Man the Hunted: Primates, Predators, and Human Evolution

by Donna Hart, Robert W. Sussman, Robert Wald Sussman

Although “Man the Hunter” is a popular description of our ancestry, the central importance of hunting is firmly fixed only in the archeological record of relatively recent human history. Man the Hunted argues that primates, including the earliest members of the human family, have evolved not as hunters but as the prey of any number of predators, including wild cats and dogs, hyenas, snakes, crocodiles, and even birds of prey. Eyewitness accounts, data collected by the authors, and the published reports of naturalists establish the astonishing extent to which living monkeys, lemurs, apes, and even humans fall victim to a wide variety of predators, some of which even specialize in the consumption of primates. Additionally, the fossil record demonstrates that primates have been prey for millions of years, a fact that necessarily shaped the evolution of our earliest ancestors in body and behavior. Skillfully combining information from a number of lines of evidence, Man the Hunted casts an entirely new light on the natural history of primates and the evolution of fossil and modern humans.

Genres: Evolution, Anthropology, Science, Nonfiction, Biology, History, Prehistory

336 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2005

Reviews

[Richard Reese · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not long ago, I came across a book that looked interesting, Man the Hunted: Primates, Predators, and Human Evolution, written by two anthropologists, Donna Hart and Robert Sussman. Almost half of the book discussed the many varieties of man-eating predators who for millions of years have enjoyed transforming our delicious ancestors into steaming feces. Would it shed light on the drastic reduction in man-eating predators? Would it explain why we plunged into our disastrous experiment with tool making, which has brought us to the brink of planetary disaster? It did not, but it was both interesting and odd.

In the deepest, darkest auditoriums of academia, the wizards of primatology are engaged in a yowling catfight over the primary factor that influenced the course of human evolution. The choices are: (a) being hunters, or (b) being prey. Apparently, (c) all of the above, is rewarded with a dunce cap and a paddle whack.

The authors believe that the general public, and a sizable mob of halfwit professors, have been stupefied by the trendy Man the Hunter myth. It proclaims that our ancestors were bloodthirsty hunters, and hunting encouraged us to become aggressive, violent, sociopathic killers, and monstrous oppressors of women. Folks entranced by this myth also believe that their human ancestors were never eaten by predators, because they were far too smart to be killed by lions, leopards, or wolves.

The authors are on a mission from God to torpedo the Man the Hunter myth and illuminate readers with the shining truth — Man the Hunted. Our ancestors were slow, weak, and lacked fierce teeth, sharp claws, and long horns. On the ground, they were easy prey. Thus, our evolutionary journey was largely influenced by being yummy meatballs in a hungry cathouse. This encouraged us to live in groups, pay close attention to reality, cooperate with one another, and become smart, lovable, feminist hominids.

Readers discover that it was impossible for our ancestors to consume meat prior to the invention of cooking, because we lack the teeth and digestive system of carnivores. Well, actually, we’re omnivores, like our chimp, bonobo, and baboon relatives, all of whom eat both plant and animal foods, uncooked. Maybe our smaller teeth evolved following the invention of cooked food.

It’s impossible to accurately determine when we began manufacturing spears, controlling fire, cooking food, or using complex language. These interesting and unusual innovations had enormous unintended consequences. They unlocked the entrance to a fantastically dangerous path.

I’ve always been fascinated by the fact that bonobos and chimps, our closest living relatives, have managed to inhabit the same ecosystem for two million years without trashing it. They wisely avoided the temptation to fool around with technology beyond sticks and stones. The book revealed an even more astonishing success story, the crocodiles, critters that have a special fondness for inattentive humans. Today’s crocs are nearly identical to the crocs that lived in the dinosaur era, 200 million years ago. They live in the water, floating close to the surface, and patiently wait for a thirsty critter to stop for a drink — a simple and awesomely brilliant strategy.

Bonobos and chimps provide us with an important lesson. Their territories are separated by the Zaire River, so they’ve never met. The bonobos are like free love hippies, whilst the chimps sometimes act like brutal biker gangs. Why the difference? The two species are almost genetically identical, and they inhabit the same ecosystem. But in bonobo country, there are no chimps, baboons, or gorillas. So, they have more food, less competition, and life is grand. In chimp country, it doesn’t pay to be a gentleman. The most aggressive male is always first in line at the buffet, as well as the primary sperm pump.

