middle East for tens of thousands of years, it is diffucult to argue that there would not have been many opportunities for the two species to mate. Hence, it would appear humans and Neanderthals were sufficiently genetically incompatible to produce offspring, or at least fertile offspring. Given the close taxonomy, I think this casts further doubt on the possibility of fertile human+ape hybrids, and perhaps even viable ones.
Chimps raised amongst humans will masturbate to human pornography, so i imagine they’d be open to human sexual advances as well. Also I read a case a few years ago where a female zoo keeper was raped by one of the zoos apes (I think it was a babbon).
On the other hand, I think it’s somewhat unlikely that if one were to impregnate or be impregnated by an ape that the baby would be allowed to come to term, or that you’d rush to the newspapers to report it, so I don’t find the lack of reporting on this strong evidence that it hasen’t happened
Both are members of the genus Pan, but only one is a chimp(anzee).