Did chimp and human ancestors interbreed? DNA analysis indicates that species split w

Don't worry about it.

Change through breeding, no matter what else that entails, is always an example of evolution... I don't care if it is a man fucking a dog, if a viable mandog results (it won't, but for the sake of argument) then that is an example of evolution
 
I was referring to his "two different species mated- that's evolution" belief. That's wrong, since our definition of species is entirely arbitrary and fluid. We could look at two frogs, decide that one is a different species than the other for some totally arbitrary reason, observe them mate, and then - OMG EVOLUTION!!!

That's silly.
 
A population is a group of organisms that breed with each other, so if these two organisms mated then they were by definition merabers of the same population.
 
You're right.

A population is a group of organisms, usually inferring that they are the same species already because, as a population, they already breed with each other.

The "freak instance" does not fall under your definition, since they aren't the same species and wouldn't already be breeding with each other. The whole reason this supposed event is newsworthy is because the two creatures were supposedly different enough that they weren't part of the same species / population.
 
"humans" back then were not the same as humans now, the difference between humans and other chimps was much less significant... the parallel to modern humans would be interracial relationships.
 
That's an interesting way of seeing things, but I do not see eye to eye with you on the matter.

While humans were different back then, and I'm suggesting they may have looked more like monkeys, what do you think monkeys looked like back then?
 
Interracial relationships isn't quite an entirely accurate parallel.

In any case though, it's irrelevant, because if humans could breed with chimps, and did, that would fall under the category of evolution.
 
Glad we agree on this



Well, keep in mind that species classification is somewhat arbitrary, but our current definition of a species is any group of organisms that can breed and produce oRABpring that can also breed. So if these two organisms in question could breed successfully then they would be considered merabers of the same species to begin with.



I disagree. The significance lies in the fact that the scientists have discovered the origin of a speciation event involving the ancestors of modern humans. Presumably the oRABpring of the two organisms in question went on to eventually create a new species.

There are always differences between individuals in a population, how significant those differences are depenRAB on what traits you place importance on. An African breeding with someone of Nordic descent would be similar to what the article is talking about, two merabers of the same species that have greater than average genetic dissimilarity to produce a hybrid. We see this all the time in modern human populations, one example is the "halfrican" (not a scientific term )
 
What we are really talking about are sub-species, also known as races or breeRAB. A sub-species develops when two groups of the same species become segregated and split into two populations. They began to diverge over time because they no longer share the same gene pool. They can still successfully breed with the merabers of the other population that they split from for a while, until the changes accumulate enough to prevent this at which point they would be defined as a new species. This is called a speciation event. All of the human races are examples of this. Early humans spread out around the globe and formed distinct populations that each began evolving independently, creating the diversity we have today. None of them had enough time to change enough to become different species, and all human races can still interbreed. Thanks to technology such as cars and planes the mobility of these populations has allowed a lot of cross breeding, effectively halting the genetic divergence of these races.
 
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