The authors lash out at Demonic Males, by Richard Wrangham and Dale Peterson, a gospel of Man the Hunter. It discusses species that kill their own kind, like orangutans, chimps, gorillas, and humans. For these species, aggressive behavior could provide some benefits, so this trait has not been discouraged by natural selection. This infuriates Hart and Sussman, because blame is shifted to the females, who shamelessly burn with desire for demonic males, and then give birth to cute little baby demons.

All parties agree that bonobos were dealt an unbeatable hand and won the jackpot. If humans had been dealt a similar hand of luxurious abundance, we’d probably be running around naked in an African paradise, having sex ten times a day. Instead, we got a crap hand — the queen of technology, the joker of excess cleverness, and the ace of self-destruction.

All parties agree that, in theory, humans could mindfully choose to outgrow their rough habits, and transform into adorable sweeties. Our unpleasant behavior is learned, not genetic. The Pygmies, Bushmen, and other hunter-gatherers were generally good-natured. Hunting doesn’t automatically turn us into monsters.

All parties agree that humans are not crazy-violent by nature. Competition, crowding, scarcity, and anxiety trigger our belligerence. So, what the heck is this argument about anyway? Certainly, the demonic male meme has the pungent funk of Judeo-Christian juju, the crabby old sky god who never tires of exterminating city dwellers and other despicable deviants. Where’s the science? Well, the science of human evolution provides us with a few hundred pieces of a 100 billion-piece puzzle, and numerous versions of the story are continuously being rewritten, hence the hissing primatologist catfights.

With brains substantially larger than Homo sapiens, Neanderthals managed to live on this planet for maybe 200,000 years without leaving permanent scars. Scientists sneer at their embarrassing lack of technological innovation (dullards!), and disregard their stunning success at sustainable living (who cares?). Scientists are quirky folks obsessed with stuff like space colonies and computer-driven electric cars. (I was surprised to learn that Neanderthals may have gone extinct because they ate too much meat.)

The book is about genetic evolution, not cultural evolution. Cultural evolution is what has blown the human journey off the rails, ignited the turbo thrusters, and sent us skyrocketing into the dark unknown. Cultural evolution provided shortcuts that gave us spears and hammers far faster than genetic evolution could enhance our anatomical assets. Today, the pace of techno-innovation has grown to furious hurricane force. So, does the hunter vs. hunted catfight really matter? The planet is not being destroyed by naughty genes. Wouldn’t it be wiser to yowl and hiss about our toxic culture instead?

Humans evolved in a healthy, wild, natural world. Our ancestors’ lives were highly adapted to the ecosystem they inhabited. Survival required being constantly alert to the ever-changing sights, sounds, and smells. Humankind still exists because our ancestors were acutely aware. Infants born today have genes that evolved during our hunter-gatherer era, genes fine-tuned for thriving in a tropical savannah amidst hungry leopards, hyenas, snakes, and crocodiles.

But look at us. We now live in a brutally lobotomized ecosystem where being eaten is no longer a normal everyday possibility. We live amidst crowds of strangers. We hunt and forage in supermarkets. We spend the last years of our lives filling diapers. Imagine what we’d look like if we spent the next 100,000 years sitting on our butts, staring at glowing screens, and guzzling soda pop.

Many species of bipedal hominids have evolved over seven million years. Humans are the last of the line. Few of our bipedal cousins survived as long as the chimps have; they flamed out. The happy ending here is that a perfect storm of manmade predicaments seems destined to yank the rug out from under our culture. We won’t have to spend the next 200 years having loud catfights over climate change, contraceptives, or evolution. Humankind will be dealt a very different hand of cards. Will we be lucky?

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book uses the fossil record and modern day predation on primates, including humans, to argue that man as prey rather man as predator drove human evolution. Convincing arguments and much more exciting than your average anthropology book.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Conventional wisdom has man as the apex predator, ruling the animal kingdom with sophisticated tools and weapons. However, the evolution of homo sapiens didn't just begin in the past 100,000 years. Going back 6 or 7 million years, man was smaller and had few weapons other that sticks or stones. "Lucy" (the first mostly complete fossil skeleton of early man) was only about three and half feet tall and weighed about 60 pounds. Three million years ago,she would have been easy prey for even the crowned hawk eagle of present time. That bird of Africa has been documented to kill and fly away with a 66 pound goat.

The authors (Hart and Sussman) meticulously go thru the list of animals that have man on the menu. Big cats, snakes, alligators, bears and hyenas to the present day continue with their predation on our species. They note that most of the diet of early man was plant based, with a few lizards or bugs to add spice. The picture of the males going out to get the bacon a few million years ago just doesn't add up. We were an edge species near the savannah, not a deep jungle predator.

