Although I didn\'t spend much time on family trees in our lecture videos this we

Question

Although I didn't spend much time on family trees in our lecture videos this week, I hope you have examined the different version of family trees of human origins that are presented both on the web site given in the study plan and in your textbook. What did you learn by investigating these family trees? How do the different versions compare with one another? Why is the hominin family tree so open to interpretation at this point? Do you think it will ever be possible to clarily the evolutionary relationships among these species? What does this tell us about evolution? What does it tell us about the nature of science?

Explanation / Answer

FAMILY TREES:

Before going into the family trees concept, first important thing here to notice is that HUMANS DID NOT EVOLVE FROM APES. We all came from COMMON ANCESTOR.

Earliest hominids were dated before 3.5 million years ago. And the earliest fossil hominids sites were found in AFRICA(ETHIOPIA,KENYA,TANZANIA and SOUTH AFRICA) Modern human and indirect ancestors split from the chimpanzee. Our human evolution is just like as other groups but we have followed an uncertain evolutionary path.

Speaking about the family trees of human origins, our evolutionary history has many dead-end side branches. And as new species evolved in family tree they better adapted to the changing environment and became extinct. The possibility of linking humans with earlier apes started only after 1859 publication of CHARLES DARWIN'S origin of species.

1. APES, MONKEYS and HUMANS fall under HIGHER PRIMATES branch.

2. From that SUPERFAMILY HOMINOIDEA are classified as APES AND HUMANS.

3. FAMILY HOMINOIDEA are HUMANS

Coming to HOMININ FAMILY TREE, modern HUMANS are the only extant or living species of HOMININ. The evolutionary process of human species started some 4 million years ago and finally produced the appearance of present day species. To tell more about evolution hominization process involved some important physical changes. Evolution itself explains about the genetic transformation of population over time. And human evolution is the evolutionary process leading up the appearance of modern humans.

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