On Mythical Sea Creatures Being Aquatic Apes

For anyone who was interested in or watched the 90-minute documentary on Animal Planet last month called Mermaids: The Body Found, about a team of scientists with forensic evidence of “mermaids” (aquatic apes that split from our line some 7 million years ago), you may be interested in knowing the Aquatic Ape theory was actually proposed in New Scientist as early as 1960!

“Mermaids: The Body Found” is fiction based but they have presented an actual hypothesis about human evolution, in documentary style presenting a story that blends fiction, myth and phenomena with first-hand accounts and the theory that suggests ‘aquatic apes’ might account for mermaid legends.

The mermaid legend has been around since before the Romans ruled the earth, and even back then, guys were asking the same question: How did these womanly fish have sex?

It’s a question that dogged filmmaker Charlie Foley when he started work on his his speculative documentary “Mermaid: The Body Found,” which recently re-aired, from his own father, no less.

“It was the first thing my dad asked me when I told him about the special,” Foley laughed to The Huffington Post. “We had to think about this, and I assume that mermaid sex organs would evolve like those of whales, seals and porpoises. Their bodies are streamlined, but those parts ‘pop out’ when needed.”

Sorry, fish fetishists, the special doesn’t show mermaids and mermen splashing around in icthyological intercourse, but there is a scene of a CGI mermaid giving birth.

Foley isn’t saying that mermaids exist, but finds it fascinating that the comely sea creatures have been talked about for thousands of years and show up in the writings of numerous cultures — even among cultures that had no contact with each other.

But despite being hailed as a “new theory” by various news outlets for Animal Planet PR, it was actually first proposed by German pathologist Max Westenhöfer in 1942, and then independently by British marine biologist Alister Hardy in 1960. After Hardy, the most prominent proponent has been Welsh screenwriter Elaine Morgan, who has written several books on the topic.

The ‘aquatic ape’ theory - that a separate strand of primates evolved to live in the sea is often dismissed as pseudoscience.

But, early hominids certainly lived near the sea - and were sailing surprisingly early.

Stone Neanderthal tools dating back at least 100,000 years have been found on the Greek mainland and on the Greek islands of Lefkada, Kefalonia and Zakynthos, which means they must have been travelling in boats.

The documentary argues that as apes evolved into ‘pre-human’ hominids, some evolved to live in water becoming aquatic ape-like creatures.

From 1930, marine biologist Alister Hardy had hypothesized that humans may have had ancestors more aquatic than previously imagined. Because it was outside his field and he was aware of the controversy it would cause, Hardy delayed reporting his hypothesis. After he had become a respected academic, Hardy finally voiced his thoughts in a speech to the British Sub-Aqua Club in Brighton on 5 March 1960. A national newspaper reported a distorted interpretation of Hardy’s ideas, which he countered by explaining them more fully in an article in New Scientist on 17 March 1960. Hardy defined his idea:

My thesis is that a branch of this primitive ape-stock was forced by competition from life in the trees to feed on the sea-shores and to hunt for food, shell fish, sea-urchins etc., in the shallow waters off the coast. I suppose that they were forced into the water just as we have seen happen in so many other groups of terrestrial animals. I am imagining this happening in the warmer parts of the world, in the tropical seas where Man could stand being in the water for relatively long periods, that is, several hours at a stretch.

The idea received some interest after the article was published, but was generally ignored by the scientific community thereafter. In 1967, the hypothesis was briefly mentioned in The Naked Ape, a book by Desmond Morris in which can be found the first use of the term “aquatic ape”. Writer Elaine Morgan read about the idea in Morris’ book and was struck by its potential explanatory power, becoming its main promoter and publishing six books over the next 40 years.

Human beings are the only naked bipeds. We carry a layer of subcutaneous fat substantially thicker than in any other primate. We exude, through our eyes and sweat glands, greater quantities of salt water than any other mammal. We are the only species of mammal to mate face to face, other than aquatic mammals. We are the only primate capable of overriding our unconscious breathing rhythms, alongside the elaborate use of lips and tongue, to produce speech ability which separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom. We are also the only primate with a descended larynx, thought to increase the variety of sounds we can produce.

Hardy argued that these features indicate a level of adaption to an aquatic environment. Thus, humans become bipedal to wade in water, and lost their hair to streamline their bodies for swimming. The fat layer kept them warm and buoyant, their secretions prevented build-up of excess salt from sea water and their larynx was protected against submersion. Language evolved because glare from the water meant signalling was no longer an efficient means of communication.

The AAH “Aquatic Ape Hypothesis” or AAT (Aquatic Ape Theory) is a fascinating, thought-provoking, and attractive idea, but one that is far from proven, though it does remain a real hypothesis about human evolution with many supporters.

Sources: huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/24/mermaid-the-body-found-animal-planet_n_1544087.html, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis, dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2148761/Were-mermaids-real-New-theory-suggests-aquatic-apes-account-legends.html, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis Fourth illustration by Christian Bocquée

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