I liked the down to earth tone of this book and the depth of it's treatment of the theoretical succession of views on early man. The bias of the mostly male researchers is also spelled out, as is the difficulty in stepping outside the box of current scientific dogma. I liked the reference to Kuhn's "The Structure of Scientific Revolution" to illustrate this point.

[Angelique Simonsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

it is really rare that I find a non fiction book that I can read cover to cover easily. This is written so well and the theories are well presented and easy to understand. It may be because this whole topic fascinates me though.

[Martin Lowery · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting theory put forth by the authors that contrary to the commonly envisioned image of early humans being hunters they argue early humans as being prey to larger predators.

By analyzing modern primates and contrasting the archaeological findings of past primates, the authors attempt to show how many modern human behaviors developed from a prey-predator relationship. From bipedalism, to language, the authors describe how such behaviors sprang from a defensive nature rather than one of violence.

The first part of the book is devoted to hard science, examining fossil records or different predators and how they may have preyed on early primates. The second half of the book is devoted to postmodern politics, whereby the authors selectively choose certain scientists, past and present, and argue that their science was a result of some puritanical and colonial mindset. While aspects of the argument have merit, the authors do very little in providing science in their deconstruction of the Noble Savage.

For example, they argue that bipedalism and speech developed from their theory of man being preyed upon. Such a theory is interesting to consider, but their criticism of the more well accepted theories for bipedalism and speech is that it was studied in a particular time period and thus is biased. Unfortunately, the authors don't discredit specific theories or specific scientists, and rather paint a broad brush across all theories that are in conflict with their own theories.

[Alexios Xifaras · Rating 5 out of 5]

Winner of the 2006 W.W. Howells Book Award. And it was, absolutely, worth it. Donna Hart and Robert Sussman have produced a classic study that destroys the "Man the Hunted" theory, which originated by the "killer ape hypothesis" of Raymond Dart and then dominated the academic community through the Wenner-Gren symposium ‘Man the hunter’. Half of the "Man the Hunted" book describes the various predators early humans had to face. The rest of the book deals with the humans' evolution and origin. Why became bipedal, how we became from hunted to top predators, and much more ! They also present a wealth of empirical data to show that aggressiveness is not innate in humans, nor did we inherited it through evolution. Highly recommend it !!

[Issy · Rating 3 out of 5]

information overload

[Isaac Panaretos · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book on human evolution; discussing where and how our our mythical ideas arose that early hominids were hunters. It provides a convincing argument based on modern science that we were in fact preyed upon by large and fierce animals and that it has only been very recently (in context with the 7 million year time span covered), that we have considered ourselves the dominant species of the planet. There are some sick stories of raptors too!

[Elentarri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Man the Hunted is an anthropology book written in a plain and easy to read manner. The authors make use of the fossil record and studies on modern day primate predation on primates (including humans), to argue that man as prey rather man as predator drove human evolution. The majority of the book takes a look at the variety of past and present predators that ate/eat primates, including large cats, wolves, hyenas, raptors, snakes, crocodiles etc. An interesting and informative read.

[Nathan · Rating 2 out of 5]

An alternate view of human evolution and predation that is not as groundbreaking as the author makes it out to be. Breezy narration and well-organized facts notwithstanding, this book would have been better - and just as convincing - at half the length.

[JJ · Rating 3 out of 5]

We were not the apex predator during our evolution. We were tasty snacks, not fit to be called a meal. Great book and insight. Easy to read. It is a bit on the verbose side, but forgivably so. If you are interested in how we became to be what we are today please include this book in your studies.

[Sophia · Rating 3 out of 5]

首先，这个翻译也太“直”了，英文表达方式完全不调整就直接转成中文那种，一句话里三五个破折号……之前看过的《进化的咬痕》中涉及到的观点似乎和这本略有关联，相较之下那本读起来就严谨许多的感觉，这一本的话，哪里有种并不想太当真的感觉……大体上，这一本在讨论的是人类祖先到底是作为猎物还是猎食者存在的问题，在列举了各种可能以人类祖先为食的捕猎者之后，作者驳斥了一部分观点，但“正反”两方看上去都不是证据很充分的样子……而且为什么要如此在意人类祖先是不是“食人族”这个问题？太在意现代人的道德观了吧。

[Thanh Nguyên · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great read that offers another insight on the role our ancestors played in the prehistoric world among other species. The narration is sometimes a bit too sassy for my taste but the numerous amounts of evidence as well as supplementary information on research methods used makes it easy for general readers to understand.