Why did our ancestors come down from trees to live on land 2 million years ago?

Updated on science 2024-07-23
15 answers
  1. Anonymous users2024-02-13

    Organisms are evolving in the direction of adapting to the environment, and the evolution process of human beings is the same, millions of years ago, human beings lived in trees for tens of millions of years, about 2.5 million years ago, the earth entered the Quaternary glaciers, the global climate became colder, and a large number of forests in Africa disappeared, replaced by grasslands, so human ancestors began to adapt to grassland life and learned to walk upright.

    Human ancestors. Humans can be traced back to 3 million years ago, such as the "mother of mankind" Lucy girl ancient human fossils, lived in Africa 3.2 million years ago, Lucy girl's skeleton has the characteristics of walking upright.

    Earlier human ancestors can only be called "Australopithecus", to be precise, Australopithecus is no longer human, earlier Australopithecus, lived in primeval forests, when most of Africa was forested, human ancestors lived here, Australopithecus resembles today's gorillas, they use their powerful limbs to move in the trees, avoiding the attacks of large predators. For example, there is a group of apes called "forest apes", which lived 20 million 5 million years ago.

    Quaternary Ice Age.

    However, 2 million 3 million years ago, the earth entered the Quaternary Ice Age, the cold air at the poles spread to low latitudes, making the global climate colder, high latitudes were covered by ice and snow, and the temperature in low latitudes plummeted, this process lasted for more than 2 million years, and it did not end until 20,000 years ago, and it was mainly this period when human beings evolved higher intelligence.

    First of all, the global climate has cooled, resulting in a large area of global forests shrinking, large trees dying or even extinct one after another, and Africa's forests gradually evolved into grasslands and deserts.

    Unlike forest life, predators in the steppe are more dangerous, and human ancestors began to stand up with the strength of their hind limbs in order to detect danger in time, and eventually gradually learned to walk upright, which is a milestone in human evolution, because walking upright greatly frees up the hands, and the creativity of the hands is unlimited.

    Therefore, the Quaternary Ice Age completely changed human beings, and human beings gradually migrated to the whole world, among which the common ancestor of modern human beings, Homo sapiens, defeated Neanderthals 100,000 years ago and eventually became the winner, and some studies have shown that modern humans also have some Neanderthal genes, and it is more appropriate to say that Homo sapiens assimilated Neanderthals.

    Others maybe. There are still many unsolved mysteries about human evolution, and it is a relatively common theory that Quaternary glaciers brought humans out of the forest, but there are other explanations, such as the discovery of the isotope iron-60 ejected by a supernova 2.6 million years ago on the ocean floor, so another theory was born.

    It is said that because this supernova is close enough to the earth, a large number of high-energy particles produced by the supernova explosion hit the earth's atmosphere, causing frequent ionospheric discharges and inducing large-scale lightning, which caused long-term forest fires and gradually turned African forests into grasslands.

  2. Anonymous users2024-02-12

    Two million years ago, our ancestors descended from trees to live on land because they had very little food and a relatively small area of land that could not sustain normal daily activities.

  3. Anonymous users2024-02-11

    Because the resources on land are more abundant and life on land is better, human ancestors came down from trees to live on land.

  4. Anonymous users2024-02-10

    Two million years ago, our ancestors came down from trees to live on land because they discovered that there were many resources on land that could meet their daily needs.

  5. Anonymous users2024-02-09

    Summary. What did the ancestors of mankind look like millions or hundreds of thousands of years ago?

    Hello dear, I am Teacher Zhang with 10 years of teaching experience, graduated from South China Normal University, is a general knowledge in the field of education, has rich experience in all aspects, I hope through my experience can really help you. Your question has been seen by the teacher and is in the process of organizing the answer, please be patient and reply to you immediately! 

    It's like this, teacher, I'll send you a ** to see. The first man was the Chadian Shah Man, also known as the Chadian apes, who lived 6.8 million years ago. His jawbones and teeth were discovered nine years ago in the Dechara Desert in Chad, and scientists created this model of the head based on these bones.

