# If we evolved from Apes..... **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 21, 2001, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535 "2001-06-21T00:13:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2001, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/21 "2001-06-21T15:08:56Z")
[http://chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/perspective/article/0,2669,SAV-0102180306,FF.html](http://chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/perspective/article/0,2669,SAV-0102180306,FF.html) > [@](#): > > Mice share 85-90 percent of their genes with us, cows 80 percent, fruit flies 61 percent and bananas 50 percent. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Lao](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Dr.Lao](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Lao)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2001, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/22 "2001-06-21T15:55:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by nick112 \* > \*\*To everyone saying that thier family came from europe: > > that is not evolution, but immigration.\*\* I am sure they were aware of this, but were using immigration as an analogy. The fact that a fifth-generation American from European immigrants exists, doesn’t mean his cousins in Europe can’t exist. Neither decended from the other, they share a common ancestor. Just like other apes and humans. Neither decended from the other, we share a common ancestor. ---
**Author:** ![E\_Bailey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bbe5ce/32.png) [@E\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2001, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/23 "2001-06-21T16:12:16Z")
Let me commend everyone for being so polite! What amazes me is that no one is pointing out that this question has been posed MANY times before and is being posted AGAIN!!! nick112 could have done a simple search of the boards and gotten his answer. Let us stop lamenting about the state of our public school systems 9at least for now) and start griping about the rampant laziness in our society as exhibited by nick112!!! ---
**Author:** ![Treason](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Treason](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treason)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2001, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/24 "2001-06-21T16:20:27Z")
Also 90% of all genetic material is not used and is usually left over remnants of viruses. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Podkayne \* > \*\* > [http://chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/perspective/article/0,2669,SAV-0102180306,FF.html](http://chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/perspective/article/0,2669,SAV-0102180306,FF.html) > > > [@](#): > > > > Mice share 85-90 percent of their genes with us, cows 80 percent, fruit flies 61 percent and bananas 50 percent. > > \*\* ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2001, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/25 "2001-06-21T20:09:10Z")
Determining how similar two species are genetically is actually pretty simple, and doesn’t require that either be sequenced. You just unzip a strand of DNA from each, and put the odd strands from the two species together and see how well they connect. Of course, there’s a good bit more to it than that, but that’s the general idea. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Lao](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Dr.Lao](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Lao)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2001, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/26 "2001-06-21T21:47:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by plnnr \* > \*\*“Damn you! You blew it up! Damn you all to hell!” > -Charlton Heston \*\* This is the joke I originally intended to make, but I got sidetracked defending the OP. But now’s my chance. **A planet where apes evolved from man?!?!** ---
**Author:** ![Pstarr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f19dbf/32.png) [@Pstarr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pstarr)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2001, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/27 "2001-06-21T23:05:55Z")
/hijack/ Is there any current species that is a descendent of a species that is still around? I mean, the original species didn’t go extinct and didn’t evolve that much but a branch (separated by geography or something) evolved separately? I think that having an example such as that would make the explanation to the evolutionally challenged, easier. /hijack/ ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/28 "2001-06-22T00:33:03Z")
**Pstarr** , IANABiologist, but I will take a stab at your question: - Shrew-like animals are considered the earliest mammals. Other mammals descended from these “shrews”. Tree shrews still exist today. - Sharks are a very, very old form of life. I THINK other fish descended from them. - Ferns are older than most all other land plants. I THINK other forms of plants evolved from fern-like plants. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/29 "2001-06-22T00:52:00Z")
from the guy with the really neat circus: > [@](#): > > I am sure they were aware of this, but were using immigration as an analogy. The fact that a fifth-generation American from European immigrants exists, doesn’t mean his cousins in Europe can’t exist. Neither decended from the other, they share a common ancestor. > > Just like other apes and humans. Neither decended from the other, we share a common ancestor. The thing of it is, i don’t even know if I still have any relatives in Europe. There was this guy named Stalin, you see, and a few million people in the Ukraine just disappeared. I do, however, have a slew of fourth cousins in Argentina. Same family name. So my “phylogeny” has a severe “allopatric” event splitting a population of coal miners between Pennsylvania and South America from an ancestrial range in Eastern Europe. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/30 "2001-06-22T01:10:09Z")
