The Beginnings of Human Life

The first ‘people’ to walk on two legs probably stood up about four to five million years ago in eastern Africa. But things started long before then: ten million years ago, the Earth’s climate was changing and the wet forests were disappearing. These were the natural home (or habitat) of apes. As the forests got smaller, so apes slowly evolved into animals that started to walk on two legs. But why did they need to do that? Scientists tell us that walking on two legs does not use as much energy and the sun shines on less of our bodies, so we don’t lose so much water. We can also carry things, see more because we are taller and reach for things higher up on trees. Another idea is that there were more lakes then than there are now and standing on two legs made fishing less dangerous.