If not from primates, then from what other line?

The Mists Of Time

What other line besides the primates might humans or our equivilent have descended through?

Go back millions of years to the ancestors of what became the primates. What if some other species line had evolved or advanced beyond the primates, and eventually become "man"?

Or suppose the gorilla and the chimp is as far as the primates developed? What other species line or ancestral species line do you think could have developed to create civilization and transform The Earth the way humans have? Why do you feel that species would be a good candidate? What do you think we or our equivilent would look like and be like had we descended through another species line other than primates? What kind of civilization and society would we have had we descended through something other than the primates?
 
Hapsburg

Hapsburg

Banned
Hard to say. If the K-T extinction event has already occurred, then probably porcine animals (and their descendants, the ursine animals), or rodents. Early primates were basically rodents, anyway, so the possibility of a rodent evolving into a sapient being is not too improbable, if primates get whacked before early apes evolve.
Another possibility, which was explored in an earlier thread on this site, by whom I don't remember, is birds, the descendants of dinosaurs. Some bird species display problem-solving levels of intelligence, so some changes in environment could have led to sentient, sapient, intelligent birds that somehow evolve to perpetual ground living.

If the K-T extinction event does not occur, then it's likely that the changing environment, the lowering oxygen levels mainly, will cause dinosaurs to get smaller, get smarter, and get leaner. This lends to the possibility of one of the smarter species of dinosaur, probably Troodon, considering their brain-to-body ratio and opposable thumbs, evolving to a bipedal, erect, sapient being.
 

Michael B

Derek Jackson said:
I believe that the most likely other mamal order to end up with a human like species would be the bear.
Click to expand...

Interesting as I would expected something from the cat or dog line. However I see where you are coming from. :)

My proposal is a giant rodent descended from something between the size of a cabybara and a Phoberomys pattersoni. You have the body mass for a large enough brain, it can got bipedal for some of the time (so freeing its forelimbs) and look at the front feet or mice. Proto-hands or what?
 

Alcuin

Banned
Michael B said:
look at the front feet or mice. Proto-hands or what?
Click to expand...

I remember thinking that when dissecting rats at school.

FWIW, my candidates would be...

1 Squerls (a similar urban environment to monkeys, use of front paws as hands. A need for intelligence to remember where they put all the nuts. It would be a different kind of intelligence but doable.) Having seen a Squat or a Rirrel (not sure which to use) I'm sure Rats must be close enough to include in the same spot. (And raccoons probably)

2 Corvidae (Jackdaws and Ravens can imitate speech and might develop language, New Caledonian crows have toolmaking ability, all corvidae have some level of problem solving and learning ability, Rooks have complex social organisation and Magpies have an abiding curiosity.)

3 Goannas (Australian lizards that run around on their back legs)

4 Chickens

5 How about, just to be really weird... some kind of bacteria that infects several species and makes its host intelligent?
 

Morgan

Great, rat-people. Hm... I think I see an emergence of a French-like culture? Hairy and loves cheese? Hell yes!
 

Tyr

Rodents.
Rats already have the intelligance of dogs and they have fairly manipulitive hands. Also they are almost as adaptable and well spread out as humans.

I don't think you'd see 'intelligant' birds- of course intelligance here being described as technilogical. Dolphins are almost as intelligant as humans they just didn't follow a technilogical path.
 
Shimbo

Shimbo

I can't see birds becoming really intelligent, or at least flying birds, they are super optimised for extreme lightness, a big brain wouldn't be light and so would not be an evolutionary advantage. Flightless birds are another matter.

Dolphins or whales I can see but their civilisation would be so different to ours that it's unimaginable. Who knows what's going on in those huge whale brains as it is? They could be way ahead of us for all we know.

Some kind of ant like collective intelligence again is so different to our ideas of civilisation that for all we know there's one already.

For a more human style intelligence and civilisation, how about kangaroos?
 

Alcuin

Banned
Analytical Engine said:
So do I. But something as small as a Goa'uld wouldn't be very intelligent without significant cybernetic enhancement. :mad:
Click to expand...

But in the case of the bacteria, they don't need to be intelligent themselves, they just open huge numbers of connections in the host's brains, making the host intelligent.
 

stevep

Alcuin said:
But in the case of the bacteria, they don't need to be intelligent themselves, they just open huge numbers of connections in the host's brains, making the host intelligent.
Click to expand...

Alciun

Be interesting to speculate what's in it for them?

How do you know this isn't what happened?;):)

Steve
 

Alcuin

Banned
stevep said:
Alciun

Be interesting to speculate what's in it for them?

How do you know this isn't what happened?;):)

Steve
Click to expand...

It's possible but my theory is that humans are not actually sentient as a species but learned to fake it after the dogs domesticated us.
 

Dutchie

Dave Howery said:
how about raccoons?
Click to expand...

Raccons are the best bet, given the animal forms that are around us now, but discounting all primates. They have hands, not proto-hands, they're very clever (wash their food), already do teach they're young, and live quite well in our urban environment, meaning they're adaptable.

Otters would be my next bet.

Whales/dolphins would need to leave the oceans so they could master fire, an that's so far down the evolutionary chain that it's beyond speculation. Unless we're talking a cultural civilization without technology, which they may already have :eek:

Bears are too solitary - mothers need to keep cubs away from adult males so they aren't killed. Not a good social situation for cooperative society.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top
Top