What do you think or know?

I think not...

Depends if you're religious or not! :)

I know we have tail bones. Im guessing that we probably did have tails.

Here is something to read if you have the time and effort.

Did we lose our tails? Did we have tails at all?

Let’s start with the beginning - Darwin. Ah, Darwin. The "Theory of Evolution". It was an amazing piece of work when written - though the discovery was not solely his own (only his happened to be published first), and suddenly, all laymen to science - and quite a few scientists themselves, had their eyes opened and everyone said "Aha!"

Well, not everyone. Many people found the idea that say, men had descended from apes, was absolutely insulting. And thus began the lively debate over the "Origin of the Species" and the concept of "The survival of the fittest" (a line, mind you, that did not come from Darwin’s original work at all), spanning from laymen to the most prestigious of scientists, and continuing to this very day.

Any dealing in evolution leads to arguments on all fronts. Biologists, I believe, *love* these types of arguments. Many of them outright denied Darwin’s findings - which does not discount the validity of his observations, but they were denied nonetheless. Opinions of pure skeptics who did not have an alternative theory, were considered invalid.

(Scientists tend to build their knowledge like a wall. If you are willing to knock out a brick you better have a better brick to put in there!)

And so, as for your actual question in this lively debate, "..if the laws of the Theory of Evolution were to be obeyed, we should all have tails!

So, why did we lose our tails?". First and foremost I have to point out a delineation in science between theories and laws. (This is something coming from my vague memory of college freshman biology - whether this concept still holds true or not, I’m not sure, so please bear with me!)

There is a hierarchical organization of terms for the "possibility of truth" of any idea put forth in science. I believe it starts with a hypothesis, which is 50% true - it either is, or it isn’t, and that’s what experiments are done to discover. A theory is a plausible explanation to a fact, but according to the hierarchy, it is classified as about 75% truth. A law is more like 90% (like laws of physics). (Note that even a law of science is not considered 100% true. As far as science and philosophy and basic human nature shows, none of us can be 100% certain of anything.)

So, yes, the theory itself does not explain why we did lose our tails, or in fact, why the great apes or the chimpanzees lost their tails too. Or does it? Let’s think on that for a minute; the laws of physics would demand a pretty big, strong tail to pick up a 400-pound ape. Now, if this ancestor of man gained mass, but not, say, tail-mass, that little tail would end up becoming pretty useless. This does not also explain the chimpanzee though, they're nowjere near 400 pounds. However, the hands could have been used for far more, and brain development could have been on the rise(I'm sure you have heard of the chimpanzees who speak American Sign Language - there are skeptics on that account too, but I personally tend to believe it). If the little ancestor used his tail to reach
branches to get out of the way of predators, or to grab food from tall branches, or whatever, these bigger ancestors would just use their hands (they can reach branches and things now without the help of a tail) or their brains to find better things to eat or figure out another way to get the food into reach. So it could be that at the time the "tail" was beginning to be lost, other things were being gained. If we have small animal A with a tail, but big animal B with a smaller, less useful tail, but with the cognitive ability to find escape, food, or mates another way, the tail ends up not being such an advantage after all, at least not as much as the ability to pick up a stick and fish insects out of a log, or finer communications and family organization systems between group
members - which undeniably aids in mating, food gathering, predator
avoidance, etc. This doesn’t mean that the small tailed ancestor is going to die out, the tail is still useful for *him* (and we still do have monkeys around), it merely delineates a branch in development, the tailed monkey went one way, and the tail-less one went another.

Genetics is an elegant, beautiful science, and can be insanely
complicated. Geneticists talk about "gene deletions" and shifts and the like, the fact that the changing of one or two base-pairs of DNA can have a good - or a deleterious - effect on an organism. But evolutionary science is still so expansive that genetics on it’s own has not as of yet been able to explain evolution, evolutionary science and archaeology is still missing many, many pieces, and as soon as human - or pre-human - brain power gets involved, things start getting VERY complicated.

Darwin’s world of strong wins and weak loses really stops working as soon as brain-power gets involved. I’m typing at a computer and I have to wear glasses to look at what I’m typing . Now, bad eyesight is a VERY deleterious trait, and according to Darwin’s theory, I should havestarved to death or have been eaten by a lion long ago - but we know that’s not the case with humans. Humans as a family group (meaning ALL of us) protect our weak. Even though I have bad eyesight, it’s not going to stop me from getting my genes into the gene pool. (Though in older days in some societies before glasses, girls with a "squint" were undesirable and often ended up being old maids - funny, huh?) With this protection of the weak, evolution will continue - but don’t think of evolution as a ladder always moving up. Evolution just moves forward. We have advanced, yes, but now in brain-power, whereas our physical traits seem to be dropping by the wayside. Things that would have killed us outright before, either physically or through environmental stresses - bad hearts, bad eyes, deformed limbs, mental retardation… none of these things is a mass killer for us anymore. These people are still getting to breed, and add their genes to the gene pool.

Ultimately, the reason we probably lost our tails was probably because at the time, the tail was not necessary for survival anymore. Just like our appendix isn’t necessary for survival anymore. Or clear eyesight. Or strong hearts. Yes, evolution is moving forward. But where it is going now, that could be anyone’s guess.

by Patricia O.

Research Specialist

http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/apr2000/956601136.Ev.r.html

Yes most definitely.

That is why men are always looking for 'tail' and women make so much money selling 'tail.'

smiless....... i`m going to do it again bud, sorry

people have tails today, they arent covered in fur, but they are definatly tails

Mine is covered in fur

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWHW-jxxS1U

sorry smiless

Well I didn't want to say anything. I had a friend who was born with a tail and so was her brother. They were removed at birth.

So yes, some people have tails.

just when I thought I saw it all!

You should create your own Believe it or Not show!

With the exception of aphorisms, the definitive answer is no. Humans do not, nor have they ever, had tails.

One of our distant ape ancestors did though.

I have a tail today....it is called banana too...... .

Double post .

as far as I understand it

we didn't come from monkeys. Monkeys, apes etc, were parallel offsprings from the same original parent

when the comet hit and killed the dinosaurs the only creatures that survived were the burrowers who lived under ground. so in that sense we are descended from rats. not monkeys

No, I do not think so. Such a characteristic was certainly present in one of our ancestor species however.

The vestigial appendage still exists.

Hmm, sometimes I think we all sprung from Adam and Eve,, but then I watch how some people behave and I think MAYBE some of us came from apes or once had tales.....who knows ,,that could have beem part of Gods plan too..