On the evening of August 7, the History Channel aired Ape-to-Man, http://www.historychannel.com/apetoman/ a documentary on the evolution of man. The narrator described how the “tiniest fragments of the past” were used to finally piece together a “full story”—the story of man’s evolution.

Greatly expanded dates and generations were mentioned at the beginning. Supposedly 300,000 generations spanned over three million years. ICR scientists are currently addressing not only those great evolutionary ages but also issues such as cost theory and Haldane’s Dilemma, which articulates the biological impossibility of producing that many generations without a serious mutational overload (see http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=articles&action=view&ID=2460

As far as a historical narrative went, the History Channel indeed described the history of man’s vain search for his secular origin. The program mentioned Darwin’s publication of his infamous On the Origin of Species in 1859 that suggested the living world’s descent from a common ancestor. Such a process implied that man was also part of this evolutionary progression. Thus began the search by secular scientists to find our roots. Starting with the discovery of Neandertal Man in Europe, the historical narrative took the viewer to the South Pacific and the efforts of the Dutch physician Eugene Dubois and beyond. Evolutionists such as Joe Cain and England’s Neandertal expert Chris Stringer were interviewed throughout the program. While examining the history of fossil discoveries, the History Channel did, however, expose a number of hoaxes that litter the human evolution trail.

While the documentary rejected discredited evidence for evolution, it offered little credible scientific evidence for the evolution of man. The program instead of being a record of historical fact (what one would expect from the History Channel), was simply an exercise in speculation.

Please continue to log onto www.icr.org for more detailed analysis of Ape-to-Man.