Why don't modern monkeys turn into people? If man evolved from apes, then why don't modern apes evolve any more? Why apes don't evolve into humans

Have you ever wondered why many species of animals that lived in distant centuries no longer exist on the planet today, and some bacteria that were previously easily killed by the action of penicillin today do not even react to this antibiotic? It turns out that all life on earth is influenced by evolution - a process in which the non-stop development of living nature occurs, with constant changes in the genetic composition of living beings and the formation of special adaptations for the survival of a particular species in given conditions. Such adaptations are called adaptations.
Adaptations arise due to mutations that periodically occur in nature. One or more genes may undergo a random mutation, and an individual will be born with a new characteristic (for example, with an increased brain size, changes in skeletal structure). And this can be very useful and even necessary for survival in the conditions in which this species now lives. This “special” individual can not only better adapt to the conditions, but also give birth to offspring in which this new trait will be fixed, helping to survive. Thus, after a certain number of generations, this species can completely change. If adaptations do not occur during life, and living conditions on the planet are constantly changing, at some certain point the species will become unviable and simply disappear.
Let's try to trace the process of human development on earth from beginning to end. How in the process of evolution did we become what we are now and why does the monkey you see in the zoo not turn into a human?
According to scientific classification, humans belong to the class of mammals. The very first ancestors of this class appeared on earth more than 200 million years ago. Their sizes were small (only 10 cm), but the small creatures were very mobile with button eyes. Most likely, they lived in burrows or nests, eating small insects.
And 70 million years ago, the order of primates began to stand out among this class. Then they were small rat-like individuals moving along the treetops.
30 million years ago, flat-nosed monkeys and monkeys began to actively evolve. Then their development took different paths. The first became the ancestors of modern gorillas and orangutans. Scientists consider chimpanzees to be the closest relative of humans. 98.4% of human and chimpanzee genes are identical. This fact indicates a very close relationship.
All primates, and humans, as you already understand, are also included in this group, have a lot of similar features: our upper and lower limbs have 5 fingers, at birth one or more babies are born, who are attached to their mother for a long time and not can live independently. The structure of the teeth and maxillofacial part of the head suggests the ability to chew various types of food. Humans, modern gorillas, chimpanzees, and orangutans have a common distant ancestor, and this is our similarity. Modern apes, like humans (especially chimpanzees), are social animals that use tools in their activities that help them obtain food (albeit primitive tools). For example, sticks broken from tree branches help them catch insects living underground. The food obtained is always distributed among the members of the entire herd.
It should be understood that all modern species of primates and humans have common ancestors. In the process of centuries-old evolution, descendants began to evolve from the progenitor in different directions, acquiring new useful qualities and characteristics, over time forming new separate species that are no longer capable of transforming into each other. In other words, today's chimpanzees and gorillas cannot evolve into humans. Man could only have appeared from anthropoid apes of past centuries, from which all existing branches of primates originated.
The human branch of development appeared in the African savannas. Our ancestors came down from the trees and began to develop grassy spaces. During the rainy season, the savannas are full of lush vegetation: leaves, grass, bushes grow everywhere. During the dry season, everything around dries up. This is such impermanence. Primates needed to adapt to conditions of both abundance and complete lack of food. In dry moments, they learned to obtain seeds and nuts, but for this they needed their upper limbs. Having freed their hands to search for food, such primates now began to walk on two limbs, and the size of their brains increased. Humanoid creatures appeared - hominids. Their appearance dates back to 9 million years ago. During excavations in Ethiopia, a female skeleton was discovered that resembles a hominid from that period. This valuable find was given the name Lucy; her height was small and was less than 130 cm. But this species of hominid, to which Lucy belonged, disappeared over time. They were replaced by more advanced creatures. Their brains were much larger, and they used stone tools rather than just wooden sticks. They were hunters and gatherers. Scientists called this type of people Homosapiens (reasonable man). Presumably, it appeared 40 thousand years ago.
Modern man moves in an upright position, uses complex technical devices in his activities, uses a whole system of sound symbols (speech) in communication, masters written symbols for transmitting information, acquires and develops skills, knowledge and abilities that he is able to transfer to children, and is not limited by his environment. , can live in conditions with different climates. Human ancestors disappeared from the face of the earth long ago.
Today's primate species have much in common, but will never be able to transform into each other. Although, scientists admit that if the human branch dies out, a new species resembling humans may appear from the existing species of monkeys. But this is just a theory.

