Very early in my career as an anthropologist, I stumbled across a curious report about a mid-19th Century Australian Aboriginal man, a whaler called Thomas Chaseland, who was said to have extraordinary physical capabilities -- particularly eyesight. Chaseland's shipmates claimed he could see land from 30 miles out to sea, spot whales surfacing outside of telescope range and see a full mile underwater. A huge man of apparently prodigious strength, Chaseland also survived several shipwrecks at the hands of thrashing whales, on one occasion swimming six miles through freezing waters that killed his fellow whalemen. But the attribute that stands out is his vision. Could it really be true, I wondered, that this Aboriginal man's eyesight was so much better than that of his European shipmates?
It was hard to believe, for several reasons. Chaseland's reported eyesight was, for a start, better than most scientists thought theoretically possible. There was also the problem that the stories had something of the "noble savage" myth about them: the hardy native whose "wild essence" gives him superhuman powers. A little research, however, showed Chaseland's shipmates were probably right. Aboriginal men, even today, do have eyesight four times as good as men of European ancestry. A 1980s survey of Aboriginal eye health proved it. This made me wonder how many other stories about the extraordinary abilities of pre-modern men were true. And what about males in our very distant, evolutionary past? I decided to find out, starting with that most male of characteristics: physical strength.
More...
0 comments
Post a Comment