[Gymnarnemia]

What, is the 'Aquatic Ape Theory' of human evolution?

I’ll tell you what it's not. It’s not about mermaids, or whale-humans, or fin-fingered Kelpies. It’s not about fish-people.

It is about fish eating people. ‘Science says’ that humans spread along the coastlines of the world first. There were people eating mussels in Sydney before there were people in central Europe. That is - we (they) spread ten thousand miles along the coast, before we spread one hundred miles inland - because the coast is were the food was.

The Theory is that, pre-human apes survived by adapting to foraging in the water. Where the food was. Crabs, shellfish, fish. The richest food sources that exist. It’s a hunter-gatherer supermarket. So humans spread like a wildfire along these lines of food. The coast.

The Aquatic Ape Theory says ‘we’ became ‘human’ while adapting to these conditions.
What am I talking about?

1) Humans have a lot of body fat – like aquatic mammals. Other apes, don’t. Keeps us warm, in the water.
2) We have breath-holding abilities that few other land-based mammals do.
3) Alone among the apes, out body-hair is arranged like seals, hydrodynamic.
4) We walk upright - better to forage for shellfish. Unlike savanh-living baboons.
5) The list goes on. (And on)

All these things are debated, contested, endlessly.

So, the idea is that for some reason (in the Afar Triangle, possibly) proto-humans had to adapt or die to an aquatic environment. And selection pressure made us walk upright, to get extra protein (fish) (for our burgeoning brains). And learn that the ocean-edge is where the food was. And the better a swimmer/diver, the more food you got.

I’m not saying that the well-watched video of lowland gorillas being forced to walk upright in order to forage in swamps is any kind of evidence, but I do note that lowland gorillas are forced to walk upright in order to forage.


Anti-Quote:
“AAH has not been accepted among the mainstream explanations of human evolution. Scientific consensus is that humans first evolved in East Africa in a period when the climate fluctuated between wet and dry, and that most of the adaptations that distinguish humans from the great apes are adaptations to a terrestrial, as opposed to an earlier arboreal, environment.”

To this I say: baboons.

Further anti quotes:
Few paleoanthropologists have explicitly evaluated AAH in scientific journals, and those that have reviewed the theory have been critical.

Langdon also argued that the hypothesis is internally inconsistent, has less explanatory power than its proponent claims, and that alternative terrestrial hypotheses are much better supported. AAH is popular among lay people (That’d be me!) and has continued support by a minority of scholars. Langdon attributes this to the attraction of simplistic single-cause theories over the much more complex, but better supported models with multiple causality.

The excellent Wikpedia summation
is here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis


Why the AAT isn’t so:

http://johnhawks.net/weblog/topics/p...pe_theory.html


I’m saying it is so. If you can see a serious flaw, I’d like to read about it.

[fedordzen]

Well swimming is very well represented at our modern Olympics.

Perhaps there is an inate desire to water.

However given that we are descended from african bush dwellers who traversed coasts, deserts, mountains and plains to inhabit this planet then coast loving antecedents aren't surprising.

[palantownia]

I am not going to enter this argument again, it was done and dusted last time with no side coming up smelling of roses. I would suggest, Paul, that if you haven't done so already, you read "Adam's Tongue" by Derek Bickerton about the development of language in humans. It gives an extraordinary view which is well worth considering and leaves the Aquatic Ape hypothesis well behind.

[Gymnarnemia]

"Adam's Tongue" - ok. I will.

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

Ok firstly h sapiens weren't in Australia before Europe. It was about the same time, but Europe most likely was inhabited first.
Secondly proto humans were in Europe hundreds of thousands of years before Australia

. Thirdly if you want to talk about how we evolved you need to talk about what happened befor h sapiens, in which case inland migration happened.

[moopogyOvenny]

Ok firstly h sapiens weren't in Australia before Europe. It was about the same time, but Europe most likely was inhabited first.
Secondly proto humans were in Europe hundreds of thousands of years before Australia

. Thirdly if you want to talk about how we evolved you need to talk about what happened befor h sapiens, in which case inland migration happened.

not arguing but can you give the lad some references?

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

Humans don't have nearly as much body fat as water mammals, and it is distributed differently? Furthermore hunter gather pops often tend to be extremely lean with muscles developed for long distance jogging. This is a genetic trait seen in a few northern African (sub Saharan) areas.
Nearly all mammals can hold their breath and dive, from dogs and cats to wildebeest.
Our body hair is nothing like a seals. That is very far fetched.

[Gymnarnemia]

O>> firstly h sapiens weren't in Australia before Europe.

*Inland* Europe? References at dawn. Bring all 14 of your aides.

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

Roughie, wiki, but the wiki article itself,is referenced

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_human_migrations

[CHyLmxDr]

Every other mammal that has returned to the water has gotten shorter legs, not an upright gait.

It's not immediately clear why an upright gait would help foraging for shellfish. Rather, walking on two feet increases the risk of slipping and being injured on wet rocks.

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

Tool making human ancestors were living in mountains in Asia a long way from any sea way before h sapien came along.

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

Paul, you said 100 miles. There were h sapiens 100 miles inland in Europe before oz. There were h sapiens a thousand miles inland before they got to Australia, there were human ancestors a thousand miles inland hundreds of thousands of years before h sapien got to Australia.

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

If you read the wiki you sea they reached northern Russia about the same time as Australia. (h sapien)

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

Soo human ancestors were living far inland a few hundred thousand years ago, and h sapiens were living inland, and on the top of mountains 100 000 years ago in Africa, and 60 000 years ago in Asia. But because, some migration after that was coastal it means we were aquatic apes?

Surely if the aap theory had any credence it isn't what h sapiens did anyway, it would be what the ancestors were doing. They moved inland very early.

[Gymnarnemia]

Martin, I've noticed that you like me a lot. (And who wouldn't?)

But your nine-to-one anti-me post ratio (count them) is a bit of a worry.

You love me why?


(I not saying you're a troll).

[moopogyOvenny]

I might be old and lonely and going blind.. but..

[corkBrobe]

Re the Aquatic Ape, to postulate that modern humans would be anyway involved is dumb. The premise was by feeding largely on seafood, it would have been an advantage to stand upright in rock-pools, etc., but as Homo has been walking upright for over 2 million years it is a bit daft to even consider them. Even going back a further 2 or more million years some probable dependence were bi-pedal. So if an aquatic ape was a possibility, then it would be more than 4 million years ago.

[moopogyOvenny]

Re the Aquatic Ape, to postulate that modern humans would be anyway involved is dumb. The premise was by feeding largely on seafood, it would have been an advantage to stand upright in rock-pools, etc., but as Homo has been walking upright for over 2 million years it is a bit daft to even consider them. Even going back a further 2 or more million years some probable dependence were bi-pedal. So if an aquatic ape was a possibility, then it would be more than 4 million years ago.

and..

?

[corkBrobe]

and..

?

And the references and discussions about modern humans traveling around the globe including huge distances inland is a load rubbish.

[AdobeCreativeSuite]

Martin, I've noticed that you like me a lot. (And who wouldn't?)

But your nine-to-one anti-me post ratio (count them) is a bit of a worry.

You love me why?


(I not saying you're a troll).

For starters they were not anti you. I in fact never mentioned you or even particularly noticed it was you posting. I rarely take much notice of that.

I was commenting purely on the premise and arguments raised.

Finally it could have all gone in one post, but I am using an iPad and scrolling up, cutting and pasting, and going to other windows (to look at references) presents some difficulties. So I hit submit, then start a new post with a new idea' rather than all in one.

So it isn't really nine to one posts. It is a counter argument for each point you raised. Point for point.