**Pstarr** : Sure, there’s examples 🙂 . Generally as the result of vicariance or immigration- i.e. a few members of species A are swept onto an island or the populations are partitioned by changing climatic conditions, or whatever. The isolated members of species A start heading off on another evolutionary trajectory and eventually the two populations are divergent enough to be called separate species ( i.e. species A and species B ). But the “parent” species remains roughly ( there’s bound to be minor changes, no matter what ) the same as it did in ancestral time when the populations diverged. And then there is the quick and dirty way, which I’ll use as a specific example. The unisexual “species” of whiptail lizard, _Cnemidophorus laredoensis_ is the result of a hybridization event between the bisexual species _Cnemidophorus gularis_ and _Cnemidophorus sexlineatus_. Althouigh defining species is problematic for parthenogens ( in this case it is mostly done through morphology for practical reasons ), all three “species” coexist today with overlapping ranges. **bordelond** : Actually from a systematic point of few, I’m pretty sure two of your three particular examples _don’t_ hold up. At any rate there is a confusion of terms. a.)Shrew-like, isn’t the same as shrew. I don’t think there is any relation other than a convergence of morphology. b.)We ( including bony fish among the “we” ) share a common ancestor with sharks, but I believe we are from divergent lines ( I won’t swear to this just now, but I’m pretty sure ). c.) You’re roughly right about ferns - But… …As I said there is a confusion of terms. You’re examples reflect much broader levels of classification that species. i.e., it’s the difference between, say, all owls and the Eastern Screech Owl. Make sense 😉 ? - Tamerlane ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Cynical](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ee59a6/32.png) [@Mr.Cynical](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Cynical)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/31 "2001-06-22T01:12:00Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Chronos \* > \*\*It’s the same reason that my parents are still around, even though I decended from them. Or more accurately, my sister and cousins, since the common ancestor of humans and other apes (yes, other: Humans are apes, too) is now extinct. \*\* So, do you differ from your parents by species or by genus? [http://anthro.palomar.edu/animal/humans.htm](http://anthro.palomar.edu/animal/humans.htm) ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/32 "2001-06-22T03:03:45Z")
Ross wrote: > [@](#): > > Evolution it may be: good, it may not. But if an evolved change were not good from some point of view, it would die out. What your statement misses is that there’s not just a linear scale with humans on the “more evolved” end and bacteria on the other. Everything is evolved to do a good job of filling a particular niche. The great apes and humans shared a common ancestor, but we each have evolved toward a different niche. They’re good at what they do, and we’re good at what we do. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/33 "2001-06-22T04:07:31Z")
> [@](#): > > Yeah, I was kinda young when it happened. I’m older than most of our board folk, who were probably all born human. I was three when my family evolved. It was pretty cool. Livin’ in our climate, we were kinda glad to shed the hair. I do sorta miss the opposable big toe, but the trade off (clothes and stuff) has largely been worth it. I remember there was this one old ape up the street who just wasn’t coming along; it took an intervention to bring him around… > > By the time I was five, you couldn’t find an ape in town. Beatle, I just wanted to say that this was one of the funniest posts I’ve read in weeks. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/34 "2001-06-22T07:09:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Treason \* > \*\*Also 90% of all genetic material is not used and is usually left over remnants of viruses. > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by Podkayne \* > > \*\* > > [http://chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/perspective/article/0,2669,SAV-0102180306,FF.html](http://chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/perspective/article/0,2669,SAV-0102180306,FF.html) > > > > > [@](#): > > > > > > Mice share 85-90 percent of their genes with us, cows 80 percent, fruit flies 61 percent and bananas 50 percent. > > > > \*\* > > \*\* I am 50% banana? ---
**Author:** ![Phobos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Phobos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phobos)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/35 "2001-06-22T12:56:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by E Bailey \* > \*\*Let me commend everyone for being so polite! > > What amazes me is that no one is pointing out that this question has been posed MANY times before and is being posted AGAIN!!! nick112 could have done a simple search of the boards and gotten his answer. > \*\* True, the moderators & the folks in charge of the SDMB server might agree…but I think everyone gets to ask that question once. ---
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2001, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/36 "2001-06-22T13:26:13Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Cicero \* > I am 50% banana? Er, not precisely. If I recall correctly, the banana genome is considerably smaller than the human genome, so it’s more correct to say that bananas are 50% human. It’s probalby true that they could be considered to be 50% elephant or 50% fruitfly, as far as that goes. . . ---
**Author:** ![toadspittle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c0e974/32.png) [@toadspittle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toadspittle)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535/37 "2001-07-02T19:56:56Z")
I just wanted to say that this is one of the best little threads I’ve seen in a while–esp. considering how picked-over the OP is. The cousins/Europeans analogy is the sharpest explanation I’ve heard to explain evolution…and I’m amazed I’ve never heard it before! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-we-evolved-from-apes/69535.md?page=1)