Evolutionary History Of The Primates

Evolutionary History of the Primates presents a documentation and analysis of the fossil record and evolutionary history of the primates to facilitate the understanding of the genealogy, adaptations, dispersal, and taxonomy of the order. The book consists of 13 chapters; each chapter is devoted to a specific genera or higher taxa of primates. The chapters contain available information on the morphology, relationships, and adaptations of primate groups. The book clarifies discussed points or documents interpretations, and it indicates the type of fossil material available for each taxon. The text will be valuable to many researchers and students who need a source of data and interpretations about fossil primates.

Primate Evolution and Human Origins compiles, for the first time, the major ideas and publications that have shaped our current view of the evolutionary biology of the primates and the origin of the human line. Designed for freshmen-to-graduate students in anthropology, paleontology, and biology, the book is a unique collection of classic papers, culled from the past 20 years of research. It is also an important reference for academicians and researchers, as it covers the entire scope of primate and human evolution (with an emphasis on the fossil record). A comprehensive bibliography cites over 2000 significant articles not found in the main text.

Examines a variety of problems in the understanding of the evolutionary history of the marsupials. In reviewing the evidence from bones, the author presents much new information on both living and fossil groups of marsupials. All groups of marsupials are treated in detail, and in the final chapter their history in space and time and their palaeobiogeography are considered.

Where did we come from? What were our ancestors like? Why do we differ from other animals? How do scientists trace and construct our evolutionary history? The Evolution of Our Tribe: Hominini provides answers to these questions and more. The book explores the field of paleoanthropology past and present. Beginning over 65 million years ago, Welker traces the evolution of our species, the environments and selective forces that shaped our ancestors, their physical and cultural adaptations, and the people and places involved with their discovery and study. It is designed as a textbook for a course on Human Evolution but can also serve as an introductory text for relevant sections of courses in Biological or General Anthropology or general interest. It is both a comprehensive technical reference for relevant terms, theories, methods, and species and an overview of the people, places, and discoveries that have imbued paleoanthropology with such fascination, romance, and mystery.

This book provides a novel focus on adaptive explanations for cranial and postcranial features and functional complexes, socioecological systems, life history patterns, etc. in early primates. It further offers a detailed rendering of the phylogenetic affinities of such basal taxa to later primate clades as well as to other early/recent mammalian orders. In addition to the strictly paleontological or systemic questions regarding Primate Origins, the editors concentrate on the adaptive significance of primate characteristics. Thus, the book provides the broadest possible perspective on early primate phylogeny and the adaptive uniqueness of the Order Primates.

This unique book carries out a comprehensive reconstruction of the evolutionary history of living and fossil primates. The text takes a comparative approach and covers the broadest possible spectrum of evidence. Although emphasis is placed on reviews of the anatomical characteristics of such species seen in a functional context, attention is also given both to evidence from the chromosomal level and to comparative molecular evidence. The tree-shrews, once thought to provide an approximate model for the ancestral primates, are repeatedly shown to differ from them significantly in key features. The primary objective throughout the book is the identification of such key characteristics in the earliest primates and investigation of the fate of these features during the subsequent evolution of the group. The major events of human evolution are examined in a broad evolutionary context, thus avoiding the ad hoc arguments that commonly result from narrow comparisons. This book will be of special interest to advanced students of anthropology and zoology, in particular to primatologists and evolutionary biologists and those concerned with mammals generally. Since technical terminology has been explained throughout, the book will also be accessible to a wide audience of people interested in primate evolution.

In 1987, the University of Chicago Press published Primate Societies, the standard reference in the field of primate behavior for an entire generation of students and scientists. But in the twenty-five years since its publication, new theories and research techniques for studying the Primate order have been developed, debated, and tested, forcing scientists to revise their understanding of our closest living relatives. Intended as a sequel to Primate Societies, The Evolution of Primate Societies compiles thirty-one chapters that review the current state of knowledge regarding the behavior of nonhuman primates. Chapters are written by the leading authorities in the field and organized around four major adaptive problems primates face as they strive to grow, maintain themselves, and reproduce in the wild. The inclusion of chapters on the behavior of humans at the end of each major section represents one particularly novel aspect of the book, and it will remind readers what we can learn about ourselves through research on nonhuman primates. The final section highlights some of the innovative and cutting-edge research designed to reveal the similarities and differences between nonhuman and human primate cognition. The Evolution of Primate Societies will be every bit the landmark publication its predecessor has been.