That would be when you said this:
If we didn’t evolve from apes, then we are not apes; and if they yet remain our closest relatives, then we must be sister taxa (or they are our daughter taxon…).
And regardless what you might consider a better analogy, the correct terminology is “sister”.
And I suppose that here is where I could ask where anyone ever said anything about extant apes…
This is a fairly common trope in fiction. There’s a twilight zone or outer limits episode with an evolving machine, and the guy gets more and more futuristic with big balding brain etc but then goes too far and ends up back at ape. Then there’s the Voyager episode where Tom Paris keeps evolving and turns into a lizard. It’s based not on any science but instead on dramatic irony.
It seems to have addressed the in-depth description of the theory put forward.
How hot is this girl that you, are looking to us, to help you, back her up?
I agree with your view. However, there is a simpler view. Natural selection is likely to have a high impact on the survival of dog types, in the very short term. A Pekingese might survive in the wild, but its chances are much smaller than those of a German shepherd dog. The group is likely to select over a very short period for large animals which can run down prey. In good times, the Pekingese may survive on carrion, or by sharing kills, but in bad times it will lose out to the hunter. Indeed it may become prey itself. I also suspect that attempts at breeding may result in small females dying trying to carry large pups.
Until we stabbed them in the back. We’re still the relatives of the comp after all.
Er, “relatives of the chimp”. There needs to be a quick on/off toggle for the auto spell check on the iPhone…
No. You simply have misunderstood what I wrote. I didn’t evolve from my parents either. But my point was already addressed by one other poster and then myself. I guess you missed it.
Essentially, it’s that we didn’t evolve from the apes into the apes. We evolved from something that was very much ape-like into the apes we are today. It’s a minor thing of grammar, but true nevertheless.
It’s also false to assert that we must be a member of a class to evolve into that class. That’s circular reasoning. When did we become this species? After we evolved from it.
There’s some moment in history in which one generation we were interfertile with our ancestors, and one generation when we weren’t. That’s when we’re the new species. While we share many traits with our immediate predecessor, we aren’t their species anymore; we’re a new one.
Let me guess: she was hot, wasn’t she?
To be honest, I have no idea what you’re arguing, or what you think you’re arguing. And I’m not sure if you do, either.
We evolved from apes. We are, therefore, apes ourselves. That’s how it works. We aren’t going to “devolve back into apes” because we never stopped being apes. All hominid species have been apes since the first Hominidae species came into being. We did not evolve from an “ape-like” group, we evolved from an ape group.
Err…what? That doesn’t make any sort of sense. I said that we are apes because we evolved from apes. I said nothing about anything evolving “into” anything.
No, that’s not how it works. New species do not spontaneously arise in a single generation. There is no “moment in history” to which one could point that would delineate the beginning of any new species, much less our own. Species are often nebulous entities, and it is rarely so clear cut when two very closely-related populations actually become separate species.
So, your argument is “I don’t understand, thus he doesn’t either.” That’s an argument from incredulity, and I’m wholly not responsible for your inability to understand anything.
Is your argument that something that’s an ape isn’t ape-like? You can stop trying this pedantry by actually reading what you’ve typed. Ape-like, would seem to be a word that incorporates the traits of being an ape. I think it’s fair to say something that is an ape, is necessarily like an ape. You seem to disagree.
Assuming for a moment that I made the profoundly stupid statement that things can devolve (which I most assuredly didn’t, thus, you’ve created a straw man argument and then attacked it instead of my point - nice work), if we can evolve from apes into being apes, then sure we can further evolve (devolve I guess?) from apes into yet apes again.
My point was essentially, and you seem to still misunderstand this, that we didn’t evolve from apes anymore than a person who moves across a state moves from that state. They move within that state.
You keep using “ape” in strange ways. In the context of this thread, most people would use “ape” to mean any (living or not) member of the clade Hominoidea. All human ancestors up to and including the most recent common ancestor of all apes are apes.
If this is the case, then “evolve from” is never a meaningful phrase, because it’s impossible for descendants to leave their ancestors’ clades. That is, all human descendants will always be hominids, all hominids descendants will always be apes, all ape descendants will always be primates, all primate descendants we always be mammals, etc, on up the nested clades.
I’m not sure why you dislike the phrase “evolve from”, but it is commonly used by scientists and they know precisely what they mean by it. “Humans evolved from apes” means the human clade is nested within the ape clade.
Since the rest of your post is little more than your usual condescension, coupled with an utter failure to grasp both the concept at hand and the flow of the thread in general, and there is little I can say in response that wouldn’t get me a warning from a mod, I will respond to this point alone:
You are wrong. The “moving” analogy is not a valid one, no matter how you try to parse it, and it is utterly inapplicable to phylogenetic systematics. We evolved from apes. Not an “ape-like” ancestor, but an actual ape.
No, we can not. You’re posting nonsense. In your “guess” we started out as apes, we are another type of apes and we will evolve into * yet another* type of ape. We aren’t going from ape to something else to “yet apes again”. We are going from ape to ape to ape.
Perhaps if you can elucidate somewhat why you are struggling with entirely uncontroversial and apparently simple concept we can enlighten you. But repeating the same erroneous assertion multiple times isn’t getting us anywhere.
Because it’s grammatically poor. Also, your logic fails because it has attendant in it that evolution doesn’t evolve. At some point in time we weren’t apes. Our ancestors, somewhere along the way, did evolve into apes. Since it’s factual wrong, the argument is unsound.
That’s not my guess. That’s something entirely of your imaginings. Good luck with it.
Wow, this GQ conversation has evolved from one of stupid questions to one of stupid answers. Surprise!
Seriously though, the game you guys are playing where you try to use fancy pants words and make yourselves sound smarter than one another is friggin’ lame. In my opinion I provided the best answer to the OP. I win!
This casual writing style is us trying to impress someone? Wow. boggled
WTF? That was a fricken’ quote from you.
I give up. Willful ignorance can’t be cured.
Aww. Instead of a point, you just lob insults. /clap
To address the very first post in this thread: Before anything is debated, doesn’t it make sense to first qualify the subject of debate?
Imagine a courtroom complete with judge, jury, lawyers for the accused, gallery etc. and no one sitting in the defendant’s chair.
Imagine everyone going back and forth presenting more and more convincing or sensational or controversial arguments while the person being accused of the crime does not even exist.
The “question” or suggestion or idea or whatever, as presented, is a non-argument, and yet here are a number of people debating it back and forth.
If this had been a thread about anything other than such a controversial issue, it would be ridiculed or ignored, as in:
My little sister said trees are really turtles in disguise, any comments?
or
A friend of mine said that the moon is a significant source of protein, what do you guys think?
Yes, it does behoove the responsible and conscientious poster to give at least a cursory investigation to the -potential- scientific nature or credibility of the initial statement, but it was determined quite early on that there is (or seems to be) none. A useful wiki link was even presented showing how erroneous arguments like this arise. And yet the debate continues.
Are we really at the mercy of anyone with a mouth?