  6. Anonymous users2024-02-08

    About 4.5 million years ago, humans and apes began to diverge, giving rise to Australopithecus ramanacus, which later evolved from Australopithecus australopithecus 2 million years ago, and further developed into modern humans. Regarding the process of human development, it is generally divided into four stages:

    1. Early ape-man stage. It lived between 3 million and 1.5 million years ago, and already possessed the basic characteristics of humans, such as being able to walk upright and make simple gravel tools.

    2. Late ape-man stage. About 2 million to 300,000 years ago, the body resembled a man, the brain was large and round, and it could make more advanced paleolithic tools, and began to use fire, such as the Peking ape man in Zhoukoudian, Beijing, China.

    3. Early Homo sapiens (hominid) stage. Between 100,000 and 200,000 to 50,000 years ago, it gradually broke away from the characteristics of apes and was very close to modern humans, such as Neanderthals in Germany.

    4. Late Homo sapiens (newcomer) stage. About 4-50,000 years ago, the evolution of human beings at this time showed a significant acceleration, and the morphology was very similar to that of modern humans, and culturally, there were already the art of carving and painting, and ornaments appeared. For example, in 1933, the cave man on the top of Zhoukoudian Keel Mountain was discovered.

    At this time, primitive religions had already arisen and had entered a matriarchal society. In the late Homo sapiens stage, modern humans began to differentiate and form, and spread throughout the world.

  7. Anonymous users2024-02-07

    In general, the reason why our ancestors left the trees to live on land was also the result of natural selection, probably because of lightning or lightning strikes that caused forest firesTherefore, the ancestors of human beings were forced to choose to live in the highland caves, and it is precisely because of this gradual adaptation to the land environment, on the other hand, it may also be because the forest is occupied by some fierce beasts, so they can only choose to live on the highlands. <>

    1. Generally speaking, the reason why human ancestors left the trees to live on land was also a forced choice, probably because of lightning strikes or lightning caused forest fires, so they were forced to escape on land. In fact, it has to be said that the reason why the ancestors of human beings wanted to leave the forest to live on land was also a helpless move, probably because of lightning or lightning strikes in ancient times, which caused the human ancestors to leave the forest to live on land, and because of this, human civilization was gradually born. <>

    2. The reason why human ancestors left the trees to live on land may be because of the invasion of ferocious beasts in the forest, so human ancestors could only be forced to move to live on land. In fact, it has to be said that it may indeed be because there are fierce beasts in the ancient forest, and because of this, it is difficult for humans to ensure that they can make fires in the forest, and most of the time they are forced to choose to live in land caves, resulting in gradual adaptation to life on land. <>

    3. The ancestors of human beings may have left the tree to go to the land to obtain food resources because of the survival instinct, and gradually adapted to the living environment on the land. In fact, it has to be said that the reason why the ancestors of human beings left the forest to live on land may also be to obtain physical resources, in some sense, the resources on the trees are relatively scarce, and it may be that ancient humans did have to live on land because of the need for hunting.

    In fact, for us, most of the time, the reason why human ancestors left the trees to live on land may also be forced to choose, on the other hand, it may also be because of lack of food, in order to better obtain food, they choose to live on land.

  8. Anonymous users2024-02-06

    When the ancestors gave up living in the trees and switched to living on land can be deduced from human bones.

  9. Anonymous users2024-02-05

    We know that we humans evolved from apes, which is undoubted, such scholarship was discovered in the Darwinian period, and then there were many serious discussions about what we humans evolved from, but now with the development of our science and technology, we are more and more affirmative of this academic theory that we evolved from apes, and it has also become the truth that we now recognize as human beings. About our human ancestors, then in the old times lived on trees. So why did you leave the trees and live on land?

    There are probably several reasons for this. <>

    1. The rate at which our human race is reproducing is too fast. First of all, the first point is about the speed at which our human race is reproducing too fast. This is a 10-point reality, because we humans can have about three or four children in their lifetime, and these three or four children can continue to have children again in about ten years or so.

