Wide Angle - The Naked Ape

Let us digress a bit today and go to the basics of things – a look into the evolutionary world. This week I present a peer into a fabulous book that I read a while back but keep going to back to from time to time. This book has a lot of “a-ha” moments in terms of the explanation of the different behavioral and bodily facets of us i.e. human beings. The book is titled “The Naked Ape” and is written by Desmond Morris, a renowned zoologist. The book was first published in 1963 and was received with wide acclaim in the scientific world but universally horrified the religious and artistic world. He faced a lot of flak but the book and the ideas therein caught on and brought him such fame that he followed it up with a series of books prominent amongst them being “The Human Zoo” (a column coming on this book too). Why was it so disagreeable to the clergy and other folks? This was because he ripped away all the layers of mystique and higher purpose attached to the human being and only looked at the human being from a zoologist’s perspective i.e. like an animal. This clearly flows in from the topic i.e. he calls us “The Naked Ape” – why naked because of all the primates i.e. the ape and monkey family that we belong to, we are the only ones without a lush fur of hair i.e. from a zoologist’s view, the human animal is almost naked. There are other peculiarities that I will dwell on of the naked ape as we move further which are very specific to us and have developed out of evolutionary needs – I will only briefly touch upon them – you can read the book for details.
Before moving forward – a disclaimer – the book and what I write below may hurt religious or artistic sentiments – if so, I apologize and implore you not to read further – the column has been addressed to the assumed majority here – the educated, science-learnt folks who are receptive of the idea of evolution.

Origins
It is well established that the naked ape is a part of the primate family i.e. monkeys, chimpanzees, gorillas etc. The basic premise of the book is that the naked ape; despite being a primate for centuries had to move out of his deep forests into the open land and compete with the specialized carnivores like lions, wolves etc. The naked ape evolved to handle this competition and developed peculiar traits that gave it such an edge and in a few centuries, got it the dominance of the world. Therefore the book compares the primate lifestyle and the carnivore lifestyle and then establishes the changes that we underwent to adapt to the carnivore world not just in our bodies, but in our life cycles, our sexuality, our feeding habits, our fighting habits etc. Let us first look at the two lifestyles: primate and carnivore.

Primate: These live in lush forests, where food is plentiful and readily available (fruits etc.), they climb and travel from tree to tree thus not being fast runners but good acrobats, they are part of huge groups where strict hierarchies work, there is no cooperation required amongst them so there is competition, the leader of the group is supreme, they eat a variety of food through the day since food is so easily available, they never have a fixed home base since it is not needed, they defecate anywhere since the feces always go out of sight, their nasal and auditory powers are not tremendous because its not needed but their vision is very well developed (to differentiate between different foods).
Carnivore (cat and dog family): These live in open areas and food is not so easily available i.e. it is to be hunted down, they travel great distances to hunt prey and hence are to have good physiques, ability to sprint is high, they have natural weapons, they have to cooperate with each other to hunt effectively hence no supreme leader exists, they always travel back to a home base, their feces are in front of them so they have evolved ways to dispose them, they go without food for long periods of time and when food is available, it is plentiful so they have to store and regurgitate food, they have excellent vision, sense of smell and sound.

Now the naked ape was happily living as a primate until he had to be forced out of the forests into the open (Garden of Eden and the expulsion anyone), there he had to compete with the big cats and dogs. We all know that the natural evolutionary response was developing intelligence which meant a bigger brain. We also know what we achieved with the bigger brain i.e. tools, fire, wheel, iron, copper etc. We also know that in terms of brain size vs body size our brains are the largest, in turn meaning larger heads. The female body just could not afford to have this big a head pass through during birth hence something called “Neoteny” came in.

Neoteny means the extension of birth time features late into life. To us it means that we are born with only 23% of the brain totally developed as against 75% for the chimpanzee (who attains full size in 6 months). Therefore our brain and body continues to develop till 22-23 – the time we become totally independent. Who would take care of this helpless, defenseless infant if the parents simply move on after birth like other primates? That is when the idea of pair bonding developed. It simply means a pair is formed encouraged by evolution between a male and female of the species and after birth, the pair bond becomes stronger for the sake of the infant. The cooperative societies and in turn kingdoms are just an extension of this idea. Pair bonding also means that the chances of female going around with other males when the male is out hunting (we are talking prehistory here) is reduced. Basically, evolution has worked ways (a lot of it is sexual but that you can read in the book, I wont write it here) to keep this bond together.

There are other changes in the naked ape due to adoption of the carnivore way – a cooperative group living and hunting (working now), feeding times spaced out like the carnivore, a fixed home base created to bring food back to and to rear progeny, specific socializing and sexual signals developed, specific responses developed for fighting etc.

I am hoping you get the basic idea of how the transformation took place and what it could entail for the naked ape when he adopted this hunting lifestyle. Of course, Desmond Morris explains it much better and in detail so go read the book. I am touching upon a few ideas that interested me to keep the write up short.

Rearing
Since the infant had to live with the mother for much longer, specific responses e.g. the smile, crying etc. were developed which was an equivalent of the clinging of the infant monkey to the mother. It is all a part of the security that the infant feels when the mother hugs him. An interesting observation made by him is about the nervous tick movements that we make in difficult situations or the rhythms that are a part of ancient or tribal music (e.g. drum beats) all link back to the heart beat that are so comforting, they transport us back to the time when we were in our mother’s womb and her big heart was thumping away above us (picture a speaker rocking from side to side before making a big speech, someone drumming fingers on a table etc.).

Feeding
This is the most interesting part. We all learnt to eat twice or thrice a day i.e. spaced out meals like the carnivore way. We also had to go around hunting for it i.e. the concept of working for a meal was imbibed into us. However, a closer look at us shows that we have not let go of the primate way – we do tend to munch through the day and most of that munching is of sweet stuff – chocolates, ice creams. What is this sweet tooth? It is the ancient primate urge that came from a diet of fruits. We also like to eat our food warm – some say this is a take from the carnivore habit where the prey is still warm when killed but Desmond says this may be because cooking and heating brings out more flavors from the food which we prefer because of our primate days.

Comfort
Have you noticed the monkeys sitting in a row once behind other grooming each other’s fur? That is the way of comforting the other and giving a sense of security and belongingness in the group. The naked ape equivalent of this is parties where a lot of social grooming happens, the end of the spectrum is us going to the doctor for minor ailments like cold, cough etc. and feeling better in a couple of days. It has been observed that people with anxiety, nervousness, and social fitment problems tend to catch more of these afflictions than happier people. This falling ill could be an extension of the need for comfort (which the doctor provides).

God
I would end this long discourse from an idea that is mentioned passing in the book but made a lot of sense. Morris asks about the concept of religion and why it has such a deep hold on us. The theory emanates out of our primate days when we were part of a group with hierarchies and a leader at the top who was the supreme leader. This was the most powerful ape that made all the decisions and we had to bow before him. We also could leave our cares to this ape. From time to time, this ape would be challenged and replaced but the seat remained. In our minds, this ancient urge to have a power above us who takes care of us, is omnipotent, omnipresent is quite strong and that is why we invented god. The next best thing to this was the king who sometimes claimed to be god. As everyone knows, religion is a structure built around God.

To end:
This is a very fleeting glimpse of the book and the ideas therein are Desmond Morris’s. The human being has developed out of a complex mix of circumstances and survival need into the formidable machine that it is. The book will answer a few questions from a zoological perspective of this supreme animal at the same time entertain you. Go read it; it will only expand your horizon.