PZ Myers. 2005 Aug 07. Ape to Man. <http://pharyngula.org/index/weblog/ape_to_man/>. Accessed 2008 Aug 29.
Posted on M00o93H7pQ09L8X1t49cHY01Z5j4TT91fGfr on Sunday, August 07, 2005
Ape to Man
As promised, I tuned in to the History Channel's Ape to Man program. It wasn't bad. It did a good job of showing how interpretation of fossils can be biased by the expectations of investigators, but eventually the evidence will win out.
They took a purely historical (duh) approach to the human endeavor of searching for fossil humans. I can forgive them in part for harping on the concept of the "missing link" since that was the quest that drove a lot of the old bone-diggers…but I wish they'd explained the problems with the concept earlier in the program. For instance, when describing Eugene Dubois' discovery of Java Man, they said that searching for the missing link between ape and man meant they expected to find a skull with a cranial capacity halfway between a chimpanzee and a modern human, but Java Man didn't fit. Of course, what we would actually expect is a range of different capacities (as has been found—see the nice chart at the Thumb). They didn't get around to explaining the more complex and branching tree of human lineages until the program was two thirds over.
Although when they did get around to it, I thought it was well done. They showed how the multiple discoveries by the Leakeys prompted a re-evaluation of the evidence. In general it did a reasonable job of showing how evolutionary theory is a driven by the physical evidence.
The recreations were a little cheesy and the weakest part of the program. It bothered me when they show the putative living representative of the original Neandertal skull, and spin a story about him out hunting deer. They were intentionally blurring the line between fiction and fact, and I'd much prefer that they kept them distinct. I also didn't care for the specific claim that hairlessness evolved in Homo erectus, something we don't know right now. Doing this kind of thing is particularly annoying in a show that also talks about the Piltdown fraud.
The worst recreation to me was showing Lucy as the personification of the transition from tree- to savannah-dwelling. C'mon. That's just a little too pat, and requires minimizing the terrestrial adaptations of Australopithecus too much. Similarly, they show the original 1856 Neandertal specimen as a victim of Homo sapiens, as another important transitional event. The attempts to represent the individual as the personification of major events that involved whole populations and many generations were excessive.
And then, at the end, they bobble the story and start talking about searching for the moment when we "became human", as if "human" were some discrete binary property. That's flawed "missing link" thinking again, and was an unfortunate way to conclude the program.
Conclusion: the show was interesting when it discussed the recent history of the discoveries, and rather aggravating when it tried to portray the lives of ancient hominids. It definitely did not pander to creationists, though, so I'll give it a passing grade.
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Just finished watching. Thought to come over here before I tried to say something. The "missing link" talk drove me nuts until very late when they finally tried to explain why it was a wrong way of thinking. I am still not sure they were entirely successful in explaining why "missing link" notion is wrong.
I tried to ignore the recreations - its cable TV after all - but I was greatly annoyed with the personification, i.e., the blurring between individuals and species, as you note here.
Not bad. Actually, I am glad they did not even give creationists half a second of time - the program was not about it. For History Channel this was excellent. If it was PBS or Discovery I would have higher standards and perhaps I would have marked it lower. -
My Glod, Paul, are you alright? You just OK'd a TV show on a scientific matter.
Did you hit your head on the car jack, or something?#: Posted by John Wilkins on 08/07 at 09:22 PM -
I agree completely with PZ. I could have done without the recreations, and I really wish they would have described them as such. While I was watching, I was hearing the familiar creationist canard "Were you there?"
But also, thankfully, it did otherwise stick pretty much to the established history.
Although I too, was bothered by the "missing link" talk. I just hope some of the more esaily impressionable stuck around long enough to hear why that is the wrong way to approach looking at the subject.
Considering it was a cable TV program, I was fairly pleased with the result.#: Posted by on 08/07 at 09:36 PM - It was only a tepid OK, alright? I think I just watched it with very low expectations, and when they didn't have a segment where they lied and said, "And some scientists believe Australopithecus was an orangutan and that the earth is only 6,000 years old", I felt relieved.
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It is sad that you have to give a qualified OK to a TV show, simply because they didn't screw the pooch too much...
#: Posted by John Wilkins on 08/07 at 09:45 PM
- I'm watching it right now and they just did the thing that drives me wild when talking about evolution. "...it would remain little more than a theory..." If you're doing a show about science, use the word 'theory' correctly. Don't use 'theory' when you mean 'hypothesis'.
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Remember who the true target audience: people who are unfamiliar with the history of the "quest for the missing link." Not a lot of people know how much work, sweat, and tears go into this research. Having a program that shows the lows and highs of scientific discovery is a great thing for the common layperson. I thought this show did a nice job of conveying that.
