Talk:Primate
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Tarsiers
Where do Tarsiers fall in under the classification scheme? john 08:05 May 11, 2003 (UTC)
Hoolie Doolie, what a mess! And here was me thinking that bird taxonomy was a tangled and ever-changing thing. Regard my recent addition of the tarsiers as a temporary patch-up and subject to revision. I consulted three pretty decent sources just now and got about 5 different answers. Still, at least the tarsiers appear in the box now. Tannin 09:23 May 11, 2003 (UTC)
Language
I just deleted the pronunciation detail. I don't think it is encyclopaedic. I also changed the reference to Primate (religion), because I'm unaware which is older. Both are in current use, and I don't know how relevant the age of each is. - Cafemusique 21:49 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)
Weight comparisions
Eh, 52kg for a human female and 75kg for a male? That seems a little low for your average westerner, at least for women. -- Kimiko 16:16, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)
- Yeah, perhaps it is a little low for average folks. Ah... I've found 62.5kg for women [1] (http://www.tumbleforms.com/bergeron/50peradfemsi.html) and 78.4kg for men [2] (http://www.tumbleforms.com/bergeron/50peradmalsi.html). Thanks for the nudge. - UtherSRG 16:33, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Great Apes
I looked it up, and humans are considered apes, but not great apes. Since gibbons(lesser apes) are also apes but not hominids, I changed "apes (including humans)" to "great apes and humans", since all apes (ie the gibbons) were already exclude.--Mishac 01:00, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Excellent! - UtherSRG 01:31, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Does "great apes" include humans? I thought "ape" could include humans, but that "great apes" was specifically orangs, gorillas and chimps....--Mishac 19:32, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)
I've always understood humans to be included in great apes. I wish the person who removes such a linkage would cite a source. - UtherSRG 19:37, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)
The Great Apes share a common ancestor. The first to speciate from the common ancestor was the orangutan. Thus, gorillas, chimps, bonobos, and humans all share a common ancestor that orangutans do not share. Then the gorillas speciated, resulting in chimps, bonobos, and humans sharing a common ancestor that orangutans and gorillas do not share. Then humans speciated, resulting in the common ancestor of chimps and bonobos that humans, gorillas, and orangutans do not share. So, it is possible to group together chimps and bonobos without including humans, but once either gorillas or orangutans are also included in the group, humans must necessarily also be included. - Mcarling 10:23, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)
- That assumes a cladistic understanding of taxonomy, doesn't it? By that standard, "reptiles" can't be considered a group without including birds, since crocodiles and birds diverged more recently than crocodiles and turtles. Mammals might have to be included as well. While understanding the order of speciation is certainly very important, I'm not sure why this should be assumed to trump the more standard way of classifying animals. john 00:12, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- That, John, is best understood as a comment about the problems with the current classification of birds & reptiles. The fact that there is an exception to the usual rule (which will presumably be corrected sooner or later) doesn't mean we have to throw the whole baby out the window along with the bathwater. Tannin 00:27, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- I suppose, but the whole phylogenetic system doesn't actually work very well with the Linnaean classification scheme. Classification schemes based on monophyletic trees invariably have many, many, many, many more groupings than the other way of doing things - generally such that there aren't even widely agreed upon names for what classification level each division is actually at. Perhaps that means that that whole current classification scheme needs to be abandoned, but as long as its around, isn't it rather unlikely that crocodiles, lizards, and turtles will all be split off into separate classes? At any rate, here we are discussing a common name, "Great Apes". I see even less reason why such a term should be monophyletic than that ordinary taxonomic groups be. john 03:00, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- There is an argument (on the reptile/bird model) for not including humans among the apes or among the great apes - if you suppose we are so different that we no longer share key characteristics that the (other) apes share. But there can be no argument for excluding us from the great apes but including us among the apes, since if we are apes, we are clearly descended from the same stock as the great apes after they split off from the gibbons. And it seems to me that the first argument was lost at the point where the Pongidae were renamed as the Hominidae. I agree that there is a need for a name for the group consisting of the orangutan, gorilla, and chimpanzees: I don't think at present we have anything less clumsy than "the non-human great apes" or "the great apes (excluding humans)". In nontechnical speech, it should be reasonable to refer to them just as "the great apes", just as we often talk about "animals" rather than "non-human animals" when we mean to exclude humans; the trouble is that there are people around who, for nonbiological reasons, don't want to recognise that humans are among the great apes, and this usage gives them hostages. seglea 10:26, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Body plan
Can someone explain what is meant by "unspecialised body plan"? thanks :)--Mishac 10:27, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)
- I unerstand it to mean "not adapted to special needs". Feline bodies are specialized catching prey: for running fast, including a tail for balance, and dentition designed to clamp onto the prey to kill it. Cetacean bodies are desgned to survive for full-time aquatic life, while other mammals have made similar adaptions to living some of the time in water. Different avian ody types adapted to the particular niches they occupy (long bills, short bills, long legs, webbed feet, etc.). Primates are generally unspecialized in these regards. The gripping hand for brachiation is the most specialized form common to primates. Obviously some primates are less specialized and others are more specialized, but in general the form is considered unspecialized. - UtherSRG 16:58, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Sexual dimorphism
Someone asked in an edit summary whether the link between sexual dimorphism and polygyny is secure. Yes, it is. It is predicted on the basis of parental investment theory (an important component of sociobiology), and it is documented in detail for the primates in papers by Clutton-Brock and Harvey, if I remember rightly (I don't have my books here). We should really put a fuller table in - the present one is haphazard, and the data are all there to quote from - we need references, too. The same rule of course holds in other taxa, though in birds the dimorphism is more obvious in terms of colour, etc than size; however females are typically bigger than males in polyandrous species, as you'd expect. seglea 18:59, 28 May 2004 (UTC)
- Originally, the article stated that pair-bonding was caused by lack of sexual dimorphism; now it says that lack of sexual dimorphism is caused by pair-bonding. Which is correct? Or is this a kind of feedback loop?
- It's interesting to see that humans, who are the rare Old World species that mostly practices pair bonding, also have relatively low sexual dimorphism. Stormwriter 21:52, 28 May 2004 (UTC)
- The human females breasts being enlarged even when not pregnant / producing milk in confusing to some. I believe thats unique among animals. (Sam Spade | talk | contributions) 11:45, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Human
Please come help out on Human. Were facing a number of questions regarding a past poll and its results, the positioning of the taxobox and an image, the definition of "Human", if Homo Sapiens should split off into its own article, and even if the "article in need of attention" header is appropriate. I'd like as much expert involvement as possible, if you please. Cheers, (Sam Spade | talk | contributions) 11:45, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)