Show me the transitional fossils and the proof for this statement. I'll be waiting, and I want tangible, factual evidence.
Okay, here you go...
Transitional fossils:
Basal catarrhine primate Aegyptopithecus, 32MYA:Those are just some highlights, there are countless more laying out the branching phylogeny of primate evolution.Victoriapithecus, 15MYA, soon after the OW-Monkey/ape split (ape side):
Basal ape/human primate Sahelanthropus tchadensis (" Toumai"), 6-7MYA:
Evidence (science does not deal in "proof"):
Fossil evidence...and thousands more...DNA evidence:
1: J Mol Evol. 1984;20(1):2-15. Related Articles,
The phylogeny of the hominoid primates, as indicated by DNA-DNA hybridization.
Sibley CG, Ahlquist JE.
The living hominoid primates are Man, the chimpanzees, the Gorilla, the Orangutan, and the gibbons. The cercopithecoids (Old World monkeys) are the sister group of the hominoids. The composition of the Hominoidea is not in dispute, but a consensus has not yet been reached concerning the phylogenetic branching pattern and the dating of divergence nodes. We have compared the single-copy nuclear DNA sequences of the hominoid genera using DNA-DNA hybridization to produce a complete matrix of delta T50H values. The data show that the branching sequence of the lineages, from oldest to most recent, was: Old World monkeys, gibbons, Orangutan, Gorilla, chimpanzees, and Man. The calibration of the delta T50H scale in absolute time needs further refinement, but the ranges of our estimates of the datings of the divergence nodes are: Cercopithecoidea, 27-33 million years ago (MYA); gibbons, 18-22 MYA; Orangutan, 13-16 MYA; Gorilla, 8-10 MYA; and chimpanzees-Man, 6.3-7.7 MYA.
Publication Types:
- Review
PMID: 6429338 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
1: Mol Biol Evol. 1988 Nov;5(6):626-44. Related Articles, 
Molecular phylogeny and evolution of primate mitochondrial DNA.
Hayasaka K, Gojobori T, Horai S.
Laboratory of Human Genetics, National Institute of Genetics, Shizuoka, Japan.
We determined nucleotide sequences of homologous 0.9-kb fragments of mitochondrial DNAs (mtDNAs) derived from four species of old-world monkeys, one species of new-world monkeys, and two species of prosimians. With these nucleotide sequences and homologous sequences for five species of hominoids, we constructed a phylogenetic tree for the four groups of primates. The phylogeny obtained is generally consistent with evolutionary trees constructed in previous studies. Our results also suggest that the rate of nucleotide substitution for mtDNAs in hominines (human, chimpanzee, and gorilla) may have slowed down compared with that for old-world monkeys. This evolutionary feature of mitochondrial genes is similar to one found in nuclear genes.
PMID: 3146681 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
1: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1999 Aug 31;96(18):10254-60. Related Articles, 
onstructing primate phylogenies from ancient retrovirus sequences.
Johnson WE, Coffin JM.
Department of Molecular Microbiology, Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, MA 02111, USA.
The genomes of modern humans are riddled with thousands of endogenous retroviruses (HERVs), the proviral remnants of ancient viral infections of the primate lineage. Most HERVs are nonfunctional, selectively neutral loci. This fact, coupled with their sheer abundance in primate genomes, makes HERVs ideal for exploitation as phylogenetic markers. Endogenous retroviruses (ERVs) provide phylogenetic information in two ways: (i) by comparison of integration site polymorphism and (ii) by orthologous comparison of evolving, proviral, nucleotide sequence. In this study, trees are constructed with the noncoding long terminal repeats (LTRs) of several ERV loci. Because the two LTRs of an ERV are identical at the time of integration but evolve independently, each ERV locus can provide two estimates of species phylogeny based on molecular evolution of the same ancestral sequence. Moreover, tree topology is highly sensitive to conversion events, allowing for easy detection of sequences involved in recombination as well as correction for such events. Although other animal species are rich in ERV sequences, the specific use of HERVs in this study allows comparison of trees to a well established phylogenetic standard, that of the Old World primates. HERVs, and by extension the ERVs of other species, constitute a unique and plentiful resource for studying the evolutionary history of the Retroviridae and their animal hosts.
PMID: 10468595 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
