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Asked by 268evnb35 to Thad on 12 Mar 2015. This question was also asked by 624evnb35.
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Thaddeus Aid answered on 12 Mar 2015:
Hi 268,
Humans didn’t really come from monkeys. Both monkeys and humans have what is called a common ancestor. Somewhere back millions of years ago there was a species that looked like a cross between a monkey and a squirrel that lived in the trees, this is what we both came from. Over time the ancestors of the monkeys and the ancestors of the humans moved into different areas of the Earth. Monkeys tended to stay in forests and jungles and the ancestors of humans moved into the plains of Africa. Because we lived in different environments, we evolved differently. We needed to stand up to see over the grass to see if any lions were going to eat us, where monkeys stayed in the trees so they evolved to become better tree dwellers. So both humans and monkeys both descend from another animal way back in time.
I hope that makes sense!
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anon answered on 13 Mar 2015:
Try drawing a family tree to think about this:
You have your grandma and granddad at the start of the tree and they had children: your mum or dad who had children (you) and your aunts and uncles who had children (your cousins).
Take a look here to help you see this:
http://genetics.thetech.org/sites/default/wp-content/uploads/sites/1/files/1stCousin1.gif
You and your cousin are related because you share a common relative (your grandparents), but you didn’t come from your cousin and your cousin hasn’t come from you. In the same way we are part of the monkey family called primates but we didn’t come from any 0f the types of monkeys that we see today, instead a long time ago we shared a common relative or ancestor with the monkeys you see today (like you and your cousin share your grandparents). The primate we share a most recent common ancestor with (which means we are most closely related to this primate than any other) is the chimpanzee, so the chimpanzees are our closest cousins!
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