But, acquiring an increasingly civilized appearance, man tried not to perceive a chimpanzee or a gorilla as his likeness, because he quickly realized himself as the crown of the creation of an almighty creator.

When theories of evolution appeared that suggested the initial link of the origin of Homo sapiens in primates, they were met with distrust and, more often than not, hostility. Ancient monkeys, located at the very beginning of the pedigree of some English lord, were perceived with humor at best. Today, science has identified the direct ancestors of our species, who lived more than 25 million years ago.

Common ancestor

To say that man descended from a monkey is considered incorrect from the point of view of modern anthropology - the science of man and his origin. Man as a species evolved from the first humans (they are usually called hominids), who were a radically different biological species than monkeys. The first proto-human, Australopithecus, appeared 6.5 million years ago, and the ancient monkeys, who became our common ancestor with modern apes, appeared about 30 million years ago.

Methods for studying bone remains - the only evidence of ancient animals that have survived to our time - are constantly being improved. The oldest ape can often be classified by a fragment of a jaw or a single tooth. This leads to the fact that more and more new links appear in the scheme, complementing the overall picture. In the 21st century alone, more than a dozen such objects have been found in various regions of the planet.

Classification

Data from modern anthropology are constantly updated, which makes adjustments to the classification of biological species to which humans belong. This applies to more detailed units, but the overall system remains unshakable. According to the latest views, man belongs to the class Mammals, the order Primates, the suborder Apes, the family Hominids, the genus Man, the species and subspecies Homo sapiens.

Classifications of a person's closest "relatives" are a subject of constant debate. One option might look like this:

Order Primates:
- Half-monkeys.
- Real monkeys:
  - Tarsiers.
  - Broad-nosed.
  - Narrownose:
    - Gibbons.
    - Hominids:
      - Pongins:
        Orangutan.
        Bornean orangutan.
        Sumatran orangutan.
    - Hominins:
      - Gorillas:
        Western gorilla.
        Eastern gorilla.
      - Chimpanzee:
        Common chimpanzee.
      - People:
        A reasonable man.

Origin of monkeys

Determining the exact time and place of origin of monkeys, like many other biological species, occurs like the gradually emerging image in a Polaroid photograph. Finds in different areas of the planet complement in detail the overall picture, which is becoming clearer. It is recognized that evolution is not a straight line - it is rather like a bush, where many branches become dead ends. Therefore, it is still far from constructing at least a segment of a clear path from primitive primate-like mammals to Homo sapiens, but several reference points already exist.

Purgatorius is a small animal, no larger than a mouse, that lived in trees, feeding on insects, in the Upper Cretaceous (100-60 million years ago). Scientists place him at the beginning of the chain of primate evolution. Only the rudiments of signs (anatomical, behavioral, etc.) characteristic of monkeys were revealed in him: a relatively large brain, five fingers on the limbs, lower fertility with the absence of seasonal reproduction, omnivorousness, etc.

The beginning of hominids

Ancient apes, the ancestors of apes, left traces starting in the late Oligocene (33-23 million years ago). They still retain the anatomical features of narrow-nosed monkeys, placed by anthropologists at a lower level: a short auditory canal located outside, in some species the presence of a tail, the lack of specialization of the limbs in proportions and some structural features of the skeleton in the area of the wrists and feet.

Among these fossil animals, proconsulids are considered one of the most ancient. The structural features of the teeth, the proportions and dimensions of the cranium with the brain section enlarged relative to its other parts allow paleoanthropologists to classify proconsulids as anthropoids. This type of fossil monkeys includes proconsuls, calepithecus, heliopithecus, nyanzapithecus, etc. These names were most often formed from the names of geographical objects near which fossil fragments were discovered.