The recreation scenes were obviously thrown in for pizzazz, and I don't have a problem giving the producers a free pass on that considering how well I felt they introduced us to the people and history behind the theories.#: Posted by on 08/07 at 10:36 PM -
What ever happened to the shows that just presented information? I think I remember watching them on PBS when I was growing up in the 80's. Was I just too young to know that they were crap as well, or did they really exist?
It seems these shows are all fancy camera shots that make my head hurt, instead of using that time to present more real information. The recreations of the fossil finds added some context to what archeologists do and how they do it (however hokey the recreations were).
As for sponsorship, and I don't know if everyone sees the same commercials for these nationally televised shows, but it seemed that I saw the NFL Season Ticket commercial for DirectTV 6-8 times during the show. Was that really the target audience for the program?#: Posted by on 08/07 at 10:43 PM -
From your description, this is the kind of shows that we need more of. Preferably with a clear distinction between fact and fiction.
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"And then, at the end, they bobble the story and start talking about searching for the moment when we "became human", as if "human" were some discrete binary property."
Well, yeah! That's the moment when we got our souls, PZ! Those immaterial things that will allow us to burn in H-e-double-hockey-sticks forever after we die!#: Posted by on 08/07 at 11:49 PM - Would the shows of the '80s that just presented information draw any viewers today? Like it or not, the expectations have changed. To pay the bills, they must appeal to a very broad audience. Eye candy is required. Stories must be told. Neandertals must have more than just reconstructions from bones, otherwise they'll only engage the imagination of the geeks, not the limited attention of the sheeple.
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Would the shows of the '80s that just presented information draw any viewers today? Like it or not, the expectations have changed. To pay the bills, they must appeal to a very broad audience. Eye candy is required. Stories must be told. Neandertals must have more than just reconstructions from bones, otherwise they'll only engage the imagination of the geeks, not the limited attention of the sheeple.
Atleast history channel didn't reduce itself to "todays generation". Talkin slang, neandrathals with rock radios..#: Posted by on 08/08 at 12:45 AM -
` I don't have cable (or even PBS - waah!), but still I cringe at the thought of; "And Lucy suddenly came down from the trees and became - dun dun dun! - upright homonin!"
` As a bona fide geek, I have to say: they're going to make a reconstruction, they should not be DOING that kind of crud!! It wouldn't be bad if the reconstructions had a story, but it should just be about normal, everyday life that has nothing to do with events that sweep across time and/or are ultra-speculative.
` Otherwise... MOO! (Or BAA, depending on your definition of society as herd animals. Ha... sheeple...)
` Also, thanks for putting my blog up on the blogroll! I shall be adding more science content again (without accidentally erasing it) soon!#: Posted by S E E Quine on 08/08 at 02:00 AM -
they glazed over the fact that mrs. Leakey was obviously a witch of some sort.
"she was walking the dogs and saw a familiar shape in the dirt."
boom- major discovery.
"the gas can fell off her truck and she saw a familiar shape in the dirt."
kabaam- major discovery.
obviously in league with some oogly-boogly spirits of some kind. did anyone take the time to do some proper witch testing? did anyone dunk her? -
I didn't have the chance to watch the show (I don't know if it will ever be aired in Italy), and I'd like to know whether it was completely OOA or with a hint of multiregionalism.
Thanks
Marco#: Posted by on 08/08 at 06:42 AM - I'd like to have seen a more comprehensive view of the molecular side, in particular our relationship to chimps and gorillas along with mention of the relative rate test. This would have been a good place to mention and discuss molecular clocks. They could also have been more explicit about why and how views of anagenesis and cladogenesis have changed.
- No hint of multiregionalism. They pretty much said that modern Homo swept out of Africa to replace the Neandertals, for instance.
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<It bothered me when they show the putative living representative of the original Neandertal skull, and spin a story about him out hunting deer. They were intentionally blurring the line between fiction and fact, and I'd much prefer that they kept them distinct>
Neanderthal hunting vs. scavenging is a long running debate. It appears to have been resolved over the last decade or so, with evidence that Neanderthals were indeed pretty capable hunters. Check out the work of Sabine Gaudzinski and Mry Stiner in particular. For example:
Gaudzinski, S. and Roebroeks, W. (2000) Adults only. Reindeer hunting at the Middle Palaeolithic site Salzgitter Lebenstedt, Northern Germany. Journal of Human Evolution, 38, 497-521.
