Baboons Branch Off: Old World Monkeys
27 Million Years Ago (+/- 2 million)
Large neocortex, Coalition politics emerge
The last common ancestor with humans and old-world monkeys lived around 29 million years ago.
Around 25 to 29 million years ago, Old World monkeys, including species like baboons and macaques, branched off from the common ancestor shared with apes. Unlike their ape cousins, Old World monkeys retained their tails and adapted to a wider range of habitats, from forests to savannas. Baboons, known for their ground-dwelling behavior, exhibit strong social structures and advanced communication. However, they lack the opposable thumbs and tool use that evolved in the ape lineage. This branching marked a key evolutionary moment, setting the stage for the development of the tailless apes, including gibbons and later great apes.
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Our last tails! The last common ancestor with humans and old-world monkeys lived around 29 million years ago.
Subject: Last Common Ancestor.
By 27 million years ago, our ancestors had opposable thumbs and could sit upright, but they still had tails and mostly moved on all fours. From this common ancestral population, evolution unfolded in two related ways. Anagenesis describes the slow, continuous changes within a single lineage: subtle shifts in anatomy and behavior accumulating generation by generation. Cladogenesis, by contrast, occurs when a population gradually splits into separate lineages that then evolve independently. In this case, one branch would eventually give rise to Old World monkeys, including baboons, while another continued down the path that would later lead to apes and, much later, humans.
What evolutionary process occurs when one species splits into two or more distinct species?.
Answer. Cladogenesis (evolution involving lineage splitting into two species).
was first published on TST 2 years ago.