Rukvapithecus

Paleoanthropologists make most of the discoveries of the most ancient bones on the African continent. In February 2013, a report was published by paleoprimatologists from the USA, Australia and Tanzania on the results of excavations in the Rukwa River valley in southwestern Tanzania. They discovered a fragment of the lower jaw with four teeth - the remains of a creature that lived there 25.2 million years ago - this was the age of the rock in which this find was discovered.

Based on the details of the structure of the jaw and teeth, it was established that their owner belonged to the most primitive apes from the family of proconsulids. Rukvapithecus is the name given to this hominid ancestor, the oldest ape fossil, because it is 3 million years older than any other paleoprimate discovered before 2013. There are other opinions, but they are related to the fact that many scientists consider proconsulids to be too primitive creatures to be defined as true anthropoids. But this is a question of classification, one of the most controversial in science.

Dryopithecus

In geological deposits of the Miocene era (12-8 million years ago) in East Africa, Europe and China, remains of animals were found that paleoanthropologists assigned the role of an evolutionary branch from proconsulids to true hominids. Dryopithecus (Greek "drios" - tree) - this is the name of the ancient monkeys, which became the common ancestor of chimpanzees, gorillas and humans. The locations of the finds and their dating make it possible to understand that these monkeys, which are very similar in appearance to modern chimpanzees, formed into a vast population, first in Africa, and then spread across Europe and the Eurasian continent.

About 60 cm tall, these animals tried to move on their lower limbs, but mostly lived in trees and had longer “arms.” The ancient Dryopithecus monkeys ate berries and fruits, as follows from the structure of their molars, which did not have a very thick layer of enamel. This shows a clear relationship between Dryopithecus and humans, and the presence of well-developed fangs makes them the clear ancestor of other hominids - chimpanzees and gorillas.

Gigantopithecus

In 1936, several unusual monkey teeth, vaguely similar to human ones, accidentally fell into the hands of paleontologists. They became the reason for the emergence of a version that they belonged to creatures from an unknown evolutionary branch of human ancestors. The main reason for the emergence of such theories was the huge size of the teeth - they were twice the size of gorilla teeth. According to experts’ calculations, it turned out that their owners were over 3 meters tall!

After 20 years, a whole jaw with similar teeth was discovered, and the ancient giant apes turned from an eerie fantasy into a scientific fact. After more precise dating of the finds, it became clear that huge apes existed at the same time as Pithecanthropus (Greek “pithekos” - monkey) - ape-men, that is, about 1 million years ago. It was suggested that they were the direct predecessors of humans, involved in the disappearance of the largest apes that existed on the planet.

Herbivorous giants

An analysis of the environment in which fragments of giant bones were found, and an examination of the jaws and teeth themselves, made it possible to establish that the main food for Gigantopithecus was bamboo and other vegetation. But there were cases of discovery in caves where the bones of monster monkeys, horns and hooves were found, which made it possible to consider them omnivores. Giant stone tools were also found there.

This led to a logical conclusion: Gigantopithecus, an ancient ape up to 4 meters tall and weighing about half a ton, is another unrealized branch of hominization. It was established that the time of their extinction coincided with the disappearance of other anthropoid giants - Australopithecus Africanus. A possible reason is climatic cataclysms that became fatal for large hominids.

According to the theories of the so-called cryptozoologists (Greek "cryptos" - secret, hidden), individual specimens of Gigantopithecus have survived to this day and exist in areas of the Earth that are difficult for people to reach, giving rise to legends about the "Bigfoot", Yeti, Bigfoot, Almasty and so on.

Blank spots in the biography of Homo sapiens

Despite the successes of paleoanthropology, in the evolutionary chain, where the first place is occupied by the ancient monkeys from which man descended, there are gaps lasting up to a million years. They are expressed in the absence of links that have scientific - genetic, microbiological, anatomical, etc. - confirmation of the relationship with previous and subsequent species of hominids.

There is no doubt that such blind spots will gradually disappear, and sensations about the extraterrestrial or divine origin of our civilization, which are periodically announced on entertainment channels, have nothing to do with real science.

Chimpanzee

Although we are indeed closely related to modern apes, they did not evolve into humans.

