The image below, commonly and erroneously called “march to progress” depicts the “evolution” of man from his earliest ancestor. What are the errors in this image? All. Starting with the fact that of the six individuals portrayed, at least four do not belong to the gender Homo (to which all of the modern human lineage belong).
The second mistake is to portray evolution as a linear event, that is, one species emerges another and so, gradually, to the final species. The third mistake, which is very common, is to believe that evolution has a purpose, in the case of the image, all previous individuals existed for the purpose of the emergence of their most evolved lineage, the homo sapiens, also known as: us.
Did Man come from the ape?
Man did NOT arise from ape. Because we are all primates. All primates have common ancestry, that is, our most primitive ancestor was a single species, so you didn't come from the ape, you came from the same ancestor, but chimpanzees suffered selective pressures that selected the characteristics that they have today and we suffered different pressures that selected the characteristics that we have. That's why an ape will never “become human”, because they have their own evolutionary lineage that separated from ours thousands of years ago.
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The evolution
Evolution is not a linear process, many species lag behind selected by environmental pressures. An example of this happened to our species and until very recently: a few thousand years ago, the Earth was inhabited by two species of humans, the homo sapiens, our species, and the Homo neanderthalensis, Neanderthal men. The latter were so named because their first bones were found in a region known as “Neander Valley", in Germany.
The two species coexisted for several years and many believe that, due to environmental pressures allied to strong interspecific competition with the homo sapiens, you Neanderthal men were extinct. Imagine if the opposite had happened or if both species existed today?
Your colleague in the next chair would have a very broad forehead and nose, be shorter and stockier than most, and even have a bigger brain than yours. The fact is that the species that presented the most adequate characteristics to pass through the sieve of natural selection was the species that has remained until today. Neanderthal men did not become homo sapiens. They just don't exist anymore.
We can then say that there was a determined plan for the homo sapiens prospered? Do not. There is no evolutionary plan, there is no way of knowing which species will continue and which will perish. Selective pressures are very random and often the one best suited to one pressure will quickly perish upon another. So when someone asks you if you came from the monkey say “No, because I'm a monkey too”.
Paulo Ribeiro
Biologist, Master in Applied Zoology
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