Human Classification Animal Kingdom Cordate Phylum Mammal Class Primate Order Hominoid Family Homo Genus sapiens speices.

Human Classification

Animal Kingdom

Cordate Phylum

Mammal Class

Primate Order

Hominoid Family

Homo Genus

sapiens speices

Primate Order characteristics:Better sight than smell3-D SightLimbs for climbingManipulate toolsRelatively large brains

Characteristics of Hominid Family:

Bipedal

Smaller Canine Teeth

Ground Dwellers

In 1978 in Laetoli, Kenya, a research team led by British paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey discovered these 3.6-million-year-old human footprints preserved in a layer of hardened volcanic ash. Two early humans of the species Australopithecus afarensis left the footprints as they walked across the African savanna.

John Reader/Photo Researchers, Inc.

"Footprints From the Past," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

“Great Apes”= Gorillas, Chimpanzees & Orangutans (Family Pongidae?)

About 98% of the genes of chimpanzees & humans are the same, making them our closest relatives of the primates

Skull Comparisons:

Human Ancestors

Homo erectus, Australopithecus,& Human

Walking upright: Bipedalism

Unlike their ape ancestors, early humans had anatomical adaptations for upright walking. The early human species Australopithecus afarensis had a wide and short pelvis and femurs (upper leg bones) that angled inward toward the knees. These adaptations provided side-to-side balance and a fulcrum for the hip muscles to hold the torso erect. In contrast, apes, such as chimpanzees, have a tall and narrow pelvis from which the femurs extend straight down.

© Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

"Evolution of Upright Walking," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Why did humans evolve?

Bipedal & larger brain advantages:

Change climate?Patchy forests?Need to hunt & run?Tool usage?

Scientists do not all agree about the appropriate classification of hominoids. They group the living hominoids into either two or three families: Hylobatidae, Hominidae, and sometimes Pongidae. Hylobatidae consists of the small or so-called lesser apes of Southeast Asia, commonly known as gibbons and siamangs. The Hominidae (hominids) include humans and, according to some scientists, the great apes. For those who include only humans among the Hominidae, all of the great apes, including the orangutans of Southeast Asia, belong to the family Pongidae.

In the past only humans were considered to belong to the family Hominidae, and the term hominid referred only to species of humans. Today, however, genetic studies support placing all of the great apes and humans together in this family and the placing of African apes—chimpanzees and gorillas—together with humans at an even lower level, or subfamily.

According to this reasoning, the evolutionary branch of Asian apes leading to orangutans, which separated from the other hominid branches by about 13 million years ago, belongs to the subfamily Ponginae. The ancestral and living representatives of the African ape and human branches together belong to the subfamily Homininae (hominines). Lastly, the line of early and modern humans belongs to the tribe (classificatory level above genus) Hominini, or hominins.

This order of classification corresponds with the genetic relationships among ape and human species. It groups humans and the African apes together at the same level in which scientists group together, for example, all types of foxes, all buffalo, or all flying squirrels. Within each of these groups, the species are very closely related. However, in the classification of apes and humans the similarities among the names hominoid, hominid, hominine, and hominin can be confusing. In this article the term early human refers to all species of the human family tree since the divergence from a common ancestor with the African apes. Popular writing often still uses the term hominid to mean the same thing.

"Human Evolution," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Did Man evolve from Apes?No!!Similar ancestorBoth:AnimaliaCordataMammaliaPrimates?HominoidsDifferent Genus & Species

• When Charles Darwin published The Descent of Man in 1871, he challenged the fundamental beliefs of most people by asserting that humans and apes had evolved from a common ancestor. Many critics of Darwin misunderstood his theory to mean that people had descended directly from apes. This caricature of Charles Darwin as an ape appeared in the London Sketch Book in 1874.

• Mary Evans Picture Library/Science Source/Photo Researchers, Inc. "Caricature of Charles Darwin," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia

2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Mammals arise from Theraapsids

Lemurs: distant relatives

The ruffed lemur lives in the eastern rain forests of Madagascar. The lemurs and their relatives are believed to have evolved in isolation from the monkeys and apes after Africa became separated from Madagascar over 50 million years ago. Since the arrival of humans on Madagascar over 2000 years ago, at least 14 species of lemurs are believed to have become extinct. Jean P. Varin/Jacana/Photo Researchers, Inc."Ruffed Lemur," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Piltdown “hoax”

The Piltdown Man was accepted as an important archaeological find in 1912 because it seemed to bridge the evolutionary gap between apes and man. It was not until 1953 that, with the help of fluorine dating tests, the bones were determined to be the jaw of an orangutan with the skull of a man, both from the Middle Ages. Here, Alvan Marston explains that it is not a missing evolutionary link, but a “most elaborate hoax.”

Hulton Deutsch

"Uncovering the Piltdown Hoax," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.