/sci/ - Science & Math

>>10401868
>isn't it still an assumption to assume that similar traits means a common ancestor?
Absolutely, but it's an assumption based on evidence. Of course we could be looking at the evidence in the wrong way, and it could turn out they're actually not related at all, but I don't know enough about this field to say why they're so confident.

>saying "theres millions of years of timespan" just makes the evidence look even less impressive in the greater scheme of species
If you can accept smaller genetic changes that happen on human timescales, it isn't a big leap to assume those smaller changes accumulate into greater changes when you have a huge amount of time. You could again argue that we can't say that for certain, and you'd be right, but there's no reason to assume otherwise, and seemingly plenty of reasons to make the assumptions currently being made.