Man the Hunted: Primates, Predators, and Human Evolution

The anthropological question of how humans evolved into a species that uses its brains rather than its brawn for survival remains an issue of contention in the academic community. Hart and Sussman have a unique take on the evolutionary mechanism that caused this: rather than "man the hunter" (using his brain to plan and organize hunts and create tools to subdue game), they propose "man as prey" caused us to evolve as we have. Their argument has merit. About half of the book discusses animals that can or have preyed on humans and early hominids - everything from eagles, crocodiles and hyeneas, to lions, tigers and bears (oh my!). Anyone who has spent any time in the wild is quickly reminded just how vulnerable we are to predators, as Hart and Sussman point out not only through contemporary accounts, but also through the fossil record. Establishing that we are food, they next go on to hypothesize how this may have influenced our early ancestors to adopt. Essentially they believe that we adopted a wide variety of coping mechanisms from vocalization and socialization to versitile locomotion and most importantly, "outsmarting" predators, causing them to find easier meals. The authors readily admit that sociological evidence is impossible to gather on early hominids, but hypothesize and extrpolate based on behaviours of similar primates. This is also used as evidence to refute the "man as hunter" hypothesis. (Baboons, chimpanzees, and bonobos for example, are only opportunistic hunters rather than strict predators). The strongest evidence, I thought, was their discussion of fossil dentition (and the inference that early hominids ate seeds, tubers and vegitation rather than a steady diet of meat.) I found most interesting their disucssion of how the "man the hunter" hypothesis was originated. The idea of "man the mighty hunter", they contend, lies with a patrilineal view of primates (which was incorrect, as it turns out, in understanding Baboon social heirarchy, and by extension of our own evolution), a Puritanical view of nature (as something that must be tamed or conquored) and a Hobbesan-understanding of primate interaction (life as "nasty, brutish and short", therefore condemning man to constant warfare and strife.) On the contrary, Hart and Sussman point out social cooperation is the norm among primates, not warfare or competition; they also emphasize the role of the female in our evolution, rather than males. (WIth chimpanzees, for example, females are the recipticles of knowledge and tool making. Females are the leaders of baboon troops, not males.) Certainly their ideas are not without its detractors, as evidenced by Hart and Sussman's discussion of the academic controversy. For the lay reader, their thesis is accessable and truly fascinating - and, I for one, see the merits of their position. Highly recommended.

A debate has raged, politely you may be sure, among archaeologists concerning whether Homo habilis, Homo ergaster, and other pre-modern humans were ferocious hunters or skulking scavengers. That debate is not even near resolution, and may well be conducted on false questions, but authors hunt and Sussman want us to consider human evolution from another angle, that of primates in general and hominids in particular as more preyed upon than preying. Their evidence derives from two sources: observation of depradation on primate species in the world today, and forensic examination of bite and claw wounds in hominid/homonoid fossils. Some reviewers seem to have read an ethical issue into the book, addressing aggression in human nature. Frankly, if such issues were raised, I hardly noticed them. My attention was riveted to the question of the central importance of predation in evolution, not only of Homo sapiens but of all multicellular life. The most successful predators on primates in the world today - leopards, eagles, and crocodilians - would seem to have been likely predators on australopithecines as well. Then there's some archaeological evidence that hyenas were on gastronomic terms with "Cro-Magnon" folk in China. But did fear of predators and the skills needed to avoid them play a significant role in human evolution. The authors think so, and their case, if not proven, is at least entertaining to the jury. I'm prompted - unrepentant carnivore that I am - to ask a broader question of evolutionary theory. Has predation been a significant accelerator of evolution, a driver if you will, since the pre-Cambrian? It's generally supposed that the development of our "large-but-not-quite-large-enough" brains was fueled by the calories of hunted or scavenged flesh. Long before "us", however, was predation the driver of intelligence. Could we Wise Homos ever have existed without someone being eaten?