The relationship between us is similar to the relationship between cousins: both brothers descended from the same great-grandfather. We and the great apes also descended from the same ancestor.

Evolution and life

We don't have to look far into the past to find evidence of evolution. Evolution is a process that is constantly happening around us. Bacteria that could previously be killed by penicillin have mutated and become resistant to this antibiotic. The color of the moths changed depending on the color of the trees on which they lived.

Animal species gradually change to better adapt to their environment. New species of animals also appear, they exist for millions of years and then disappear. Evolution needs time and luck to work successfully. Traits that help a species survive better—unusual but more efficient teeth, a larger brain—may appear in the newborn as a result of random variation. If the traits that appear in this way are truly useful and allow their carriers to better adapt and survive in conditions in which other representatives of the species cannot survive, then the new individuals will produce viable offspring and the trait will be fixed. After many years, all animals of a given species will look different.

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What is common between man and ape

Man belongs to the order of primates. More than 100 species belong to this order - monkeys, chimpanzees, gorillas. We primates have more common features than differences: we have five fingers and toes on our hands and feet, our teeth are adapted for chewing various types of food - from a piece of meat to juicy fruits, we give birth to one or more babies at a time, which grow for a very long time before becoming independent.

Our closest relatives are the great apes - gorillas, orangutans and chimpanzees. We are similar not because we descended from them, but because we have common ancestors. The first mammals - the ancestors of dogs, whales, chimpanzees and humans - appeared 216 million years ago. These were small creatures with button eyes, nimble, no more than 10 centimeters in size. Scientists think they lived in burrows and nests and ate insects. They were invisible, but after the extinction of dinosaurs, it was mammals who took over the inheritance rights.

Interesting fact: evolution is a process that constantly takes place around us.

The first primates on Earth

About 70 million years ago the first primates appeared. Small, rat-like, they moved along the treetops, and soon populated the entire planet. 30 million years ago, marmosets and small monkeys gradually replaced the primordial primates. Later, monkeys and monkeys evolved in different ways, from the latter the orangutan, gorillas and chimpanzees appeared.

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Different paths of evolution for humans and apes

Humans and chimpanzees may have a common recent ancestor - an animal that lived millions of years ago and may be somewhat similar to chimpanzees. But then the paths of man and chimpanzee diverged forever. One evolutionary branch gradually led to humans, the other to the modern chimpanzee. If we could repeat evolution at an accelerated pace, as in the movies, we would see how animals in one branch become more and more like modern humans, and in another - like chimpanzees.

Chimpanzees are our closest relatives. We share 98.4 percent of our genes with them. We can observe some signs of similarity with our own eyes. Chimpanzees are social animals that use tools, such as twigs, to dig up tasty ants from the ground. They divide the food among all members of the herd.

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The reason for our transformation into people and our “historical homeland” is the steppes of Africa - the savannah. Some groups of our primitive, ape-like ancestors left the forests and began to live on the grassy expanses of the savannah. During the wet season, the grass becomes lush, the leaves become green, and the bushes grow. When the rains stop, the leaves dry out and the grass turns into hay. Animals living in the savannah must adapt to such conditions: sometimes there is an abundance of food, and at other times it practically disappears. So creatures that learn to live in bushes and dig up nuts and seeds from the ground will be able to survive and not die in these harsh conditions.

Interesting fact: all mammals share a common ancestor that appeared about 216 million years ago.

The emergence of humanoid animals

Over time, important changes occurred, they led to the fact that a previously unknown creature became the conqueror of the savannah. It was very similar to a monkey, but walked on two legs. Hands were freed to search for food. The brain has enlarged. It was not yet a man, but this creature was no longer a monkey either. Such hominids - human-like animals - first appeared about 9 million years ago.

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Thanks to excavations, we learned their appearance. In Ethiopia, scientists have found an almost completely preserved skeleton of a woman, affectionately named Lucy, less than 130 centimeters tall. Lucy lived and died millions of years ago. She walked upright, probably had hair, but was very similar to a monkey.

Over time, the species of hominin to which Lucy belonged became extinct. Scientists think they lost the battle for savannah habitat with later hominids that replaced them. These later hominids had more developed brains and used stone tools. They already knew how to hunt large animals, but they did not lose their skill in collecting fruits.

