The taxonomy of the Hominoidea is in a state of flux, as molecular evidence
has drawn close lines of relationship than expected. Below are two of the
many current phylogenetic classifications. Clearly, they are not clearly defined
and the final classification has not been decided.
In the Science Week reference below, they state:
"hominine: The terms hominine, hominin, hominoid, hominid, are not interchangeable, but their classification criteria are variously in a state of flux. In general, the hominoids are a primate superfamily, the hominid family comprises the great apes within the hominoid superfamily, the hominini are a "tribe" within the hominids characterized by a number of features including bipedalism, and the hominini are further partitioned into the genera Homo and Australopithecus. Concerning research in human evolution, most paleoanthropologists agree that what is important is to achieve an understanding of the evolutionary transitions and transformations, and any classification scheme must be secondary to this objective. In other words, in this context, classification must ultimately reflect phylogeny (the actual evolutionary relationships), and as knowledge of phylogeny changes, so must the extant classification schemes."
| Superfamily Hominoidea ('hominoids') Family Hylobatidae (e.g. gibbon) Genus Hylobates Genus Symphalangus (e.g. siamang) Family Hominidae ('hominids') Subfamily Ponginae Genus Pongo ('pongines') (e.g. orangutans) Subfamily Gorillinae Genus Gorilla ('gorillines') (e.g. gorilla) Subfamily Homininae ('hominines') Tribe Panini Genus Pan ('panins’) (e.g. chimpanzee) Pan troglodytes (chimpanzee) Pan paniscus (bonobo) Tribe Hominini ('hominins') Subtribe Australopithecina ('australopiths') Genus Ardipithecus Genus Australopithecus Genus Paranthropus Subtribe Hominina ('hominans') Genus Homo (human) |
Superfamily Hominoidea ('hominoids') Family Hominidae ('hominids') Subfamily Homininae ('hominines') (18 Mya) Tribe Hylobatini Subtribe Hylobatina (8 Mya) Genus Hylobates (e.g. gibbon) Genus Symphalangus (e.g. siamang) Tribe Hominini ('hominins') (14 Mya) Subtribe Pongina Genus Pongo ('pongines') (e.g. orangutans) Subtribe Hominina ('hominans') Genus Pan ('panins’) (e.g. chimpanzee), (3 Mya) Pan troglodytes (chimpanzee) Pan paniscus (bonobo) Genus Homo (human), (6 Mya) Genus Gorilla ('gorillines') (e.g. gorilla), (7 Mya) |
The divergence of Old World monkeys and hominoids at the Oligocene-Miocene
boundary (approximately 23 million years ago) provides the best primate calibration
point for hominid evolution and yields a time and 95% confidence interval
of 5.4 +/- 1.1 million years ago (36 nuclear genes) for the human-chimpanzee
divergence. Older splitting events are estimated as 6.4 +/- 1.5 million years
ago (gorilla, 31 genes), 11.3 +/- 1.3 million years ago (orangutan, 33 genes),
and 14.9 +/- 2.0 million years ago (gibbon, 27 genes) (Stauffer et al, 2001).
The changes and variability in human taxonomy reflects the finding that
little confidence can be placed in phylogenies generated solely from higher
primate craniodental evidence (Collard and Wood, 2000). Existing phylogenetic
hypotheses about human evolution reflect unreliable tools of analysis. New
approaches and methods are needed to address the problem of hominin phylogeny.
Molecular genetics has had a major impact on phylogenetics, so hominoid
paleontologists and morphologists need to use this genetic data. Genetic
evidence shows that chimpanzee and human hominoids are closely related,
sharing many postcranial similarities. Miocene hominoid fossil postcrania
show that few of these taxa share significant similarities with living apes,
suggesting that few if any are related to specific extant lineages. Given
the genetically inferred relationships of hominoids and the morphology of
the earliest hominids, the common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees was
probably chimp-like, a knuckle-walker with small thin-enameled cheek teeth.
Miocene hominoids, mostly postcranially archaic and with large, thickly enameled
cheek teeth, probably throw little if any direct light on hominid origins
(Pilbeam, 1996).
Neanderthal genetic sequences appear to fall outside of the modern human
lineage, possibly sharing a common ancestry with our lineage around a half
million years ago. Human ancestry appears to be derived from an African population
that may have remained relatively isolated in Africa for tens of thousands
of years before migrating out in the last 100,000 years. This replaced archaic
humans, including neanderthals, throughout the old world (Disotell, 1999).
References:
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