Extinct Ancestors of Modern Animals

[Spalea]

" Evolution is the single most important concept in all of biology. It is absolutely vital for understanding both the history of life on earth and why our modern organisms have their current traits and behaviors. Nevertheless, it is also one of the most misunderstood concepts in modern science. Much of the confusion stems from creationists’ faulty arguments, but even those who accept evolution often don’t really understand it.


We did not evolve from modern apes, but we share a common ancestor with them. In other words, if we back the clock up a few million years, we will find an ape-like ancestor whose populations split, and different groups went down different evolutionary paths. One group evolved into us, and another group evolved into chimps. So we and chimps share a great, great, great…great grandparent who went extinct a few million years ago, but we did not evolve from chimps, monkeys, or modern apes. "

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