Modern man

Modern humans, who according to the zoological classification belong to the species Homo sapiens (reasonable man), first appeared about 40,000 years ago. We walk upright, our hands can make complex tools, we have developed a language of sound symbols and use it to communicate with each other. We live in complex social groups. We have developed a whole system of views on people, nature and society and pass on knowledge to our children, whom we teach rules of behavior.

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We no longer limit our habitat to the savannah, but live all over the Earth, even in places where a solitary creature of our species cannot survive left to its own devices, for example in the Far North. The ape-like creatures that were our ancestors have long since disappeared. We and modern great apes are not alike, but we are related animals. Together we inhabit planet Earth.

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This question is asked sooner or later by every person who is familiar with the theory of Charles Darwin. This is especially true for opponents of this theory. If we accept Darwin's theory as true, then we can assume that the process of evolution lasted about one and a half million years, and ended approximately 40,000 years ago.

Now such a process is simply impossible, and this is explained by several reasons.:

The ecological niche is already occupied by Homo sapiens, who has settled almost throughout the entire planet. The number of people around the world is very large.
The emergence of a new species in an already existing ecological niche is impossible. A modern person simply will not allow a competitor to appear.
In our time, there are no necessary natural conditions for evolution. There is an opinion that previously there were special conditions on Earth that led to the beginning of evolution: the climatic features of the regions previously changed consistently. The wet and warm swamps were replaced by post-glacial cold, which forced apes to begin adapting to these unfavorable conditions in order to survive. They began to protect themselves from the cold and get food using the first primitive tools. Nowadays, such climate changes are impossible, so the evolution of apes will not occur.
In the modern world there is no longer that species of monkey that became the ancestor of modern man. There are two hypotheses regarding the species of monkeys: Australopithecus (steppe monkeys) and Naiapithecus (carnivorous monkeys). Whichever of these hypotheses turns out to be true, one fact remains: neither one nor the other species no longer exists. Modern apes have never been able to transform into humans and will never be able to do so today. They are completely satisfied with the state in which they are now. Prerequisites for a change of state also do not arise and will not arise in the near future. The most ordinary natural selection occurs when one species is replaced by another. It favors individuals who differ from others in some way. As a result, the original form begins to gradually die out, and a new species appears on its basis. Selection factors can be completely different.

The concept of an ecological niche is a specific cell occupied by a specific species. During natural selection, old cells are destroyed and new ones are formed. The human niche is currently occupied by the person himself, the same applies to modern monkeys - each species has its own niche.

If we assume that one day man will completely disappear from our planet, then in a couple of million years his ecological niche may be occupied by one of the modern species of anthropoid apes.

At the moment, the evolution of apes into humans is impossible, but in the distant future such a possibility cannot be ruled out. This could happen if human extinction and significant climate change occur.

But even in this case, it will take at least 3-5 million years. In approximately this amount of time, the brain of a monkey is capable of evolving into the brain of a homo habilis. At the same time, the brain of Homo habilis can grow to the brain of a modern person only after another 2 million years. This time is too long for humans to observe the process of evolution.

How scientific is Darwinian theory of the origin of species?

Fight for non-existence

Russian schoolchildren once again celebrated Knowledge Day. From this very day they will begin to study the same unreformed Soviet school curriculum, which, if anything has changed, is perhaps in the humanities... As for the natural sciences, there is truly amazing constancy. Schoolchildren who went to the seventh grade in September of the year 2000 will hammer away at Darwin's evolutionary theory in the same way as their parents - the very ancestors from whom they descended.

