MAN'S LONG PAST
MERRIAM, ALAN P.
Man's Long Past African Genesis: A Personal Investigation into the Animal Origins and Nature of Man, by Robert Ardrey. Atheneum. 380 pp. $6.95. Reviewed by Alan P. Merriam The thesis of African...
...But the point of separation for Ardrey is clear: the "natural" or "wild" animal differs markedly from the "captured" or "domesticated" animal...
...In another sense, it is a restatement of the old argument between the biological and the environmental, nature and nurture, instinct versus learning, and Robert Ardrey in this book is definitely on the side of biology, nature, and instinct...
...Thus man exists now, for example, in climates which were formerly denied to him because his learning has given him the means to overcome the natural setting...
...Ardrey sees in the behavior of non-human animals four basic instincts which have been inherited by man: drives for territory, for status, for organized society, and for order...
...And finally, but not so hopefully, he concludes that ". . . conscience as a guiding force in the human drama is one of such small reliability that it assumes very nearly the role of villain...
...He concludes that "human behavior in its broad patterns cannot with any assurance be attributed to causes lying within the human experience...
...To this is added a fifth, derived from the special nature of the development of Australopithecus, the drive to kill: "Man is a predator whose natural instinct is to kill with a weapon...
...Again, "The contemporary revolution in the natural sciences points inexorably to the proposition that man's soul is not unique...
...Yet, in transferring the nature of the wild animal to man, Ardrey does not seem to consider the fact that man is basically not a wild, but rather a domesticated, animal...
...Thus he stands forth against what he calls the "romantic fallacy," which he holds is ". . . the central conviction of modern thought that all human behavior, with certain clearly stated exceptions, results from causes lying within the human experience...
...We need more knowledge of human evolution, of the human problems that biological change brings with it, of the nature ofoour forebears and particularly of the African fossils which seem more and more clearly to point to the African origin of man...
...There seem to me to be four major concerns which Ardrey perhaps has not considered fairly enough...
...these attacks are partially justified, although it seems clear that both kinds of studies give us usable evidence...
...Although Ardrey is an impassioned defender of Raymond Dart, discoverer of Australopithecus, many of Dart's colleagues are not convinced either that the fossil form was a tool-maker or user in the sense developed in this book, or that he was anything but a sideliner in the course of man's evolution...
...This general proposition is supported by two kinds of evidence, the first relating to the instinctive and other behavior of various primate and non-primate animals, the second devoted to the supposed behavior of Australopithecus, a pre-human form found in southern Africa and generally dated to a period about 750,000 years ago...
...Man's nature, like his body, is the product of evolution...
...He argues, too, that ". . . civilization is a normal evolutionary development in our kind, and a product of natural selection," which has been the tool whereby order has been established among men...
...If mankind survives the contemporary predicament, it will be in spite of, not because of, the parochial powers of our animal conscience...
...This leads to the fourth point: Ardrey does not consider fully the influence that man's learned behavior has had upon evolution...
...Third, Ardrey makes strong and continual attacks on studies of primates and other animals made in zoos and not in the natural habitat...
...This, in turn, means that evolution as a process must necessarily be affected since survival in its rawest sense may no longer be the problem...
...I do not believe, however, that Ardrey has answered finally the questions he has raised...
...Neither the evidence nor the nature of the conclusions derived from the proposition can be considered in detail here, but it should be noted that much of the evidence remains doubtful to those who are most directly concerned with studying it...
...Ardrey argues, for example, that despite our base instincts ". . . our predatory animal origin represents for mankind its last best hope," because in many ways we have risen above our inheritance...
...African Genesis raises many of these problems, and for this reason I am glad to have it published and a source of discussion, speculation, and controversy...
...Surely, without tools other than weapons, man would be a different animal today...
...And if the evidence for which Ardrey is steadfastly arguing is in some doubt, then so must be the conclusions...
...Reviewed by Alan P. Merriam The thesis of African Genesis parallels in a certain sense the Jungian concept of a racial unconscious, except that instead of "racial," one reads "primate," and instead of "unconscious," "instinctive...
...the problem here is that man has apparently used many other kinds of tools in his evolution, including fire...
...These conclusions are not all hopeless, however, as some reviews have seemed to make them...
...First, although he states flatly that Australopithecus is the "last direct ancestor [to man] in the animal world," this truly seems to be in doubt...
...A second problem arises from Ardrey's emphasis on the tool as weapon...
Vol. 26 • April 1962 • No. 4
