How Many Missing Links Are There?

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Written by Lucy Timbrell

Editing by Andrew Dixon

Title editing by Manuel Rubio

Fact checking by Amanda Rossillo

Special thanks to Adam J. Kuperavage and Robert B. Eckhardt, Charles R. Peterson and the Idaho Museum of Natural History, Grzegorz Niedzwiedzki and Marta Hodbod for image permissions.

Music from Silver Maple, Epidemic Sound and Artlist.
Stock footage from Storyblocks, Artgrid and Shutterstock.

00:00 Introduction
04:46 Why Do You Need A Missing Link?
15:26 How To Find A Missing Link
30:07 The Missing Links
42:12 Evolution Is Messy

[WL]

This reminds me of a joke in Futurama where the scientist is debating a creationist orangutan (don’t ask), who asks “what is the missing link between humans and chimps”, to which he retorts “homo erectus”. The question is repeated and he says “homo habilis”, “homo heidelbergensis”, etc. time skips forward and dozens of intermediate species have been added to the list and when the question is asked again he says “my god, you’re right!” and proceeds to hunt for the next missing link.

Pokes fun at the entire concept in a way, as you can always break down an intermediate between any two related species in more granular ways as infinitum

[demanzanop]

After all, the missing link is the friends we lost along the way.
Quite literally.

[jredmane]

On potential knuckle walking ancestry: gorrillas and the chimp/bonobo lineage each have a very different way of knuckle walking, which indicates that each lineage adapted for knuckle walking independently

[faolitaruna]

Aquatic ape is my favourite "99% wrong" hypothesis.

[sunnyjim]

Excellent video, in all respects. But extra special appreciation for Lucy Timbrell, for writing the actual script - outstanding work. 👏

[jacksonwhiteside]

Last time I was this early I watched the episode with neopithecus

[saman]

F that fish that evolved and made me go to work millions of years later. But thanks for life i guess

[EricaHansberry]

Thank you for all the hard work and effort that goes into producing these wonderful videos we get to watch for free. I'm so grateful.

[DeathReaper-foix]

This channel literally said: QUALITY OVER QUANTITY

[ZeoViolet]

When I was a kid, they still pushed _Rampithecus_ as an early Hominid some 14 million years ago. That's since been discredited. It was, however, a primate.

[RexKwon]

Technically, we're still in the most recent Ice Age. It's just been thousands of years since the last glacial maximum. However, because there are still polar ice caps, and because we still have glaciers, we're still in an Ice Age by definition. Once the ice caps melt and the glaciers melt, we'll no longer be in an Ice Age.

[itsClaptrap]

i take evolution as a fluid, all animals are transitional species in the most tiniest mutations ever. The differences between individuals provides ample opportunities to go whichever direction the whole could go in times of survival. These mutations would be reinforced with successful breeding, spreading these beneficial mutations wide across those that survived.

We're a transitional species ourselves to a future species.

[dragonwarlord]

You’re guys piano melody slaps that starts right around 5min mark. You use it in so many of your videos and it goes so well in this series and history of universe!

[mistingwolf]

Chimps are also known to go to war against other troops who encroach on their territory. It's very human-like in execution.

[saladinbob]

Are you suggesting Boa Constrictors are evolving into limbed creatures again? You said "have developed" not "have retained" suggesting this has occurred after they lost their limbs.

[misssherrie-may]

I love it when you post on all your channels. They are amazing!!

[sortacoolmaybe]

I wish we had a time machine that could take your genetic code and show you your lineage dating back millennia.

[harrietharlow]

As always, a video full of information, a relaxing soundtrack, and stunning images. Thank you so much for uploading.

[glennchartrand]

I imagine that human evolution is tangled.

It would be like taking every breed of wolf, coyote, and dogs
Inter-breeding them all on a island then after hundres of generations you release them into isolated areas all over the world....then after thousands of generations after the canines had time to differentiate from each other and adapt to their local environments they expand, run into each other and interbreed all over again.

[jredmane]

As far as we know, boas didnt re-acquire their spurs, rather the spurs are vestigial hind legs that were never evolved away because they increase mating success, and so have been preserved in modern species. These little spurs dont funtion as hind legs any more, but at no point in the evolution of boas did they have no hind legs at all. They just started using the same steuctures to do different things.