For God's sake, don't misunderstand us. No one is calling for returning the Law of God to school (although such attempts have been made) or presenting students with all kinds of pseudoscientific hypotheses that modern home-grown occultism offers us in such abundance. The school must be cleansed of Blavatsky and the Roerichs, of all quackery in the most ruthless manner. But Darwin's evolutionary theory (although calling this working hypothesis a theory means overpaying it quite a lot) has long been no longer considered as the only one. Moreover: the last hundred years have shaken it like no other fashionable hypothesis of those times. Darwin benefited from history even more than Marx. However, all this is not the same problem, and you never know how much nonsense was driven into children’s heads during the Soviet era - but, firstly, with the next change of course, this nonsense was burned out with a hot iron. No mention of Trofim Lysenko and a minimum of information about Michurin - this is the result of Khrushchev’s “thaw”; but then someone else cared about education and the program was promptly rid of rudiments and atavisms. And secondly, Darwin’s evolutionary theory is a stage not only in the history of science, but, alas, also in the history of ethics. The struggle for existence as the main engine of progress is a bloodthirsty and dangerous delusion. Darwin was strongly opposed by his contemporary, the famous Russian anarchist Kropotkin, who, on the basis of enormous factual material, concluded that in the animal world mutual assistance is represented no less than the notorious struggle. This skirmish—by no means just a scientific one—has shaken the world for decades; in Alexander Melikhov’s recent novel “Humpbacked Atlanteans,” it is described with almost detective fascination. The well-known Russian philosopher Nikolai Lossky, relying on the facts collected by Kropotkin, built an entire alternative theory, according to which goodness seemed to be the only engine of progress. In general, Soviet journalism was in vain to squeal something about the fierce struggle for survival in capitalist countries. Darwinism was adopted precisely by the Soviet regime - as a justification for its countless atrocities. This is where the fittest truly survived! However, of course, not the strongest. The most adaptable.

Darwin's theory, which declared adaptation to be the main condition for survival, the most necessary virtue, was generally ideal for Soviet pedagogy. Darwin looked at man as an exceptionally cruel, cunning creeping creature, which feature of evolutionary theory was recently illustrated by Victor Pelevin in his elegant story “The Origin of Species.” There, Darwin, in the hold of the Beagle, on which he made his famous journey, kills a giant ape with his bare hands in order to prove his species superiority over it and to substantiate the theory of the struggle for existence. He spits fur for a long time afterwards. However, facts are stubborn things, and if Darwin’s theory were at least somewhat conclusive, one would have to come to terms with precisely this idea of human nature. Meanwhile, it was precisely the factual confirmation of Darwin’s main conclusions that has conveniently collapsed in recent years. This does not mean that the hypothesis is completely refuted. In the end, nothing more harmonious (except for the creationist myth - the hypothesis of creation) has yet been invented. This only means that it is no longer possible today to present Darwinism as the final truth. Finally, we need to explain to children that they did not descend from a monkey. Perhaps this will keep them from doing something nasty again.

Let us recall in general terms the main provisions of this theory, which for so long was presented to our schoolchildren as the only and all-explanatory one. Firstly, matter has the ability to self-organize and become self-complicated under the influence of external forces, which is why more complex organisms develop from less complex ones. Secondly, inanimate matter strives to become alive and further complicate itself in an animate form. Finally, thirdly, living organisms have the ability to adapt to living conditions. For the first time this bright thought dawned on Darwin when he observed the evolution of the beak of Galapagos pochards.

Everything would be fine, but here’s the problem: the types of living organisms that exist now are completely separate. That is, despite significant variability within a species, they still never change enough to move from one species to another. Consequently, the main postulate of evolutionary theory - the variability of species - is not experimentally verified in any way. But perhaps something similar could have happened in previous historical eras, under the influence of cataclysms and who knows what else? Then archeology could help the Darwinists, but archeology is in no hurry to help them. All one hundred and forty years that have passed since the publication of the theory (1859), archaeologists have been digging like moles, day and night, without a lunch break, but have not dug up anything that could console Darwin. Our fellow Englishmen were especially let down: the Geological Society of London and the Paleontological Association of England undertook a broad study of modern archaeological data, and this is what the head of this project, John Moure (by the way, also a professor at the University of Michigan), said: “About 120 specialists prepared 30 chapters of a monumental work. .. Fossil plants and animals are divided into approximately 2,500 groups. It has been shown that each major form or species has a separate, special history. Groups of plants and animals SUDDENLY appeared in the fossil record. Whales, bats, elephants, squirrels, ground squirrels are as different when they first appeared as they are now. There is no trace of a common ancestor, and even less visibility of a transitional link with reptiles.”