The Middle Palaeolithic site Salzgitter Lebenstedt (northern Germany), excavated in 1952, is well known because of its well-preserved faunal remains, dominated by adult reindeer (Rangifer tarandus). The archaeological assemblage accumulated in an arctic setting in an earlier part of the last (Weichsel) glacial (OIS5-3). The site is remarkable because of the presence of unique Middle Palaeolithic bone tools and the occurrence of the northernmost Neanderthal remains, but this paper focuses on an analysis of its reindeer assemblage. The results indicate autumn hunting of reindeer by Middle Palaeolithic hominids. After the hunt, carcasses were butchered and in subsequent marrow processing of the bones a selection against young and sub-adult animals occurred. Adults were clearly preferred, and from their bones, again, poorer marrow bones were neglected. This focus on primeness of resources has been documented in other domains of Neanderthal behaviour, but Salzgitter Lebenstedt is the best example yet known in terms of systematic and routinized processing of game. The Salzgitter Lebenstedt assemblage displays some remarkable similarities to the Late Glacial reindeer assemblages from the Ahrensburg tunnel valley sites. The subsequent review of the evidence on subsistence strategies from earlier periods of the European Palaeolithic shows that hunting of large mammals may have been a part of the behavioural repertoire of the Middle Pleistocene occupants of Europe from the earliest occupation onwards. At the same time, it is suggested that these early hunting strategies were incorporated in ways of moving through landscapes ("settlement systems") which were different from what we know from the middle parts of the Upper Palaeolithic onwards.#: Posted by on 08/08 at 07:47 AM - my take on the show is here.
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What struck me most about the show was how little information it attempted to communicate. This observation is not a criticism. In fact I think the abiding fault of many of those who write about evolution (starting with me) is an inability to shut the fuck up after making a point or two. People just can't drink from a fire hose, especially if what is to be taken in aren't new facts but new concepts. I'm guessing that the dilution factor in Ape to Man was pretty reasonable.
An academic friend of mine attended a conference on college-level teaching a couple of years ago. In one of its workshops, scientists made a presentation on a biochemical topic to an audience of professors from the humanities and social sciences. Questioned afterwards, the scientists expressed anxiety that they had spoken down to their listeners. The listeners, on the other hand, reported that they got lost five minutes into the lectures. It would be interesting to debrief people who watched the History Channel show in the same fashion.#: Posted by Jim Harrison on 08/09 at 11:10 AM -
http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20050809/cm_usatoday/evolutionlacksfossillink;_ylt=Amodanijw6uZxy_KSeImJ46s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3YWFzYnA2BHNlYwM3NDI-
Utah state senator Chris Buttars weighs in on 'divine design' and evolution, and USAToday decides to run it somewhere other than the comics page:
These vehement critics claim that there are mountains of scientific proof that man evolved from some lower species also related to apes. But in this tremendous effort to support Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, in all these "mountains of information," there has not been any scientific fossil evidence linking apes to man.
The trouble with the "missing link" is that it is still missing! In fact, the whole fossil chain that could link apes to man is also missing! The theory of evolution, which states that man evolved from some other species, has more holes in it than a crocheted bathtub.
I realize that is a dramatic statement, so to be clear, let me restate: There is zero scientific fossil evidence that demonstrates organic evolutionary linkage between primates and man.
I guess he didn't watch the show.#: Posted by on 08/09 at 02:28 PM -
Contact :
> > pharyngula.org/index/trackback/2694
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According to one Creationist "[the]results of mtDNA research do not prove that Neanderthal was significantly different from modern humans" That is the already disproven
by the paper and by a man named "Ross"
I would like to have access to your mind on this
The Krings study was cited. So, Where can I get a
copy ???
I thought Theologians speak of the "soul" was part of the human make-up....................Reply to "That's the moment when we got our [human] souls, PZ"
:#: Posted by on 08/12 at 04:08 PM -
The question is :Do you mean the paper in 1997 or the one in 1999. Something like that can be of considerable help.
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Best Quote : "Talk more about Gigantopithecus blacki the Pleistocene of China [or] go home"#: Posted by on 08/14 at 04:23 PM -
I wonder did the Creationist was saying that from a Morphologic argument -or- not ?
Q. -About the paper, do you mean the one in 1997 or the one from 1999 ?
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A Interesting Quote I read last week reads :
"Talk more about Gigantopithecus blacki the Pleistocene of China [or] go home"#: Posted by Portraits -of- Pharyngula on 08/14 at 04:34 PM -
That's :'99 -
Publishing-date --
Q. Where can I obtain a copy of either... "DNA sequence of the mitochondrial hypervariable region" or "A view of Neandertal genetic diversity" Yes, these two were both back in 1999 ;)#: Posted by on 08/14 at 04:56 PM