Evolution of Man?

[Woody]

The question itself is slightly misleading, before answering, define "man" and what you would consider preceeding it.
Also what made you mention neanderthals?

Neanderthals are considered homo sapiens' cousin, not predecessor. Homo sapiens is man that occupies its own genus and species classification.

[Avatar]

Actually there is no evolution of man as such,
there is evolution of life out of which one temporary product happens to be what we call homo sapiens.

[(Q)]

Discussing reality with one who has not shown to have a tenuous grip is most certainly a waste of time.

Why would you be interested in facts of evolution where, in another thread, you applaud the future opening of a creationist museum?

I would have to ask then, which of the two of these threads was created to push buttons?

[Lemming3k]

Neanderthals are considered homo sapien's cousin, not predecessor.

About a hundred years ago, people believe homo sapiens evolved from neanderthals, for at least 20 years we've known this not to be true, you seemingly understand this hence why i was confused as to the apparent underlying implication in a few of your posts that some people still believe they are our predecessors, but we have that out of the way now.

Homo sapiens is man that occupies its own genus and species classification.

There are several homonid species, most likely linked in some way, off the top of my head i recall homo neanderthalensis and homo sapiens share the common ancestor homo heidelbergensis, going back from that we have homo ergaster and homo erectus, i forget which one we are related to and which one branches off, if we go back further you'll find australopithecus afarensis and australopithecus africanus(about 4 million years ago).
It should be quite easy to search for a tree of human evolution which shows how we can roughly trace back our ancestry almost 6 million years, the tree would show many branches off leading to dead ends.

[Avatar]

[Woody]

picture

One survivor and 16 missfits in 5 million years -- not very good adaptation. I can only conclude that mankind is a dead end if he can not control the environment that "created" him. Pretty depressing.

[Avatar]

There is no necessity that the human race should survive.

[Woody]

There is no necessity that the human race should survive.

It won't survive.

[Avatar]

hehe, survive what? the end of the universe (if it comes)? this planet? solar system? survive the collision between Milky way galaxy and Andromeda galaxy?
there are a lot of things to survive and some things we have survived
it's all in our hands, laws of nature and chance (or luck)

[Lemming3k]

One survivor and 16 missfits in 5 million years -- not very good adaptation.

I'd say its pretty good adaptation, across 5 million years a species has managed to evolve sufficiently to still exist in some way through trying different variations of which some survived longer than others and, although now different to its original form it continues, for how much longer, we'll find out.

[Fraggle Rocker]

With such a big world and such small populations -- what would we be competing for? There are around 8 billion homo sapiens on the earth right now and we manage to survive. Back then there was maybe what 50,000? There are more street people walking around the US. That's one homo sapiens back then for every 160 thousand that are here today. If the extinct homos were more intelligent than apes then why couldn't they outcompete apes? Were they inferior even to apes?

The only reason that billions of people are able to survive on earth today is because of the development of animal husbandry and agriculture, which defined the transition to the Neolithic Era. We produce food rather than hunting and gathering only the food that already exists in nature. Our ancestors were at the mercy of the seasons and could only consume the edible plants they found and the animals they were able to chase down and kill. There isn't enough naturally occurring food on earth to feed even half a billion people.

I don't know where you got that 5,000 population figure. A bit of googling shows that the lowest estimate of the total world population in 10,000BCE, the dawn of the Neolithic Era, was one million and it could have been as high as ten million.

Humans were not direct competitors with the other apes. It's an arguable hypothesis that the earliest hominids came down out of the trees precisely to get away from the growing competition for the poor nutrition provided by the herbivorous/insectivorous simian diet. None of them could possibly have been thinking of outcompeting the giant grazing mammals of the savannah for the even poorer nutrition provided by raw, unrefined, unhybridized grasses and leaves. No, they almost certainly saw the other mammals as sources of a high-protein meat diet, rather than as competition.

It's been persuasively suggested that the hominids didn't stop when they reached the ground, but walked over to the nearest lake. The "Aquatic Ape Theory" has been discussed on SciForums at great length. It is much easier to compete with lower-energy cold-blooded aquatic animals, especially gill-breathers who take in far less oxygen to metabolize. Mammals and birds invariably rule when they migrate into an aquatic environment, from otters and ducks to polar bears and seagulls to seals and puffins to cetaceans and penguins. Warm-blooded air breathers are the kings of the water.

