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Chapter Summary
Many primatologists compare humans and various primate species in an effort to understand our evolutionary past. We must, however, avoid anthropomorphism in the process. Primatologists create primate taxonomies to help us understand primate diversity and inter-relationships. Traditional taxonomies compared phenotypes and adaptations of primates to recognize four grades of primates. Cladistic taxonomies, however, ignore adaptations and fossil records and classify primates on the basis of homologous traits found in living species.
Primatologists classify primates into various sub-types. Strepsirrhines include lorises and lemurs. Haplorhines include tarsiers and anthropoids. Anthropoids are further divided into Old world and New world varieties, each with distinguishing physical characteristics.
Old world anthropoids include species of monkeys and apes, as well as humans; all share the same nose shape and the same number of premolars. Apes are distinguished from Old World monkeys by dentition, skeletal shape and size, and the absence of a tail. The African apes are far more closely related to one another than to gibbons or orangutans, and human beings are more closely related to chimpanzees than to any other ape species. Chimpanzees make tools that help them forage for food.
Paleontologists assign primate fossils to various categories after comparing their cranium and postcranial skeletons. They conclude that the first undisputed primates appeared during the Eocene. The early ancestors of later anthropoids appeared in the late Eocene and are known from sites in northern Africa and Asia. Some Oligocene primate fossils look like possible ancestors to modern New World anthropoids; others, like Aegyptopithecus zeuxis, appear ancestral to all later Old World anthropoids.
Early Miocene hominids were diverse and included Proconsul hesoloni, which is generalized enough to have been ancestral to later apes and humans. Subsequently, in the middle Miocene, hominoids spread and diversified, and their fossils are found from Europe to eastern Asia. By the late Miocene, many hominoid species became extinct. Paleoanthropologists agree that chimpanzees, gorillas and humans shared a common ancestor in the late Miocene.
Learning Objectives
In this chapter, the student should learn to do the following:
- identify the major physical/morphological characteristics of primates;
- outline the different kinds of primates and their distinguishing morphological features;
- discuss what makes anthropoids distinct from other primates;
- outline how and why primatologists are increasingly engaged in primate conservation;
- understand how primatologists can help contribute to our understanding of early human evolution and behaviour.