All living things supposedly evolve from a common ancestor but why did some evolve more than others. For example, humans are said to ascend from apes but why do apes still exist and not evolve into higher forms.
Dear Josias,
they do. The process of evolution takes place in a time scale difficult to wrap one's mind around. With our brief existence on this planet (and the even briefer time we know about evolution through natural selection) we can't notice such evolutionary changes. Due to your question I assume that you are not that familiar with the process of evolution, so I recommend you reading one (or all) of the following books by Richard Dawkins:
- The Blind Watchmaker
- Climbing Mount Improbable
- An Ancestor's Tale
- The Greatest Show On Earth: The Evidence For Evolution
Best regards,
Chris
Most apes existing at the time when the human lineage first appeared no longer exist, but have indeed evolved into "higher" forms (chimps, bonobos, gorillas, humans, etc).
And prokaryotes do evolve, as the quick spread of antibiotic resistance among human bacterial pathogens has shown.
It is a mistake to think that prokaryotes have not been evolving. They are exquisitely adapted to the lives they lead and just because they have not become multicellular does not mean that they are not complex. And it would also be a mistake to think that evolution always leads to greater complexity. Consider the cave fish that evolved from ancestors with eyes. But due to the fact that it lives in darkness the metabolic energy required to produce an eye would be wasted in this environment so natural selection appears to have favored individuals who divert these resources to other purposes. Oh and on another note I always stress we share a common ancestor with the apes but we did not evolve from them. The common ancestral population diverged into two lineages which each went on to experience additional divergences. If you look at the survivors today you see H. sapiens and Pan troglodytes (Chimpanzees) and P. paniscus (bonobos or pygmy chimps.) On the lineage that we belong to there were many other hominid species found in the fossil record. I do not study humans or chimps but to my knowledge the only divergences in the chimp lineage was when the two types of chimps diverged from one another. But I would do some checking on that because I do not keep up with developments in that field.
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