I don’t know if this really counts as devolution, if there even is such a thing, but that title is the easiest way to get my point across in brief.
Anyways, I’m just asking for someone to explain something that’s baffled me while I thought about evolution.
Let’s assume we did evolve from primates. As far as I know, all primates are, pound for pound, stronger than us. Why is it that when we developed more powerful brains, that our muscles receded into what we have today? I would think the benefits of being physically strong would greatly outweigh the disadvantage - the only one of which seems to be that more muscle tissue requires more energy, food, etc.
Basically, if we evolved from a species that was stronger than us, why didn’t we keep the strength AND develop the brain?
As far as I know, ‘devolution’ is a political term, referring to the dismantlement of hierarchies.
Organisms that become morphologically simpler aren’t ‘devolving’, they are just evolving - evolution is not ‘progress’, it is just change.
Obviously because being stronger than we are had no significant effect on whether we could reach sexual maturity and reproduce. The overwhelmingly dominate trait that was key to our survival (and survival means reproducing successfully) was our large brains…tool making…problem solving…care for the young…etc
Apparently, being as strong as our ancestors paled in comparison to the ability to use the larger brain to reach maturity and reproduce.
As generation after generation lost the powerful muscles and suffered no consequences, it faded out. Actually being leaner and requireing less calories was likely an advantage, which selected out the powerful big muscles that can’t go without food long.
Smart and lean was advantageous to reaching reproductive age and reproducing.
…but to answer your question; big muscular frames can be a hindrance as well as an advantage (all that muscle requires energy to maintain it); when you are able to outwit predators, rather than simply outrun them, the selective forces are no longer present.
I was just thinking, on the grand scale of things, that a smart animal with a chimp-like build would beat out a smart animal with a human-like build. I may be wrong, but wouldn’t the advantage of that great strength, speed, and agility be enough to compensate for the more energy required? Or would the combination of the brain and muscles be overkill and just too much to maintain? Or did we just evolve from primates that weren’t very strong?
I just can’t get past this thought: It’s not like suddenly something evolved into a strong stupid ape at the same time as a weak smart human. I would think there would eventually have been something that retained both advantages and ruled.
Obviously I’m not arguing, I’m just trying to work out all the kinks in this theory that I can’t understand.
To just give you one question to focus on, why didn’t a creature with the strength of a chimpanzee and the intelligence of a human come about to overthrow humans?
It seems like we took 3 steps forward and 1 step backwards.
I have heard that Chimanzes are reputed to be very strong compared with humans despite not being obviously muscular.
I have often wondered about this.
Is it simply the case when a Chimp does something, it just does it whereas human beings tend to be more restrained and do not attempt to use their full strength - unless perhaps there is plenty of adrenalin flowing.
You think it is just because of pure instinct that they’re stronger? I doubt it… Humans can lift weights, train, and also train in fighting techniques - using their intelligence to increase their strength and their strategy, and I doubt many humans can take on a chimp that’s their size. From what I understand, the bodies of chimps are just better structured.
Now that I think about it, I’ll offer up an answer that makes the most sense to me, but I don’t know whether or not it’s true.
Say that all of todays species evolved from one type of primate. This primate must’ve just been as strong as humans. Then it eventually evolved into different species, one being smart (us), others being strong and instinctive. This is probably over simplifying evolution, but maybe I’ve been thinking about this backwards - perhaps chimpanzees evolved to be stronger to keep up with us evolving in intelligence. Any thoughts?
What I had in mind was closer to “Humans are instictively weaker”. Your point about fighting techniques (martial arts) being a case in point - humans can be trained to override this instinct and apply much more power than one would normally expect in an everyday situation.
I would certainly not welcome the prospect of having to fight a human-sized chimp, even if I had martial arts skills. Still, I am inclined to think that a skilled but unarmed human would be in with a good chance of winning.
What is it about the chimp that is better structured?
Humans are no less belligerent than are chimpanzees. Chimpanzees have different muscle insertion geometry. Humans are built to cover a lot of ground. We’re the distance runners.
As for the original post, there is no such thing as biological devolution. Evolution has no ultimate goal, this, it is not possible to “regress” or “go backwards”.
Chimp muscles are stronger than human muscles. It’s not the geometry so much as the tissue itself. Here’s a cite but it was the first one I found that was not highly technical so there might be better ones.
The discussion of a skilled human fighter vs. a chimp is interesting but digresses from the question of raw muscle strength.
Are chimps no longer around? Obviously, there isn’t one best way, evident in diversity.
Chimps: that’s one way to survive, reproduce
Humans: one way to survive, reproduce
Etc.
Don’t underestimate the importance of being lean to surviving! Alot of what we know says that humans/human ancestors moved around alot, lasted through tough times and found new ways/places to hack it out. Certain body types are more suited to that.
Certain body types (chimps) and their powerful muscles require more calories per pound and once the muscles are weakened…can they eat? Can they move on…live lean for long periods? To the extent that humans could, probably not. Humans/human ancestors not having to depend or or support the muscular structure of more pweful ancestors gave them and advantage.
Apparently, the key to surviving as a human/ancestor was being lean, getting around and using the brain. Having more muscle mass to support AND to lug around nomadically was a disadvantage.
We only have a common ancestor with current great apes, we didnt evolve from them. 
Thus, all this discussion is pointless, as we dont know all that much about our common ancestor
Alright Philster, that pretty much answered my question, thanks. I guess I’m just mad that a 90 lb chimp can easily beat me up.
Chimps are indeed stronger than humans.
What physical thing are humans good at? Endurance.
Humans would beat any ape or monkey, and many other animals who sprint much faster than we do, in a marathon.
Wasn’t the band Devo named after ‘devolution’?
Yes.
They took inspiration from a hypothesis that our protohuman ancestors increased their inteligence by killing other protohumans and eating their brains. It was kind of a Lamarckian Inheritance through cannibalism thing. The hypothesis further said that our species had reached its apex and it would be reverting back to protohumans.
Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo currently writes music for Nickelodeon's original cartoons.One thing to remember is that evolution tends toward “good enough”, not necessarily “best”. In an intelligent design, it would be nice if humans had human intelligence and chimpanzee strength. It would also be cool if we had wings like a bird, but we never evolved wings because we didn’t need them. Our big brains made us good enough to survive in our ecological niche.
I understand being jealous that a 90-pound chimp can beat you up, but which one is the threatened species? Has the chimp’s strength really done it that much good competing with humans? We’re at the top of the food chain and the chimp is at our mercy, so you can’t really fault evolution with making too many mistakes in our design.
Firstly, we are primates. You OP doesn’t exactly say it, but it kind of implies that we are no longer primates.
Also, keep in mind that it is particularly H. sapiens that are lightly built, not our immediate ancestor, H. erectus, nor our close cousins H. neanderthalensis. Both of these species were much stronger, pound for pound, than we are.