The Ape-Man Within by L. Sprague de Camp – Book Review

I must say, after reading a number of books on anthropology and the human mind, I thought I knew what to expect of such literature. I mean this in the sense that, after a while, you kind of get used to various styles of writing, and start seeing the point authors are trying to make even before they finish their phrases. This was completely untrue for the latest book I've read, “The Ape-Man Within.” Authored by famous writer L. Sprague de Camp, and published by the skeptical and inquiry publishing house Prometheus Books, the book is a work of art as far as the wit of the author, and the amazing volume of information contained, go.

The fact that de Camp has had a rich life experience, and that he is a man of great intellect clearly transpires from the way his book is written. There is no beating around the bush, just straight up facts and ideas. At various points in his chapters, when he ventures into guess or assumptions, he makes these things very clear at the start of the sentence, so as not to leave room for discussions later on. This is a very intelligent approach, because people who may not agree with what he has to say may pick on these assumptions to bring down the entire argument of his book.

The World of Humans

I was also left with a bitter-sweet taste after reading The Ape-Man Within, as I am left every time I read a work covering these fields of science. As a human being, I naturally believe that some things are correct and some are not, and anthropology books have the habit of taking everything you believe, and taking it apart piece by piece, analyzing it, and showing you precisely why your entire way of thinking is wrong. And this is precisely the reason why many people simply do not enjoy readings such books, or prefer to combat them every way they see fit. In the ninth chapter, called “And Hate Alone Is True,” de Camp shows precisely why this happens.

Moving on to the ideas expressed by the author himself, we are being treated from the very first pages with the history of the concept of “evolution,” starting from the controversy Charles Darwin elicited when he first published his great work, “On the Origin of Species.” He then goes on to highlight the types of humans that have until the time of publishing been found, and to detail their body types and so on. He also brilliantly identifies the reasons why most humans even now fail to accept that we shared a common ancestor with primates. In spite of the evidence, the brain is simply unable to accept the knowledge, simply on account of the good opinion we have of ourselves.

The fact that we view ourselves as special individuals has been identified by de Camp and others as the main source for the world's religions, each calling humankind the “children of God,” or some variation along these lines. But we'll get to that later. The author also goes on to highlight the history of the most ancient humans, beginning from the times when our ancestors were traveling in extended families, to when the first tribes appeared, and so on. While writing about this might make no sense to the casual reader, the reasons become apparent later on, when the book tells us about the influence that the habits formed around those times have on our minds even today.

This is the main reason why people do not accept scientifically proven truths such as global warming. Our ability, as a species, to think ahead usually does not exceed a year, as this is the time our ancestors needed to foresee, in order to be at a certain location in time for harvesting wild plants. Given that the extended families moved from camp to camp over a given territory, and that they did so once every year, it stands to reason that the brain did not have to learn how to plan for many years ahead. And this is precisely what global warming asks of people, to think of the distant future. Our brains are unfortunately unable to do this efficiently without training.

Related to these types of issues, de Camp also showed the mechanisms that the human mind employs to protect itself, sometimes even against logic. He illustrates that some would go to extreme lengths to protect their erroneous beliefs, and how people would cling on to everything they can to promote their own hatred, even if unwillingly. From this perspective, one might argue that the book is offensive, and indeed, it can be considered as such. But the cleverness of it all – and this goes for most anthropology-related books as well – is that by arguing against the findings, you prove that you are subjected to them more than you are willing to admit.

Separation and its Consequences

Another important aspect that the author places emphasis on is the fact that humans have an innate tendency to separate themselves into groups, and exhibit hate against other groups. This can be done according to race or color (as evidenced in Chapter 4 – The Breeds of Man), by ethnicity, religious orientations, geographical area, historical background, political views, language and so on. The differences between the “in-groups” and the “out-groups” are what gave rise to most of the world's conflicts, and will most likely continue to do so in the foreseeable future.

While reading these pages, I stopped to contemplate whether this is true in real-life for me, and for some of my closest friends. Upon analyzing our behavior, as a group, from an outside perspective – as in really stopping to think about it rationally, I understood that we were indeed behaving in an exclusive manner. That is to say, we were very likely to disapprove of other groups, either silently or openly, but to let some of the same “errors” slide if they were made by someone in our group. I also noticed the same things happening in other groups of friends, with which we had contact, but only on a casual, no-strings-attached type of level. Conflicts were always a possibility in these circumstances, but we engaged in none because all members of all groups took pride in being civilized people.

Obviously, this does not apply in the case of larger, more powerful, and more influential groups, such as Christians and Muslims, followers of the two main “heresies of Judaism,” as de Camp puts it. Fanatics from these two groups place their own above anything else, and tap into people's never-ending supply of hate in order to further their leaders' agendas. All their talks of salvation and doing the work of the Lord/Allah does not stand up to any sort of rational question. The messages are simply hate words disguised in paragraphs quoted inappropriately, or misinterpreted, from the Qur'an and the Bible.

When, in one of my articles here, I used the same technique – quoting a single verse from the Bible to support one of my arguments with some Christians – many jumped up in the comments section to let me know that I cannot take words out of context. Funny they should say that, given that their entire system of belief – which includes perceiving all Muslims as heathens, and every other religions for that matter – is based on such crass manipulations of a historically inaccurate book. In tune with this, de Camp too gives a short history of the early days of Judaism, moving up to the days when Christians first appeared, and on to the conditions that give rise to the Islamic faith.

He emphasized the exact notions that were removed or adapted from the initial faith (Judaism) to produce its secondary heresies, which went on to encompass a large portion of the world's population. Imagine how the crusades would have looked like if the Chinese were Christians. They would have conquered the entire world, and spread their civilization throughout. This means that everyone at this point in time would be a speaker of the Chinese language, and also carry some of their physical traits.

If you shivered at the thought, then you are one of those who consider that “us” is better than “them.” This is again a matter of identification with a group, and under this reasoning, speaking Chinese would be bad because this language is not yours. But ask American citizens, and most have no problem with the wars of conquest their country leads in Iraq and Afghanistan, which seek to spread the Western culture, capitalism, corporatism and religious views into the Middle East. They don't have a problem with this precisely because it's their language that is promoted, and their culture. Therefore, the “us” is always correct, regardless of prisoner abuse and atrocities committed in these countries, and “they” (the Iraqi and Afghani people) are wrong, and should be thought a lesson.

Conclusions

“An author of considerable erudition, de Camp writes with concision and wit. He admirably summarizes the current knowledge about our origins, and speculates convincingly about why we do some of the things we do. He also summarizes well the historical context of events such as the most recent war in the Balkans. This book is suitable for any intelligent reader with some high school education.” Humanist in Canada

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