After developing a digestive system better suited to a high-protein diet, and developing hunting skills, perhaps then the hominids climbed back out to declare themselves kings of thte savannah.

Woody, you need to do some of your own research before you start posting. Many of the errors you've made here could have been corrected in half an hour of serious googling, without having to take any classes or even go to a library. Some of the information that has eluded you is even right here on SciForums.

This is SciForums. We are all scientists here. That means we do our own research, even if it's secondary or tertiary research.

[Woody]

Fraggle Rocker said:

I don't know where you got that 5,000 population figure.

I don't know where you got the 5,000 figure either because I said 50,000 -- pay attention. But homo sapiens was estimated to go as low as 10,000 at one time.

We produce food rather than hunting and gathering only the food that already exists in nature.

Odviously, but the world is a big place, and I don't picture a lot of hominids killing each other to extinction -- it seems they would have more important things to do like providing shelter, hunting, etc.

Many of the errors you've made here could have been corrected

errors such as what -- asking for man's immediate predecessor -- like there isn't one or something?

Many of the errors you've made here could have been corrected in half an hour of serious googling

Well maybe I over did it then, because I spent longer than that. I'm having no luck at all finding a genetic predecessor to man -- can you help me here?

Heidelberg man is the closest and it was discovered over 80 years ago. Nothing new since then?

[Woody]

hehe, survive what? the end of the universe (if it comes)? this planet? solar system? survive the collision between Milky way galaxy and Andromeda galaxy?
there are a lot of things to survive and some things we have survived
it's all in our hands, laws of nature and chance (or luck)

How about an asteroid collision?

[TheAlphaWolf]

woody:

With such a big world and such small populations -- what would we be competing for?

Most hominids never got out of africa (I think) and lived in relatively small areas (compared to "with such a big world", and there's competition for game, space, etc. Humans are very savage to the out-group if you hadn't noticed.

There are around 8 billion homo sapiens on the earth right now and we manage to survive.

6.5 billion

If the extinct homos were more intelligent than apes then why couldn't they outcompete apes? Were they inferior even to apes?

our ancestors were savannah uh... dwellers..., other apes are forest dwellers. two different environments, different food sources, etc.

[Woody]

Alpha Wolf said

our ancestors were savannah uh... dwellers..., other apes are forest dwellers. two different environments, different food sources, etc.

How about babboons? They live in the savannah -- competition is tough out there too -- lions and such.

Homo Sapiens have no problem living in the woods again, and would probably prefer it, being they are such slow runners.

[James R]

1) I have answered that with "singularity" -- man could have evolved.

What's "singularity"?

2 a) genetics -- DNA evidence shows Neanderthal is not a predecessor -- can you provide DNA evidence that correlates a predecessor.

What are you asking here? You want DNA from an extinct species?

2 b) comparitive anatomy -- yeah there are features in man that could imply "external" genetic material -- like goose bumps. the appendics, and others.

How so?

Also Negros have more wisdom teeth, and more leg muscles than the rest of humanity.

No they don't. Whatever gave you the idea they do?

2c) paleontology -- There are other hominids that made tools, built fires, etc. Perhaps they were apes that were copying man's example. Apes are quite intelligent creatures.

I don't understand your point here, either. Please explain.

[Singularity]

I fail to see what is short about a few 100,000 years. ....

That can mean upto 20,000 generations.

[Singularity]

There is no necessity that the human race should survive.

Nice pic.

Strong religious beliefs and illusion that GOD will save us all will definately hasten our extinction.

Look at war videos, they all die in millions praying GOD for help.

Its just a matter of time when we will die in billions.

[Singularity]

I'd say its pretty good adaptation, across 5 million years a species has managed to evolve sufficiently to still exist in some way through trying different variations of which some survived longer than others and, although now different to its original form it continues, for how much longer, we'll find out.

I have heard that human brain has increased by 100grams in past 1000 or some years; its possible that humans have an incremental brain gene, ie. brain gene may mutate such that at each generation brain will be slightly bigger.

Sorry, thats my theory.

[Avatar]

If the brain gets too big, communications between different parts of it become slower and brain starts to lose on its' processing capacity thus a decrease in intelligence.
According to a research done by french neurologists our brain can not get much bigger than it is now.