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From: mll@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM (Mark Luce)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Humans and apes cannot be cross-fertilizated.
Message-ID: <9560006@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM>
Date: 14 Jun 91 00:50:41 GMT
References: <1678@tau.sm.luth.se>
Organization: Hewlett-Packard, Fort Collins, CO, USA
Lines: 38

/ hpfcso:sci.bio / d90-ngp@sm.luth.se (Niklas Grip) /  8:10 am  Jun 13, 1991 /
     writes:
Not long ago someone asked if it is possible to cross-fertilizate a human with
a monkey.  Yesterday I read in a scientific magazine that it is impossible.  It
is true that human chromosomes have many similarities other monkeys' chromo-
somes, but they are a little rearranged.

If you combine a set of human and a set of monkey-chromosomes, such a combina-
tion cannot give rise to a specimen of anything.  You see, two of each rudiment
is needed to develop a foetus.

     In reference to this and to the previous thread that Niklas mentions,
doesn't anyone on the net understand the many differences between monkeys
and apes?? One expects this sort of confusion from the general public;
laymen often regard chimpanzees and gorillas as overgrown monkeys. 
     For the record, apes and monkeys are very different and have been on
separate evolutionary paths for probably 30 million years (Oligocene epoch);
Apes and monkeys are more distantly related than, say, dogs and bears, who
didn't part evolutionary ways until the Miocene. What would you think of a
person who called a dog a bear, or vice-versa?
     Humans are only distant relatives of modern monkeys, and it is simply
ridiculous to suppose that they could be cross-bred. Apes, or at least the
great apes, and particularly the African apes, might be a different story.
We are very close relatives to the chimpanzee (separation time of 5-7
million years ago) and only somewhat less so to the gorilla (6-8 million
years). The Asian great apes (the orangutan and Gigantopithecus) separated
from the African ape/human lineage perhaps some 11-14 million years ago
and so are somewhat more distantly related. 
     Could humans crossbreed with chimpanzees? Although I am skeptical, I
don't think it can be ruled out. We do share >99% of our genomes; my under-
standing is that this is greater than in the case of horses and donkeys.
Perhaps the experiment should be carried out, if only to confront the
'scientific creationists' with something they would find very hard to
ignore.
     I do remember reading in the Weekly World News a few years ago that
Chinese scientists were attempting to produce chimp/human hybrids. They
called them 'workoids' :-) Why the Chinese felt they needed workoids was
something that WWN did not address...