Well either you are not very bright, or you are being deliberately provocative. Leaving aside your use of the ill-defined concept of "real" taxa, you are surely aware that the term "ape" refers to a class of primates known as hominids, wheras the term "human" is restricted to a species of ape, one of several that together comprise the hominids.
Either you are not familiar with what scientists routinely tell people these days (i.e. that humans
are apes), or you are not familiar with rival schools of systematics and their respective methodological precepts, or you are not familiar with scientists arguing over the reality of biological taxa, including the base taxon
species, as well as the so-called "higher taxa" too (
genus and above).
I'm getting the distinct impression it's all three! However, let's address them one by one:
(i) Do scientists assert that humans are not only descended from apes, but that we
are apes? Of course they do! Nothing could be more commonplace. See for example Aron Ra, previously posted in "The Stage Theory of Theories" post #425, between 1:05:00 - 1:07:00 below for a typical affirmation thereof:
You even imply it yourself above!
(ii) If it is granted that humans are
descended from apes, or primitive apelike creatures, does it follow that we
are apes? Well, that depends on your taxonomical predilections.
Take the parallel case of modern birds, for example. If it granted that birds descended from dinosaurs (of a certain kind) then
* the
pheneticist groups according to morphological similarity. Genealogy is not taken into consideration at all in his groupings.
* the
cladist has no choice in the matter. The cladist recognizes only monophyletic groups -- as
he defines that term -- as legitimate, namely, all and only descendants of some ancestral root form. If birds are
descended from dinosaurs then birds
are dinosaurs. Period!
* the
evolutionary taxonomist (
à la Ernst Mayr) also takes genealogy into consideration in his groupings, but not
only genealogy. The evolutionary taxonomist also recognizes only monophyletic groups as legitimate, but he defines the term differently from the cladist,
viz., only but not necessarily
all descendants of some ancestral root form. If birds are descended from dinosaurs, but have subsequently diverged to such a degree that the ET feels it inappropriate to lump the two together, the ET is at liberty to assign birds a separate and higher taxon of their own. If this is done, birds are
descended from dinosaurs, but birds
are not dinosaurs.
The same considerations apply to apes and modern humans. Even granting that modern humans are descended from apes, unlike the cladist, it does not
necessarily follow from the methodological injunctions of evolutionary taxonomy that humans
are apes.
"Mayr, in his role as one of the most vocal spokesmen for the classical evolutionary taxonomists, made it clear in this statement that autopomorphies (and their complementary simplesiomorphies) must be considered in the recognition and ranking of groups in classifications. Mayr cited examples to demonstrate why excluding unique characters in assessing rank produces what he believed to be absurd results. Mayr's taxonomic abominations included the grouping of man with the great apes as proposed by Linnaeus, among others, and more poignantly for him as an ornithologist, the treatment of birds and crocodiles as each others' nearest relatives among living organisms, or birds as a subgroup of dinosaurs when extinct groups are also considered."
- "Biological Systematics: Principles and Applications", 2nd edition, Schuh & Brower, p14
(iii) The reality of species and higher taxa. I quote below from "Speciation" by Jerry A. Coyne & H. Allen Orr . . .
"As a result, more work on speciation has been performed over the last two decades than over the entire period from 1859 to 1980. This latest phase has involved reexamining nearly every conclusion about speciation reached during the Modern Synthesis. Debate about species concepts--virtually quashed by Mayr's forceful arguments in Animal Species and Evolution--was revived as biologists not only introduced dozens of new concepts, but even questioned whether species exist." (pp 4-5)
"But we must start at the beginning--with the question of whether biological nature really is discontinuous. Do species exist as discrete, objective entities, or are they, as Darwin believed, purely arbitrary constructs? If species are not real, then the problem of speciation is moot and we need go no further.
Most biologists certainly act as if species are real: naturalists label their specimens, systematists reconstruct the history of life from from species-specific traits, population geneticists measure DNA variation within species, and ecologists calculate species diversity. Yet a vocal group of biologists, including many botanists, dissent, claiming that species are subjective divisions of nature made for human convenience. This view is common enough to merit serious examination. [ . . . ]
In The Origin, Darwin apparently felt that species were not real:
'From these remarks it will be seen that I look at the term species, as one arbitrarily given for the sake of convenience to a set of individuals closely resembling each other, and that it does not essentially differ from the tern variety, which is given to less distinct and more fluctuating forms.' (Darwin, 1859, p. 52)
'In short, we shall have to treat species in the same manner as those naturalists treat genera, who admit that genera are merely artificial combinations made for convenience. This may not be a cheering prospect; but we shall at least be freed from the vain search for the undiscovered and undiscoverable essence of the term species.' (Darwin, 1859, p. 485)
A number of biologists have agreed with Darwin's published view that species are arbitrary constructs. Surprisingly, this group includes the evolutionist J. B. S. Haldane, who observed that "the concept of a species is a concession to our linguistic habits and neurological mechanisms . . . a dispute as to the validity of a specific distinction is primarily a linguistic rather than a biological dispute" (1956, p. 96). Raven (1976), Mishler and Donoghue (1982), and Nelson (1989) have made similar arguments. [ . . . ]
A different view, common among botanists, is that while some species are real, other groups are less discrete owing to extensive hybridization or the presence of uniparental reproduction (e.g., selfing or clonal reproduction). We find it puzzling, if not contradictory, that many evolutionists who doubt the reality of species nevertheless act as if species were real when doing their own research, using Linnaean names and treating members of one species as equivalents. [ . . . ]
We will conclude that species are indeed discrete in sexually reproducing organisms, probably discrete in asexually reproducing organisms, but often not discrete in organisms that reproduce both sexually and asexually." (pp 9 -12)
"ARE "HIGHER" TAXA REAL?
Most biologists agree that species are real in a way that supraspecific taxa -- including ranks like genera and families -- are not. Higher-level groups often share a common ancestor (i.e., are monophyletic), and can even be distinguished as large morphological clusters. Yet because evolutionary trees can branch at any level, higher-level groupings are necessarily somewhat arbitrary. Indeed, systematists such as Griffiths (1976) have even suggested doing away with formal taxonomic ranks altogether. [ . . . ]
The "reality" of such groups thus consists only of their common ancestry and the traits that allow us to recognize it. Unlike species, such groups do not evolve as a unit nor are they homogenized by interbreeding." (pp 16 -17)
In conclusion, then, for the statement "Humans are apes" to be both true and expressing a fact of nature, -- not merely an artificially constructed fact of human taxonomic convention (
cf. "Frank Sinatra is classified as jazz in Tower Records") -- both terms would have to
refer. That is
"Homo sapiens (a species and
real) is part of [insert higher taxon here] (and this taxon is
real too)"
Unfortunately, what had up to this point been a pleasant and informative exchange with Pinball and TheVat has now been disrupted by the mass intrusion of the usual abusive and pig-ignorant Red Guards of scientism resorting, as they invariably do, to puerile insults and name-calling. I am once again reduced to being both stupid and a cunt (A typo? See also "Compromised Science" exchemist, post #409).
I will therefore bow out gracefully and allow you to enjoy your celebration of ignorance and childishness alone.