An enlightened reader, if he has not completely forgotten the school curriculum, will, of course, be amazed. But what about the transitional forms, ape-men, walking through the pages of Soviet (and basically unchanged) anatomy textbooks? Where to put all these Eoanthropus, Hesperopithecus, which actually turned out to be a pig, because it was reconstructed from a pig tooth, Australopithecus? Sinanthropa, finally?

There's no need to put them anywhere. Because they did not exist in nature. There is no transitional link between ape and man, just as you and I do not have any rudiments. Here science has dug up a lot since Darwin’s times: almost all the organs that Darwin considered rudimentary, that is, having lost their functions, have successfully found these functions. They are also found in the appendix, and even in Darwin’s tubercle, which we have, if you remember, on the ear.

The foundation for the long line of “ape-like ancestors” was laid by Pithecanthropus, invented by the zoologist Ernst Heinrich Philipp August Haeckel, a professor at the University of Jena. To discover Pithecanthropus, the scientist with a long name did not need to leave his native place: he simply invented it along with the “Eoanthropus” (“man of the dawn” - who arose at the dawn of time, therefore). The scientific world did not appreciate Haeckel, his scientific career ended ingloriously, and he devoted the rest of his life to preaching social Darwinism in working-class neighborhoods. But a young Dutch doctor with a courageous and inspired face, not at all like a monkey, was fired up by Haeckel’s theory and decided to find Pithecanthropus. The young scientist's name was Dubois, and his task was extremely simple: to find suitable remains and interpret them correctly. Which is what he did, going to Indonesia as a civilian surgeon for the colonial troops. In principle, such self-sacrifice, which had nothing to do with mercantile motives, should have alerted Dubois himself, forcing him to assume that man does not live by bread alone, and especially not by the struggle for survival alone... but Darwinism turned even more heads.

Our hero arrived in the Malay Archipelago and began his search. There was nothing suitable in Sumatra. Soon, Dubois hears a rumor about a human skull discovered on the island of Java. He moves there, finds another fossilized skull in Java - but he is interested in the missing link, and he puts the skulls away for a while, while he continues to study the sediments. Soon he discovers a fossilized monkey tooth, and after digging for another month, he comes across the skull cap of a gibbon.

