

"False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often endure long; but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, for everyone takes a salutory pleasure in proving their falseness: and when this is done, one path toward error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened."

The Aquatic Ape Theory (often referred to as the AAT or AAH -- I'll generally refer to it as the AAT/H on this site) says humans went through an aquatic or semi-aquatic stage in our evolution and that this accounts for many features seen in human anatomy and physiology. Using the principle of convergent evolution, it says that life in an aquatic environment explains these features, and that a transition from ape to hominid in a non-aquatic environment cannot.

This web page offers a critical examination of the Aquatic Ape Theory, treating it as a serious scientific theory. It is one of the few online sources that does so. There are many other web sites which deal with it, but they do not offer the critical examination which any theory needs to be given.

Why have I done this site?

1) Because AAT/H proponents ask why don't people take their theory seriously as science, and the way you take a theory seriously as science is to examine it for accuracy and criticize it where it falls short, because...

2) "Valid criticism does you a favor" Carl Sagan, page 32 of The Demon-Haunted World (1995).

I am doing what many AAT/H proponents -- including its principal proponent, Elaine Morgan -- have repeatedly claimed they want done: treating the AAT/H as befits a serious scientific theory.

Accepting any new theory uncritically is foolish. When doing a critique of any theory of human evolution, you check the facts the authors use to support the theory.

All scientific theories need to be examined for accuracy; it's an essential component of the process of science. I'm afraid that when the Aquatic Ape Theory is examined, it does not fare well. The AAT/H is built on many supposed facts which, when examined, do not turn out to be true. Perhaps the kindest thing would be to ignore it, but I am not that kind.

Instead I've begun an ongoing response of pointing out errors of fact, errors in theoretical understanding (which, though critically important, is more problematic because a lot of people seem to think this is waffling), and urging the theory's proponents to respond to valid objections to their theory.

Examining the Facts: A necessary process of science

There are a number of claims made by AAT/H proponents, and tracking down the source material which supposedly supports these claims is not always easy. In a dramatic departure from the way science is supposed to work, references for specific AAT/H claims are not always available; many times the author(s) involved simply make a claim without any reference to a source of evidence for the claim. For instance, during the period I put together most of the evidence for this site, chief AAT/H theorizer Elaine Morgan was posting regularly in the sci.anthropology.paleo newsgroup, and claimed to be willing to supply references for her written AAT/H claims, but she proved to be reluctant to provide these references to people who have a past history of actually reading the source and reporting back what it really says. Others -- who didn't engage in this sort of "anti-social" behavior -- reported they have no problem getting references from Morgan.

Nevertheless, a number of the claims made by Elaine Morgan and other AAT/H proponents have been tracked down and examined. The results are not encouraging. Quite frankly, when I first read the work done on the AAT/H, I saw some big holes in the reasoning, but I did think that the evidence which was (sometimes) given was probably accurately and fully reported. When I started looking these things up, however, I found that I was wrong on that count -- the AAT/H has proven to be a hotbed of those "false facts" Darwin referred to.

What makes me think I know what I'm talking about here?

I got started on this subject through reading and posting in various science newsgroups during the early days of the web. I've got a knack for library research and I like the detective work that's needed to find an appropriate source of information. I've also had an informal background in anthropological research, helping my late wife, Nancy Tanner, with her research on human origins, matriliny, and social organization. This entailed finding, reading, and learning to understand a lot of info that I didn't know, such as molecular studies. In the process, I've learned that my knack for research also includes an ability to translate some pretty heavy technical jargon into English, and explain some complicated subjects in relatively simple terms. This ability to ferret out information sources from often obscure clues came in handy when I started to examine the evidence offered for the AAT/H. The references for AAT/H statements, when they are given at all, are often maddeningly incomplete or misleading. For instance, it took some hunting to find the source for a quote when the quote supposedly came from a "famous authority during a television programme" (it was actually a 1929 book by Prof. Frederick Wood Jones). Another time the source of information for a claim was said to be a 1979 book, with an author mentioned. Finding the ref then started with finding that book, then finding the one page out of hundreds (which wasn't given) that referred to the actual reference which contained the info (a 1956 article), then finding the article which contained the info, which, it turned out, didn't actually say what the AAT/H proponent claimed it did. To complete the critique of that one AAT/H claim (about seal sweat) also required finding yet another article, and a total of perhaps 6-8 hours of actual research time. I'll guarantee you the original one paragraph AAT/H bogus claim didn't take that long to churn out... and people wonder why anthropologists don't spend their time and meager research grants chasing down AAT/H claims.

So I guess I'd say my qualifications for this work are 1) a knack for library detective work, 2) an ability to learn basic scientific precepts (anyone should be able to do this one), and 3) being just a little bit nutty, cause those examples I just gave show you've got to be a little crazy to do it.

As a note, let me state that I am not the Jim Moore who is a primatologist at UCSD, nor am I the Jim Moore who wrote and cowrote several books on Darwin, nor the Jim Moore who's an anthropologist at CUNY. Although I'm not them, from what I've seen of their work, I wouldn't be insulted to be mistaken for any of them. I hope they feel the same.

I'd like to thank the posters in the old sci.anthropology.paleo newsgroup, in particular Phil Nicholls and Alex Duncan, for pointing out many false facts and methodological errors in the AAT/H's arguments. Their research was helpful to me many times. This site is a partial update and redo of a site I had up several years ago, and I will be continuing to update it whenever I have the chance. In surfing while rewriting and adding to this site, I've noticed several AAT/H boosters make the rather odd criticism that my previous site was old, as if that somehow made the facts therein wrong. Although many of the facts posted on this site were first posted on my old site in 1995, they are still valid. The facts have not changed. The diving reflex has been present in terrestrial mammals for centuries, it was in 1995, and it still is, despite the AAT/H claim to the contrary. Salt hunger has been present in humans for centuries, it was in 1995, and it still is, despite the AAT/H claim to the contrary. The infant swimming response has been present in terrestrial mammals for centuries, it was in 1995, and it still is, despite the AAT/H claim to the contrary. Hymens have been present in terrestrial mammals for centuries, they were in 1995, and they still are, despite the AAT/H claim to the contrary. I could go on, but you'll see all these facts as you go through the site. Suffice it to say that there have been valid objections to the AAT/H since its inception, and there still are. Established facts, as opposed to the AAT/H's many "false facts", do not change.

I've also noticed a criticism that I simply engage in ad hominem attacks on AAT/H proponents, in particular Elaine Morgan. This is a peculiarly funny sort of criticism, since it is in itself a variation of an ad hominem attack, that is, instead of attacking the accuracy of what I'm saying, it attacks how I say it. This is a classic logical fallacy, one of several that AAT/H proponents often engage in -- there's a link to a site on logical fallacies on my links page. The thing is, I go after the accuracy of what these people say, and, yes, I have an aggressive style. But pointing out that someone made an error, or altered a quote, or said that a scientist said one thing when they actually said the opposite, is not an ad hominem attack. Frankly, it's doing them an enormous favor, as Carl Sagan stated in that quote. (This does, of course, assume they're trying to do a good, accurate job at what they're saying.) It may not sit well with everyone, but quite frankly, I find it really annoying when good science is taken to task for not accepting a theory which is so full of holes and mistruths, and which is argued for so dishonestly. And, by the way, not only are honest scientists harder on each other than I am on Morgan, Verhaegen et al., any honest scientist is harder on their own work than I am on Morgan, Verhaegen et al.

Contents