Did We Descend from Animals?

Did We Descend from Animals?

Alfred Russell Wallace was the co-discoverer, with Charles Darwin, of the idea of evolution by natural selection. Wallace came up with the idea after laborious researches and profound thought over fifteen years.⁽¹⁾

The reason we never hear of him is because his system was not fully naturalistic. He thought our mental abilities are considerably above what is necessary to survive. Therefore, we could not have evolved to where we are today by a process of natural selection.⁽²⁾

Psychology

The question is whether Wallace was right. Do we have abilities far beyond what we need - and therefore could not have them due to evolution by natural selection? Let us start with Jerome Kagan of Harvard University. He is "a near-legendary figure in the field of child development" and "one of psychology's most erudite and rigorous experimentalists." (See R.A. Shweder, "Humans Really are Different," Science 283:798 (1999).

Kagan argues that there is no non-human animal model for human pride, shame, and guilt. Similarly, we are concerned with right and wrong and have a desire to feel virtuous; this is unique and discontinuous with animals. For example, "Not even the cleverest ape could be conditioned to be angry upon seeing one animal steal food from another."

In his book, Three seductive Ideas (1988), Kagan points out that humans do things for reasons, entertain ideas about the significance of their experiences, and are aware of the long-term consequences of their actions. Their moral sense makes humans a special creation. There is more that could be reported on Kagan, but let's move on.

Creativity

Another area that humans exhibit a capacity greater than needed to survive is in art and music. How does one explain choral singing from an evolutionary standpoint? Or works of art? Pictured at the left are horses from a cave containing the oldest paintings we have discovered to date. The skill level is exceptionally high - there is shading and perspective - techniques previously thought to have been invented much later. [See M. Balter, "New Light on the Oldest Art," Science283:920-922 (1999).]

No monkey or ape today could draw a picture of horses equal to what humans did when they first entered Europe. The differences between us and them are so great - how could they be relatives? But why do humans draw pictures at all? Shouldn't those cave artists have been out hunting? That is what animals do. The same thing could be said for poetry, novels, sculpture, and other expressions of creativity. Why do we have these seemingly extraneous abilities? We don't need them to survive.

Anatomical Differences

We look more like the monkeys and apes than any other animal. Evolutionists dwell so much on this relative appearance that they miss the differences. Further, appearances can be deceptive. For example, mandrills (right) look like gaudy baboons. However, recent research has shown their closest relatives are not baboons, but long-legged monkeys called mangabeys. Appearances are deceiving. [See "When is a Mandrill Not a Baboon?," Science 283:931 (1999).]

The most obvious difference when we compare ourselves to monkeys and apes is that we are basically hairless. Why? Why are our presumed relatives covered with hair and we are not? What survival advantage is there in having no hair? Weather permitting, why don't we walk around naked as a matter of course?

Even when the weather permits, we at least walk around with our genitals covered. An exception was sophomore Andrew Martinez who attended classes in 1992 at the Cal-Berkeley campus in the buff. You may have read about him; they called him "the naked guy" (pictured at the right). However, some women complained and suddenly one of our most liberal universities had an anti-nudity policy. Kagan is right - we have deep moral emotions and a spiritual nature that animals don't have.

The same thing occurs with the sex act. Not only have we made our genitals private, but the use of them is private, too - an obvious difference from the animals.

Similarly, we are much more sexually active than our supposed relatives, the primates. We usually have a comparatively lengthy courtship phase and often form prolonged pair-bond relationships. None of this happens with the primates. For them, precopulatory patterns are very brief and so is the act itself. Further, the female is receptive for only about a week or so out of her monthly cycle, but women are virtually receptive the year around. Also, the human female orgasm is unique compared to primates; so are lips, protruding breasts, hemispherical buttocks, the angle of the vagina, and the retention of the hymen.

Physiological Requirements

Our bodies do not just have unique features compared to primates and other animals. The information stored in our DNA is unique to every person. So where did our DNA and its information come from in the first place? Some say we came from chemicals, but chemicals don't have this information in them. If we did come from chemicals, how did we get our extremely complex programming? Without this information natural selection cannot work - it has to have something to select on.

Even given our DNA and the information stored in it, there are tough questions. If we evolved due to chance beneficial changes in the information in our DNA, why don't we observe this in the laboratory? What we see is the opposite. When we do see DNA changes occur, they are for the worse and the result is a whole host of genetically-related diseases.

Further, there are features in our bodies that are so intricate that they could not have evolved. For our bodies to work correctly, a whole series of systems had to be in place at once and could not have slowly evolved. One example is our immune systems. There is a complex series of events that have to sequentially occur just to heal a cut finger. Invading bacteria have to be identified and destroyed without harming the rest of our cells. This sequence did not evolve - it does not work in a piecemeal fashion. It either all works together following the right protocol, or it doesn't work at all. If it does not work, we die - we do not survive. The same thing occurs with seeing. To see, a series of intricate reactions have occur in the correct sequence or we do not see at all. The immune response, seeing, and others like them are all irreducibly complex systems that have to be designed and assembled correctly the first time. See my review of Darwin's Black Box for more details.

Discussion and Conclusions

We are unique from the animals, not just in the obvious and well-discussed areas such as speech and reflective thinking, but in many other areas as well. We differ from the animals morally, spiritually, sexually, and creatively. There is no support for the claim that we evolved from the animals and that the apes and monkeys are our nearest relatives. To say that we are animals undermines moral behavior and implies that we have no control over our impulses.

The data presented here concerning the question about whether we evolved at all is brief. More information about humans can be found in Instant Creation - Not Evolution by Dorothy Allford, M.D. (New York: Stein and Day, 1978), or in my related articles: Problems with Chemical Origin of Life Theories, The Implications of the Cambrian Explosion for Evolution, The Coelacanth, Living Fossils, and Evolution, No Evidence for Evolution, and Did Birds Evolve from Dinosaurs? Research Says No!

Acknowledgments

The picture of Wallace is courtesy of Yale University Press. The cave picture is courtesy of the French Culture Ministry/Drac Rhone - Alpes, and Science 283:920. The mandrill picture is courtesy of Zig Leszczynski/Animals, Animals and Science 283:931. The picture of the "Naked Guy" is courtesy of the San Jose Mercury News - Sipa and Newsweek Magazine, 23 Nov 92, p. 10.

Notes

1. H.L. McKinney, Wallace and Natural Selection (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1972).

2. The appeal of Darwin's idea is not its massive evidence, because there is none. See "No Evidence for Evolution." Darwinian evolution's appeal is its naturalism - it is a non-supernatural explanation of how we got here. This is why Wallace's version of natural selection did not win out.