Note that Dubois understood from the very beginning: the lid belongs to the gibbon. But in his dreams he had already planted it on the Pithecanthropus skull. True, he also came across bones of other representatives of the animal world, but this worried him least of all. The ape part of the ape man had already been found; all that remained was to find the human part, preferably the lower part. Only a year later, when Dubois himself began to doubt the success of the enterprise, a tibia was found fifteen (!) meters from the previously found skull cap. Human. Pithecanthropus was severely scattered - it must have been blown up. The owner of the bone was a woman, overweight and suffering from a serious bone disease, with which an animal would not have lasted long - but the fossil woman lived a long life. This precisely testified to her belonging to the human race, which shows non-Darwinian care for its weak members. Dubois, however, was not embarrassed by all this: with a gigantic effort of will, he combined the tooth, the skull cap and the tibia - and he got the famous “Javanese man”. Having hidden four more human tibias, discovered right there, Dubois waits a year and finally sends a telegram to the mainland informing his colleagues about the great discovery. The conservatives did not understand anything and began to pester with questions: after all, at the site of the same excavations, bones of crocodiles, hyenas, rhinoceroses, pigs and even stegodons were discovered. Why not attach a human tibia to a hyena's skull? The luminary of comparative anatomy, Professor Rudolf Virchow, spoke categorically about the skull cap: “This animal is most likely a giant gibbon, and the tibia has nothing to do with it.” Of course, if the scientific world had known about the hidden human skulls, they would not have started talking to Dubois seriously at all. After all, this would indicate that ancient man coexisted peacefully with his giant ancestor. But Du Bois kept all the other fossils safely hidden. And yet, despite all the measures he took, he never achieved scientific and public recognition. Then the ambitious man hid from his “ignorant colleagues” and only occasionally snapped in response to the accusations. He remained in voluntary seclusion until 1920, when Professor Smith reported that he had discovered the remains of the most ancient people in Australia. Here Dubois could not stand it - after all, he dreamed of going down in history as a discoverer! It was he who found the most ancient skulls, not some Smith! It was then that Dubois presented the remaining skulls and other shin bones to the stunned public. Nobody expected this! The discoverer of "Javanese Man" was leading the public by the nose! So the myth of the “Javanese man” burst with a bang, only to be reborn in the pages of the works of Soviet scientists. Open a textbook from 1993, and not a simple one, but for grades 10-11, for schools with IN-DEPTH study of biology, and you will find out that “the Dutch anthropologist Eugene Dubois (1858 -1940) IRREVENTABLY PROVED the correctness of Charles Darwin’s theory of the origin humans from animals related to the great apes." We don’t know about Dubois, but the textbook irrefutably proved that someone still really wants to see only monkeys around them... 1 Let’s take the eoanthropus. This was generally discovered in a strange way: all the evidence of his belonging to the glorious tribe of ape-men was found in Piltdown. As necessary, the missing parts of the jaw were torn off until there were enough of them to form a full-fledged exhibit. Oxford experts surprisingly quickly recognized the authenticity of the find, the British Museum staff took it all into storage with suspicious haste, and anthropologists studying the Piltdown Man phenomenon were given only plaster casts of the remains. For forty years the scientific world lived as an eoanthrope, breathed and dreamed of an eoanthrope - until one fine day in 1953, everything collapsed. Anthropologists were provided with authentic Eoanthropus bones for fluoride analysis. The British Museum simply relaxed, and the Piltdown find was immediately exposed as a fake! An almost modern orangutan jaw with “false”, slightly tinted teeth was attached to an ancient human skull! The scientific world was tearing its hair out. Hundreds of monographs, thousands of dissertations went to waste! If only Soviet scientists could talk about the corruption of bourgeois science. But Darwin was dearer to us. A similar story happened with Sinanthropus, found among Chinese comrades. Fourteen holey skulls without a single skeletal bone were interpreted as the remains of ape-like ancestors. At the same time, not a word was said about the fact that they were found in an ancient lime kiln factory. Who would have burned her there, I wonder? Grasshoppers? Long-eared owl? Hardly. Most likely, ordinary homo sapiens worked at the factory, who feasted on the brains of the “Sinanthropus” during their lunch break. But not a single bone was found because the meat of monkeys, due to its toughness, is unsuitable for food - but their brain is considered a delicacy in many cultures. The holes in the backs of the heads of the “Sinanthropes” are by no means evidence that their comrades dealt with them to the fullest extent of the severity of revolutionary times. This is simply how monkey brains were removed. Realizing that it would not be possible to carry out a similar operation with the scientific world, the synanthropological lobby considered it best to lose the famous remains under unclear circumstances. So there are no traces of Sinanthropus anywhere else except in Russian biology textbooks. In general, there is not a single scientifically proven fact of the transition from monkey to human. But the textbooks are silent about this - defending the theory of evolution long ago acquired a religious character. Darwin himself would have envied the stubbornness of his current followers: “I am sure that there is hardly a single point in this book to which it is impossible to select facts leading to directly opposite conclusions,” he wrote in the preface to the first edition of his Origin of Species. . It seems that I.L. assessed the current state of mind in Russian biology most soberly. Cohen, leading researcher at the US National Archaeological Institute:

“It is not the task of science to defend the theory of evolution. If, in the process of impartial scientific discussion, it turns out that the hypothesis of creation by an external superintelligence is the solution to our problem, let us cut the umbilical cord that has connected us with Darwin for so long. It suffocates and detains us.”

What if external superintelligence has nothing to do with it? Yes, please. Present facts, argue, prove. But for God’s sake, do not present to a schoolchild as the final truth the rather controversial and offensive hypothesis that he descended from a monkey, and that, in turn, from a slipper ciliate. And then the student, perhaps, will think three times before participating in bullying the smartest person in the class. And he even reads a book in his spare time. And he will finally see in himself the likeness of some more merciful creature than the giant gibbon...

Magazine "Ogonyok"
September 2000
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