http://www.csm.ajb.co.uk/journals/journal.shtml

Fossil men such as Homo Neanderthal and H. erectus have labyrinths in their inner ears whose pattern is the same as those in modern man. Fossil apes such as Australopithecines have a simpler pattern of labyrinth, the same as in modern apes. This difference between man and ape is because upright man needs a more complex system to monitor balance. Wishful thinking and fraud notwithstanding, apes are apes and man has always been man.

In the past few decades, emphasis has moved from fossil finds to genetic studies. Comparisons of mitochondrial DNA of women of various ethnic groups, and of genes on the Y-chromosomes of men have shown that all people are related to a common ancestor in the recent past.

However, it was claimed that there is a mere 1.5% difference between the genomes of man and chimp. This was said to confirm man’s descent from the ape. New studies in 2002 of the genomes of various primates have revised that difference to 5%. Moreover, the genetic difference between man and the 1mm long nematode worm has been measured at only 25%, and the worm is clearly not closely related to us.
Even more recently, New Scientist for 15th March 2003, page 26 reports on findings published in Genome Research, vol. 13, p.341, under the headline “Yawning gap divides monkeys and us”. “Contrary to what you might think, large differences in DNA, not small ones, separate apes and monkeys from both humans and each other. Scientists believed that differences between primates were mainly the result of variations in individual DNA letters. But a detailed comparison of human chromosome 21 with corresponding regions of genetic material in chimpanzees, orang-utans, rhesus macaques and woolly monkeys shows the differences affect great chunks of DNA. ‘There are large deletions and insertions sprinkled throughout the chromosome,’ says Kelly Frazer of Perlegen Sciences Co. of California, USA.”

Oliver, the cross-breed

http://www.geocities.com/willc7/Oliver.html

http://www.cathuria.com/bcd/bcjungle.htm

KILLER APE

(1953) dir: Spencer G. Bennet; w/ Johnny Weissmuller, Carol Thurston, Max Palmer, Burt Wenland, Nestor Paiva, Ray Corrigan. · · · A Jungle Jim tale revolving around, but not really involving, a "killer ape" that is actually a Cro-Magnon dude (although the flick hints that it is some sort of disgusting human-gorilla crossbreed).

Is yesterday's science fiction becoming possible? Might some mad scientists be able to cross-breed man with one or more of the modern apes?

Creationists maintain that this is impossible -- and that such impossibility "proves" that man and apes did not evolve, but were always separate.

http://www.adam.com.au/bstett/BMissingLinkFruitlessSearch49.htm

The “Genesis kind” refers not to species, but is more comparable to the modern term “family” such as the cat, dog, or human families (Mehlert, 1995). Wide variation within each kind allows many races and species to breed from one pair of the originally created kinds, and many of the various forms within the kind or family are cross-fertile. No variation, though, has been shown clearly to cross the Genesis kind boundary, and individuals from different “kinds” or families cannot “cross breed” to reproduce.

http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/magazines/docs/v22n3_liger.asp

Ligers, tions, Mules, zeedonks and zorses, etc.

Bestiality?
http://forum.darwinawards.com/index.php?s=98d144664ae36d151bc0e8f2a7b20c13&showtopic=5209&st=0&#entry226440

Not necessarily, because the cross-breeding could be accomplished by artificial insemination.

http://members.aol.com/oddwonder/animals.htm

Many scientists believe it is possible, through artificial insemination or perhaps more natural techniques, to crossbreed humans and gorillas. There is really nothing to stop someone from doing this. Think of the ethical questions that the baby would bring up. Would you raise the child as a human or an animal?

Speculation that "Oliver" might have been half human.

Is the truth about Oliver being covered up?

In the United States and overseas, breathless speculation raged over the ape with the shaved head. Was he "the baby Bigfoot?'' A mutant or hybrid chimp? Or perhaps a newly discovered primitive African humanoid? Miller also hinted at the unspeakable: An ape-human hybrid.

In press accounts of the time, Miller said he intended for Oliver to undergo a full battery of scientific tests to determine his identity, but the results, if any, were never made public. After belonging to Miller for several years, Oliver was owned by a series of West Coast animal trainers, beginning with Ralph Helfer, owner of Enchanted Village in Buena Park, Ca., where Oliver was exhibited as a freak. "They had two or three shows a day. I'd just walk him out on stage while another fellow talked about him. They had theories that he was half-man, half-ape. That was part of the show,'' recalled Bill Rivers, who years later would be the last animal trainer to own Oliver. "It was just like seeing a space alien,'' he said.

Oliver later became part of Helfer's menagerie at Gentle Jungle doing occasional television commercials and shows. But when the facility closed he was given to Ken DeCroo who had worked there. DeCroo, an anthropologist and animal trainer, said Oliver was unlike any of the hundreds of chimps he had worked with in both research and commercial settings. "It was very hard to predict what was happening in that brain and generally he acted more human than chimp in a lot of settings,'' recalled DeCroo.

"This is the classic example. Very often I would sit him down in the living room with me to drink coffee. And one time he was out of coffee. I never trained him to do this, but maybe he knew it from the past. He got up from the table, walked into the kitchen, picked up the coffee pot, poured coffee into my cup, then into his, and then took the pot back into the kitchen,'' he said. "But here's the chimp part. He's making a terrible mess. His brain is telling him what to do, but his body isn't quite doing it. But he had the awareness. He understood where all the elements fit and that I was out of coffee. It was shocking,'' he said. DeCroo is now struggling to put Oliver down on paper. "I'll tell you how much Oliver has affected me in my life. I'm writing a novel, which is very much fiction, but is very much based on Oliver,'' he said.

"It's about researchers in a university that decide to do the experiment: man and ape. This experiment is quite possible, but would you do it?" he asked. "In deciding that, you can imagine the ramifications both ethically and scientifically. And what do you do with the creature in the end? It's quite an adventure and Oliver inspired it,'' he said.

The answer appears to be no.

Speculation about Bush

http://www.artspike.org/publish/public_html/comments.php?sid=2613&tid=2065&mode=nested&order=&thold=

What would it look like?

http://forum.japantoday.com/upfiles/2674/Ig11927.jpg

Sanctuary

http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/sep2002/ncrr-30.htm

Whether it has happened or not, if it is possible (which it appears to be) then eventually will happen.

Let's assume for the sake of argument that this could be done. A disgruntled worker in a facility somewhere embarks on a covert insemination program, using his own semen. Or a female (suffering, possibly from a variation of Munchausen's Syndrome) decides that the best way to get national attention would be to mother a genetic interspecies cross.

Once the, er, thing exists, what would be its rights? Would religious thinkers assign it a soul? The ensoulment of humans only has always struck me as arrogant and unfair, and this would certainly put the idea to the test.
http://www.ekac.org/symp.html

Dr. Stuart Newman is a professor of cell biology and anatomy at New York Medical College, where he directs a research program in vertebrate developmental biology. Dr. Newman, a member of the board of directors of the Council for Responsible Genetics, has been a consultant to the National Institutes of Health on policy regarding the use of human fetal tissue for research. In response to the suggestion of some scientists to create a subhuman species by merging human and chimpanzee, Dr. Newman has applied for a patent on a process used to make human-chimp chimeras as a way to prevent anyone from using the technology.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2004/01/12_401.html

Interesting article called "The Yuck Factor" Could the patent law system be used to prevent advances in nanotechnology?

http://www.stevequayle.com/News.alert/Genetic_Manip/020418.Chimera.patent.html

They are serious

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3494543.stm fossil DNA?