Chapter 9 Primate Origins and Evolution Flashcards
Why become a primate? What were the first higher primates? What evolutionary developments link past primate species and living ones?
Visual predation hypothesis
The proposition that unique primate traits arose as adaptations to pretying on insects and on small animals.
Angiosperm radiation hypothesis
The proposition that certain primate traits, such as visual acuity, occurred in response to the availability of fruit and flowers after the spread of angiosperms.
Euprimates
“True Primate” Start of Eocene, 56 mya
Proprimates
A separate order of early primate ancestors from the Paleocene such as the plesiadapiforms.
Adapids
Euprimates of the Eocene that were likely ancestral to modern lemurs and possibly ancestral to anthropoids
Omomyids
Eocene euprimates that may be ancestral to tarsiers.
Four Reactions To Environmental Stresses
Genetic change
Developmental adjustments
Acclimatization
Cultural technology
