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Orang utan is a Malay/Indonesian word translated to 'Jungle human'. Orangutan are very calm, gentle and human like. It's a mystery how similar they are to us hu

Orang utan is a Malay/Indonesian word translated to 'Jungle human'. Orangutan are very calm, gentle and human like. It's a mystery how similar they are to us human in a sense that they are very predictable and very intelligent. Perhaps, evolution as we understand ..were already known to the people who were living nearby to the orangutan.

perl4ever 7y ago
Following the link, there is some stuff about how new genetic research shows that humans may be closer to orangutans than chimpanzees.
- thaumasiotes 7y ago
  While theoretically possible, that idea starts in a deep hole, since orangutans don't come from Africa.
  - WomanCanCode 7y ago
    Our origin is actually not that simple and straight forward. They now believe we may have bred with non homo sapiens https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-06004-0 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-06004-0
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    Closer to orangutans doesn't mean evolved from orangutans. The idea is that humans evolved from a common ancestor, and retained more of the DNA that orangutans now have than chimps did.
    - thaumasiotes 7y ago
      Closer to orangutans does in fact mean that the most recent common ancestor with orangutans is more recent than the most recent common ancestor with chimps. That's how you measure evolutionary distance. > and [humans] retained more of the DNA that orangutans now have than chimps did. That can't possibly be the actual argument. If humans shared more genetically with orangutans than with chimps, we would conclude that humans had diverged from orangutans -- not chimps -- regardless of whether that were true, because the genetic distance is all we have to address the question with.
      - lm28469 7y ago
        > we would conclude that humans had diverged from orangutans -- not chimps Isn't the current consensus that humans and chimps diverged from a common ancestor. Not that human diverged from chimps?
        thaumasiotes 7y ago
        Those are the same thing stated two different ways. I'm contrasting diverging from chimps with diverging from orangutans.
      - perl4ever 7y ago
        I'm not the expert on the topic, but as far as I can tell, the claim is in fact that (a) there are more similarities to orangutans, yet (b) the split from chimps is more recent. If I understand correctly you are saying "distance" is proportional to time by definition, and what I was reading seems to say that is not strictly the case. "Theoretically, orangutans have had more time to accumulate genetic variation compared to humans and chimpanzees, which split into their own lineages 5 million to 6 million years ago. One would expect at least twice as much variation in the orangutan genome. However, in the study, a comparison of the three genomes shows that humans and chimpanzees have lost or gained new genes at twice the rate of orangutans." "there are many similarities to the human and orangutan genome, much more similar than human to chimp, in fact. They suspect that could be because humans split from a common ancestor with chimps, of which both species had the same ancestral orangutan DNA. What remains curious is that humans and chimpanzees have evolved separately for millions of years. In the process, chimps for mysterious reasons lost some orangutan DNA that humans retained." Source: https://primatology.net/2011/01/26/orangutan-genome-sequenced/ https://primatology.net/2011/01/26/orangutan-genome-sequence...
        thaumasiotes 7y ago
        The paper referenced from that quote ( https://sci-hub.tw/10.1101/gr.114751.110 https://sci-hub.tw/10.1101/gr.114751.110 ) actually says this: > We therefore conclude that human is closer to orangutan than to chimpanzee in 0.8% of the genome, and chimpanzee is closest to orangutan in 0.6% of the genome. That looks like humans are overwhelmingly more similar to chimpanzees, and chimps to humans, than either is to orangutans, no?

perl4ever 7y ago

Following the link, there is some stuff about how new genetic research shows that humans may be closer to orangutans than chimpanzees.

thaumasiotes 7y ago
While theoretically possible, that idea starts in a deep hole, since orangutans don't come from Africa.
- WomanCanCode 7y ago
  Our origin is actually not that simple and straight forward. They now believe we may have bred with non homo sapiens https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-06004-0 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-06004-0
- perl4ever 7y ago
  Closer to orangutans doesn't mean evolved from orangutans. The idea is that humans evolved from a common ancestor, and retained more of the DNA that orangutans now have than chimps did.
  - thaumasiotes 7y ago
    Closer to orangutans does in fact mean that the most recent common ancestor with orangutans is more recent than the most recent common ancestor with chimps. That's how you measure evolutionary distance. > and [humans] retained more of the DNA that orangutans now have than chimps did. That can't possibly be the actual argument. If humans shared more genetically with orangutans than with chimps, we would conclude that humans had diverged from orangutans -- not chimps -- regardless of whether that were true, because the genetic distance is all we have to address the question with.
    - lm28469 7y ago
      > we would conclude that humans had diverged from orangutans -- not chimps Isn't the current consensus that humans and chimps diverged from a common ancestor. Not that human diverged from chimps?
      - thaumasiotes 7y ago
        Those are the same thing stated two different ways. I'm contrasting diverging from chimps with diverging from orangutans.
    - perl4ever 7y ago
      I'm not the expert on the topic, but as far as I can tell, the claim is in fact that (a) there are more similarities to orangutans, yet (b) the split from chimps is more recent. If I understand correctly you are saying "distance" is proportional to time by definition, and what I was reading seems to say that is not strictly the case. "Theoretically, orangutans have had more time to accumulate genetic variation compared to humans and chimpanzees, which split into their own lineages 5 million to 6 million years ago. One would expect at least twice as much variation in the orangutan genome. However, in the study, a comparison of the three genomes shows that humans and chimpanzees have lost or gained new genes at twice the rate of orangutans." "there are many similarities to the human and orangutan genome, much more similar than human to chimp, in fact. They suspect that could be because humans split from a common ancestor with chimps, of which both species had the same ancestral orangutan DNA. What remains curious is that humans and chimpanzees have evolved separately for millions of years. In the process, chimps for mysterious reasons lost some orangutan DNA that humans retained." Source: https://primatology.net/2011/01/26/orangutan-genome-sequenced/ https://primatology.net/2011/01/26/orangutan-genome-sequence...
      - thaumasiotes 7y ago
        The paper referenced from that quote ( https://sci-hub.tw/10.1101/gr.114751.110 https://sci-hub.tw/10.1101/gr.114751.110 ) actually says this: > We therefore conclude that human is closer to orangutan than to chimpanzee in 0.8% of the genome, and chimpanzee is closest to orangutan in 0.6% of the genome. That looks like humans are overwhelmingly more similar to chimpanzees, and chimps to humans, than either is to orangutans, no?