The devolution of man

 

Some racist shit 
(Credit: Neanderthal Museum)

An interesting piece on the fringey “initial bipedalism” hypothesis, which claims that all vertebrates are descended from a kind of aquatic proto-human, which later “dehumanized” into all the Vertebrata known today…except in the human lineage, of course!

While this sounds very, very bizarre, I´m actually familiar with similar speculations about apes being descended from humans, rather than the other way around. See my review of Friedrich Kipp´s “Childhood and Human Evolution” on this blog (the second link below). 

Kipp is probably an Anthroposophist, and Anthroposophy´s founder Rudolf Steiner seems to have had a view of evolution similar to that of the initial bipedalists, in which humans form the “stem” of a teleological evolutionary process, with all other groups being side-branches. Hence, all living creatures are – in some sense – devolved from a human archetype.

Steiner also proposed, if memory serves me right, that the proto-humans were aquatic. Kipp only discusses the great apes in his book, however, perhaps because he wants to sound as scientific as possible. I didn´t know that a “scientific” version of Steiner´s full speculations even existed, nor was I familiar with the connection to cryptozoology. It seems Heuvelmans was far more “out there” than I expected!

Very interesting stuff to read on a lonely Good Friday morning…

Aquatic proto-people and the "theory" of initial bipedalism

Scientific Anthroposophy?