Mermaids: Real or Imagined?

From the beginning of recorded history there has been a belief in mermaids. There are cave drawings in Egypt, that depict the appearance of said creatures of the sea. Recently Animal Planet ran two stories about the possibility that these creatures may exist and are undiscovered. In fact 3.6 million viewers watched the two programs.

All of the evidence used in the filming was based on a hypothesis called the ” Aquatic Ape” hypothesis or theory purposed by a marine biologist, called Alister Hardy in circa the 1930’s and was published in the 1960’s. By the 1970’s Elaine Morgan had written six books on this theory and gained some attention with her book called, “the Descent of Woman.” She wrote this book because of her irritation at the authors and scientists of the day that gave women little notice in the theories that were being accepted on evolution. Elaine Morgan (video on her reasoning) is a  octogenarian scientist feminist and believed the reason the theory was not accepted was because men in the scientific community were not interested in viewing women as the main subjects of their research. She also felt that the dominance of the Savanna theory, biased the research evidence found by these academics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTe9qVEAcXk

I use the word theory very loosely when speaking on this Aquatic Ape theory.  A theory is something built on testable hypothesis. Since there is no proof other than folk lore and cave paintings created during the paleolithic period some 30,000 years ago, it is difficult with any amount of certainty to say this is a theory and it is testable. However, that being said, a great deal of thought and scientific information went into the creation of the television program called, Mermaids: the Body Found and the New Evidence, which aired on Animal Planet and was created by Charlie Foley. It gives a person pause when it comes to dismissing mermaids and the Aquatic Ape theory and Darwinism.

If one wanted to visualize how these creatures would look, the creators of this program came close to creating a possible imagine based on the scientific information they had from other evolutionary theories. I for one, love to swim and scuba dive and could spend hours in lakes and pools. Swimming for me is as natural as breathing. I love the water (not so much now after watching Jeremy Wade in Monster Rivers), however. One of my children swam in our pool before she could walk. Yes babies do open their eyes underwater and can swim without being taught. They instinctively hold their breath. This leads me to believe there could be something to this whole idea of mermaids, even though it was not based on actual events, for the most part. I would like to think, after watching the creations of Animal Planet’s mermaids, they do look like the mermaids in the Mermaid’s presentation.

It is with great interest people all over the world watch presentations like the one aired on Animal Planet. I think we want to know how much of the fork lore about mermaids is real and how much is myth. I ran across this video and thought, “okay, that makes me think!” So I am putting in this blog video for you to view and consider whether you think there might be some truth to the myths we all grew up with. This video is  a lecture length video and worth watching if nudity or length doesn’t bother you. I highly suggest you also look at the material Elaine Morgan has written, as well. The video does ramble a bit, and could be a better presentation of the subject matter; however, it has presented some highly interesting material. The choice of pictures could be more scientific if they existed; but they certainly would hold the attention of some viewers. I apologize, for these pictures, to the female or males reading this blog and watching this video. What is so interesting is the concept the narrator is unraveling in the telling of the history, myth, folk lore and the art in some of the pictures.

Warning: Parental Guidance due to nudity of the 1 and 1/2 hour video. See: “Secret History of Mermaid”s on my Blog roll.