Every few years a new theory of human evolution emerges and its authors gleefully bash all those who came before. This is highly entertaining for the general reader and often very convincing too. In this case physical anthropologist Sussman and his former graduate student, wildlife biologist Hart counter the once vaunted and lately battered "man the hunter" scenario with its opposite: man as prey. Nobody doubts that early hominids were prey to animals like saber tooth tigers, crocodiles, bears, hyenas and many more. But after reading the first half of "Man the Hunted," you will wonder how those poor hominids ever survived long enough to develop the brains needed to defend themselves and become us. The authors amass lots of fossil data and modern studies of predation to show that primates (including humans) were and still are, prey. Reading this impressive catalog of dangers, you can't help but think of the defensive abilities other primates have that we lack - chimps are powerfully muscled and agile in trees, monkeys have long useful tails to swing swiftly through forest or jungle, gorillas are large and formidable, and all of them are more threatening as biters. Hominids, however, with brains not much larger than chimps, had a puny physique (although more powerful than homo sapiens became) no claws or sharp teeth, and they couldn't run very fast on their two legs or swing as easily into the trees. No defenses at all, it appears, except for vigilance and the protection of the group. How did we ever survive? The authors tackle this question in the second half of the book, approaching evolution from a defensive posture. Bipedalism, for instance. Numerous "models" have been posited to explain why we walk around upright - to free our arms for carrying, to allow scanning of terrain, to make us more energy efficient in terms of foraging for food and heat dissipation, to look larger and more robust to predators and mates. The authors reject all of these as primary causes, but incorporate each as an advantage to a creature already "preadapted," as all primates are, for bipedalism. First, we came down from the trees, because, living at the edge of the forest, many ground plants were available. Then, "it made life much SAFER to be bipedal." "Bipedalism is only advantageous if you leave the trees and descend to the ground for the majority of your activities, and if you do it BEFORE you have evolved enormous torsos and arms." At this point we could still take refuge in the trees fairly easily, and standing on two feet we could scan more of the area for danger. In the last chapter they lay out rules for hominid survival which include living in social groups of 25 to 75, using both trees and ground, being able to scatter into smaller groups or come together to mob or intimidate predators, having more than one male in social groups as protection, using males as intimidating-looking (because upright) sentinels, carefully choosing sleeping sights and employ

This is an excellent and balanced book about humans as prey for other animals. It is at a "popular" level, but professionals will be interested in much of the data. The authors marshal evidence of everything from eagles to hyenas eating people and other primates, and point out that the predator universe back when people were evolving was much more impressive than now--sabretooth cats the size of bears, with fangs over six inches long, abounded. Here in California, we had lions almost twice the size of African lions; wolves as big as St. Bernards; and other friendly fauna. Obviously, early hominids were more hunted than hunting. The rise of brain size clearly went along with a rise in hunting and in self-protecting ability, but I was surprised to find out how many people get eaten even today. The authors deconstruct the myth of the violent chimp, and subject claims of human aggressiveness to some deflation. A point they could make more clearly is that hunting has nothing to do with intraspecies aggression; just watch a cat--the brain and behavior mechanisms of hunting have to be quite different from those for intraspecies fighting. Hunting did not make humans fierce to each other. Probably, group rivalry did that. My wife recalls from her Peace Corps days in Ethiopia the need to stay locked in one's house at night, because of the hyenas; they ate about one person per day in Addis Ababa. An acquaintance, noted for his arrogance, went swimming in the Nile in spite of local warnings about crocodiles. He was last seen disappearing slowly, feet first, down a large Nile croc. Local people watched helplessly from the bank; the river was a churning mass of huge crocs. Eventually they could venture out and catch the offending croc--too late. Another Peace Corps worker visited the site, and found the locals selling souvenir photos of the croc cut open with the unfortunate Peace Corps volunteer's body parts being cut out of its stomach. The story is still used as a cautionary tale.... Yes, humans are prey.

From a mathematical/statistical viewpoint, one of most unjustified beliefs of the modern age is that humans are a killer species. Unfortunately this myth is embedded in both popular and scientific cultures, and has resulted in a completely distorted view of human and primate species. The number of humans throughout history that have actually killed another human being is extremely small, and warfare is actually quite rare between humans. Yet we are told over and over again that humans have an innate propensity for murder or violence. The good news is that such a viewpoint has been challenged recently by some anthropologists and social psychologists, with two of these being the authors of this book. They not only give fossil evidence that supports their assertion that humans and other primates are not violent by nature, but also give constructive arguments as to their actual nature, namely that their behavior is a consequence of their exposure to predation. The book is fascinating reading, and readers who accept the "Man the Hunter" paradigm in anthropology will find solid challenges to their belief structures. It is indeed refreshing to finally see a book in print that gives serious effort to countering this paradigm. The book begins with the authors asking whether human evolution has been molded by hunting ability or by survival techniques that were developed to avoid being eaten. They then spend much of the book elaborating on the fossil record and contemporary evidence of predation on human and non-human primates. The authors are intellectually honest enough to admit that quantitative data is sparse, and that they use current examples of predation on primates to estimate the rates of predation on ancient hominids. Fossils of the losers in predator-prey encounters are available they say, but there are not enough of them to obtain conclusive figures on the rate of predation or reliable information on successful strategies to outwit predators. As an example of their analysis, the authors point out that in all the research conducted so far, killings among chimpanzees averaged only one every 8.5 - 17 years. So much for the assertion that chimpanzees are natural-born killers. They also point out, but unfortunately do not give any references, that current research into the neurophysiology of aggression between species indicates that this form of aggression is very different from the violence humans sometimes wage against each other. Because of its importance, and because it would enhance the case of the authors, it would have been very helpful if the authors had cited research papers on this topic. Most enlightening is the section of the book entitled "The Other 50%" the authors illustrate, without appeals to some current notions of "masculine" versus "feminine" science, the pitfalls of ignoring how the females are behaving in primate groups. Why is the behavior of females always ignored in anthropological studies? The historical record reveals