    Historically, the human race has slowly expanded, and it is obvious that the trees cannot accommodate the slowly increasing number of human beings, so the food on the trees is not enough to support the continued life of our human beings. <>

    Second, there is not enough food on the tree for us to continue to support. Secondly, there was not enough food on the trees, and our ancestors at that time continued to support it. Because the fruit on the tree basically only bears fruit once a year, and our human ancestors at that time used a lot of fruit every day.

    In the long run, basically many apes would go hungry, and in order to find themselves or fill their stomachs, they went to land where there was more food, which was the hope of apes at that time. <>

    3. The curiosity of mankind at that time. The last point is about us humans being very curious creatures. Then the land is a place that we have never explored before, and going to a wider land is the vast future of these human beings with the psychology of exploration.

  10. Anonymous users2024-02-04

    First of all, people should shelter from the wind and rain, looking for a better living environment, only by leaving the tree to create a better living environment, and secondly, the resources on the tree are limited, can not meet the needs of human beings, and they must continue to go to the land to open up wasteland.

  11. Anonymous users2024-02-03

    According to Darwin's theory of evolution, animals will slowly evolve in a direction suitable for survival, and human ancestors left trees to live on land because land is easier to move and more suitable for survival.

  12. Anonymous users2024-02-02

    Human beings did not arise out of thin air, but evolved millions of years ago, at that time, human beings, we call ancestors, at that time they were no different from wild animals, but slowly evolved wisdom, there is no limit to modern society, many times ancient human beings lived on trees, so why did they leave trees to live on land? Although you can avoid danger in the trees, you can't guarantee the food**, there are all kinds of creatures on land, and the food is also very abundant, which is safer than the caves in the trees.

    Our ancestors were not as smart as they are now, and they could not have today's magnificent buildings, but they were also the most intelligent creatures in that era, and it was necessary for them to avoid dangers in that era, and these dangers were not ** for the same kind, but ** for those large predators, these predators will hunt no matter what, we are desserts in their eyes, so our ancestors first lived on trees, but due to the increase in population, the supply of food was broken, and the only way to look for food was to the land, At this time, I found that the land was far more comfortable than the trees, not only was the food very abundant, but also the living environment was better, and the predators would be encountered both in the trees and on the land, so my ancestors simply lived on the land.

    Wisdom is also slowly evolving, at that time governance was not civilized, there was no embodiment of civilization at all, and the most primitive human beings could not speak at all, only through roaring or some manual expression, and their departure from the tree is also a kind of evolution, the original meaning of evolution is to make the development of the species better, and at this point they chose the right one.

    As the most intelligent creature on the earth, everything is not achieved overnight, although the history of our human beings is too young compared to other species, only a few million years of history, and even human civilization is only a few thousand years, but looking back on the past, every step we have taken seems to be right, indicating that the choice of our ancestors is not wrong, and the land is more suitable for our development.

  13. Anonymous users2024-02-01

    The most important reason should be climate change. Because of climate change, trees are decreasing, and grasslands are gradually formed. Humans have also had to migrate long distances.

    It is also because the feet can walk longer distances, so humans have slowly become bipedal walking. to have more stamina.

  14. Anonymous users2024-01-31

    Because the resources on land are more abundant, it is better to survive without trees, so human ancestors will come to live on land.

  15. Anonymous users2024-01-30

    Because there is more food on the ground than there is food on the trees, the ground can guarantee the food**.

Related questions
26 answers2024-07-23

Saudi Arabia suddenly discovered human footprints dating back 120,000 years. According to the professional interpretation of scholars, this discovery is of great significance to mankind. After all, if these footprints were not found, who would have traced human history back 120,000 years? >>>More

5 answers2024-07-23

Now the study should be a little earlier than 1.7 million years.

16 answers2024-07-23

This unique studio was formed after 15 million years due to the slow formation of the weather and the oxidation of the leaf after it grew at that time.

17 answers2024-07-23

She was very good later, because she rarely appears now, rarely appears under the camera, and is not in the public eye, and there is no surrounding news report, so there is no news, I wish her a happy life.

11 answers2024-07-23

This has to do with the environment in which the snake lives and the amount of food in the vicinity of the snake, because snakes are so able to eat and weigh so much, and they are the same as people.