Modern Men Are Wimps

Australian anthropologist Peter McAllister calls us all wimps in his new book "Manthropology," which details what some ancient humans and human relations were capable of. Among the comparisons, he claims:

• Prehistoric Australian aboriginals would beat Usain Bolt in a sprint.
• Tutsi men in Rwanda would out-jump the best modern high jumpers. They had to, or they wouldn't become men.
• Neanderthal women could whip Arnold Schwarzenegger in arm wrestling.

Why?

"We are so inactive these days and have been since the industrial revolution really kicked into gear," McAllister tells Reuters. "These people were much more robust than we were.

In fact, the book does not reveal any new concept, generally speaking.

Last year prior to the Olympics, reporter Jeremy Hsu wrote that our early ancestors would in general have bested us at strength events. "We Homo sapiens have followed an evolutionary track away from sheer body strength and toward the lean, mean endurance qualities of a long-distance runner," Hsu wrote.

Going farther back to our close relative the chimps, the contrast is starker.

"A big male chimp weighs about 50 kilos [110 pounds], yet could easily rip the arm off someone," says Dan Lieberman, a biological anthropologist at Harvard University. "You would never want to arm wrestle a chimpanzee."

Indeed.