Pinnacle Of Evolution Research Paper

Where are humans positioned on the tree of life? Are we a lowly twig or something more?

As intellectually and cognitively developed as humans are it would be a mistake to categorize them as some sort of pinnacle of evolution. A mistake rooted in an ideology of human superiority that because humans are the only species known to have established cultures, built complex societies, and be fully aware of their own existence, that they are a sort of unique golden branch bearing perfect apples along the tree of life; In essence humans see themselves as more than just a primate species.

However, there are a lot of issues with this ideology. For one, there would need to exist some sort of objective metric used to determine what a pinnacle species

According to John Mears, the most prominent features of the human species present themselves from the neck upwards. “Delicately configured, vertical faces with high foreheads, small brow ridges and teeth, reduced jaws, and prominent chins” (Mears) along with specialized vocal tracts that provide for the production of speech account define major characteristics that set humans apart from other apes visually. Apart from that humans are structurally similar to modern great apes. An obvious example would be opposable thumbs used for grasping and holding objects; A characteristic shared among many primates. Bipedalism is another major defining characteristic of modern humans however the ability to walk on two limbs is not limited to just humans. The great apes possess bipedal abilities but not on a permanent basis; rather they tend to alternate between bipedal and quadrupedal methods of movement whenever necessary. The differences between modern humans and the great apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, etc.) fall along more qualitative measure. For example, humans are not well known for their physical methods of attack. When faced with a predator or adversary, humans would not likely resort to biting or using teeth for attack because “their teeth, for instance are puny besides those of chimpanzees” (Ruse). Humans also very clearly present significantly less amounts of hair than the great apes do. One major quantitative difference however is in the genetics. On a chromosomal level the great apes exhibit 24 pairs while humans exhibit only 23 pairs. This difference however, could only really account for less than 5% of the difference in the genomes of humans and the great apes. According to Marion Dresner humans also share about 98.5% of DNA with that of Chimpanzees; although more current studies have shown the number to likely be closer to