One Species, Living Worldwide (2024)

FAQs

One Species, Living Worldwide? ›

The billions of human beings living today all belong to one species: hom*o sapiens. As in all species, there is variation among individual human beings, from size and shape to skin tone and eye color. But we are much more alike than we are different. We are, in fact, remarkably similar.

Starting in Africa with our early hominin relatives (who are more closely related to us than to chimpanzees), visitors will travel forward in time to meet our ancient human relatives as they spread into Europe and Asia. The journey ends with modern humans as the only surviving human species in the world today.

However, thus far no evidence for violent eradication has been found. Instead, the most plausible model suggests that these ancient hominin species were driven to extinction by a combination of a changing climate, the emergence of novel pathogens (perhaps 'imported' by the dispersing H.

Their genetic legacy is more certain. Many living Asian people inherited perhaps 3 to 5 percent of their DNA from the Denisovans. Despite the bits of genetic ancestry they contributed to living people, all of our close relatives eventually died out, leaving hom*o sapiens as the only human species.

Why did Neanderthals go extinct? The most recent fossil and archaeological evidence of Neanderthals is from about 40,000 years ago in Europe. After that point they appear to have gone physically extinct, although part of them lives on in the DNA of humans alive today.

Hypotheses on the causes of the extinction include violence, transmission of diseases from modern humans which Neanderthals had no immunity to, competitive replacement, extinction by interbreeding with early modern human populations, natural catastrophes, climate change and inbreeding depression.

Neanderthal skull bases appear to be less arched than those of modern humans but more arched than those of modern apes. This suggests that the Neanderthals would have been capable of some speech but probably not the complete range of sounds that modern humans produce.

The paper estimates that as few as 1,300 humans were left for a period of around 120,000 years. While the exact causes aren't certain, the near-extinction has been blamed on Africa's climate getting much colder and drier.

There were once nine human species, now it's just us. But could new human species evolve? For that to happen, we'd need isolated populations subject to distinct selective pressures. Distance no longer isolates us, but reproductive isolation could theoretically be achieved by selective mating.

Unlike most animals, humans are a relatively young species and we are extremely mobile, so we simply haven't evolved into different subspecies.

What will humans evolve into? ›

We will likely live longer and become taller, as well as more lightly built. We'll probably be less aggressive and more agreeable, but have smaller brains. A bit like a golden retriever, we'll be friendly and jolly, but maybe not that interesting.

A group of closely-related organisms that have common physical and genetic characteristics and are able to interbreed to produce fertile offspring. As humans, we experience dramatically fewer hazards today than we did in our early evolution. However, genetic studies indicate that we are still evolving.

Neanderthals looked similar to humans but had more prominent brows, protruding faces, and rib cages that were shorter, deeper, and wider. In addition, their eye sockets were much larger, though it is unclear if their vision differed from ours.

The Bible tells us that Adam and Eve were created on the Sixth Day of creation. “Neanderthals” are not mentioned. And science tells us that “Neanderthals” lived from between 400,000 and 40,000 years ago. The Earth is, according to a literalist reading of the Bible, only around 6,000 years old.

Answer and Explanation:

East Asians share the greatest amount of DNA with Neanderthals with 2.3 to 2.6% of their DNA belonging to Neanderthals. Western Europeans have 1.8 to 2.4% and Africans have 0%.

However, Neanderthal DNA is slightly more abundant in the genomes of East Asian populations. This discrepancy has long perplexed scientists because Neanderthal remains have been found extensively across Europe and the Middle East but not further east of the Altai Mountains in Central Asia.

hom*o sapiens evolved in Africa from hom*o heidelbergensis. They co-existed for a long time in Europe and the Middle East with the Neanderthals, and possibly with hom*o erectus in Asia and hom*o floresiensis in Indonesia, but are now the only surviving human species.

We hom*o sapiens didn't used to be alone. Long ago, there was a lot more human diversity; hom*o sapiens lived alongside an estimated eight now-extinct species of human about 300,000 years ago. As recently as 15,000 years ago, we were sharing caves with another human species known as the Denisovans.

Biodiversity refers to every living thing, including plants, bacteria, animals, and humans. Scientists have estimated that there are around 8.7 million species of plants and animals in existence.

For most of H. sapiens' existence, in fact, multiple human species walked the earth. In Africa, where our species got its start, large-brained hom*o heidelbergensis and small-brained hom*o naledi also roamed.