2. How can you say that chimpanzees are more like us than any other creature alive today? Give
some points in support of your answer
Answers
Explanation:
Humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans and their extinct ancestors form a family of organisms known as the Hominidae. Researchers generally agree that among the living animals in this group, humans are most closely related to chimpanzees, judging from comparisons of anatomy and genetics.
If life is the result of "descent with modification," as Charles Darwin put it, we can try to represent its history as a kind of family tree derived from these morphological and genetic characteristics. The tips of such a tree show organisms that are alive today. The nodes of the tree denote the common ancestors of all the tips connected to that node. Biologists refer to such nodes as the last common ancestor of a group of organisms, and all tips that connect to a particular node form a clade. In the diagram of the Hominidae at right, the clade designated by node 2 includes gorillas, humans and chimps. Within that clade the animal with which humans share the most recent common ancestor is the chimpanzee.