Quote:
Originally Posted by John Murphy
I can't understand if we evolved why is there nothing out there that is remotely as intelligent as us, not even close. If we are the smartes creature and at top of the food chain, why is it what we evolved from died out, it must've been intelligent too. There is nothing living that is remotely as intelligent as us, or that even has a close resemblence to our appearence.
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For many reasons, partly because evolution does not mean that species will get more intelligent, that it is likely a very rare accident, and because our species killed off any other intelligent competetors. At one point in time Cro-Magnon man (us) and Neanderthals existed in the same places at the same time. Our ancestors out survived, and likely killed off many of the Neanderthals, or drove them out.
Besides that, we are not so much more intelligent than many other species including Wolves, Dolphins, and Apes. We are merely one step ahead of them. Given a very specific environment, one of those could make the leap to human intelligence over a few million years.