Rosa Rubicondior: Refuting Creationism - Eating Carrion Made Us Human

Wednesday, 22 October 2025

Refuting Creationism - Eating Carrion Made Us Human

Factors influencing scavenging behavior in humans.

Carmen Cañizares (@canitanatura).

Eating carrion made us human | CENIEH

One of the most telling weaknesses of creationism is how heavily it depends on piling assumption upon assumption to sustain its narrative. As Stephen Hawking observed in The Grand Design, the more assumptions a theory requires, the less likely it is to be true. This is simply the reverse of Occam's razor, the principle that the simplest explanation consistent with the evidence is usually the most plausible.

Creationists take the simplistic story of human origins from the Bible and build layers of speculation upon it — not derived from scripture or evidence, but from the circular reasoning of “this must have been true, or my beliefs are wrong.”

A classic example is their claim that there could have been no death before Eve’s supposed sin, because death is ‘evil’ and evil only entered the world after the Fall. From this, they conclude that Adam and Eve — and indeed all animals — must have been vegetarian. To prop up this contrivance, they add yet another assumption: that plants aren’t really ‘alive’ in the same way as animals, so eating them doesn’t count as causing death.

This is a textbook case of a weak theory being shored up by multiplying entities and assumptions — the very opposite of sound scientific reasoning. It also collapses under biological scrutiny. There is no evidence in the Bible to support it, and human anatomy and physiology clearly reveal that we are omnivores with a long evolutionary history of meat consumption.

And now, a team of evolutionary anthropologists led by Ana Mateos of Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH) has published a research paper in the Journal of Human Evolution, in which they argue that before early hominins developed the technology to hunt large game for themselves, they were probably dependent on scavenging carrion—often from the kills of apex predators.

An important advantage of scavenging is that it provides a reliable source of high-protein food with relatively low energy expenditure. Carcasses can also sustain a population through periods of drought, when prey is scarce and some animals die from natural causes. Early hominins could have used sticks and stones to drive off predators, while their highly acidic stomachs minimised the risk of disease from decaying meat. Later, cooking provided additional protection against pathogens.

After what was likely a brief evolutionary phase as scavengers, humans developed the tools and cooperative strategies to become apex predators themselves. This reliance on carrion may even have been one of the critical factors that set our lineage on a different path from the other African apes, driving both physical and physiological changes.

Consequences and Benefits of Meat Consumption in Early Humans. The shift to a more meat-rich diet was a pivotal moment in human evolution, with profound biological, behavioural, and social consequences:

Brain Expansion
Meat is an energy-dense, nutrient-rich food, providing essential fatty acids, proteins, and micronutrients such as iron and vitamin B12. This helped support the high energy demands of a growing brain, contributing to the marked encephalisation seen in later hominins. A smaller gut and larger brain — an energy trade-off known as the expensive tissue hypothesis — may have been made possible by this dietary change.
Reduced Foraging Time
Compared to a purely plant-based diet, meat provided more calories in less time, freeing up time for other activities, including toolmaking, social interaction, and exploration. This would have supported increasingly complex social structures and cooperation.
Technological Innovation
Scavenging and later active hunting required tools for butchery, processing, and eventually weaponry. This drove advances in stone tool technology and the development of planning and communication skills.
Social and Cooperative Behaviour
Hunting and sharing meat likely reinforced group cooperation, division of labour, and reciprocal relationships. Food sharing may also have been important in strengthening social bonds and kinship networks.
Geographic Expansion
A flexible omnivorous diet, including meat, allowed early humans to exploit a wider range of habitats, enabling migration out of Africa and into diverse environments.
Evolution of Digestive and Immune Systems
Regular meat consumption likely influenced gut physiology, including increased stomach acidity to handle pathogens from carrion. This helped reduce disease risk and may have co-evolved with cooking to improve food safety and digestibility.

The research is summarised in a press release by the Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH)

Eating carrion made us human
A study led by scientists from the CENIEH rethinks the role of scavenging in human evolution, highlighting its importance as an efficient subsistence strategy complementary to hunting and gathering
Ana Mateos and Jesús Rodríguez, scientists at the Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH), are the lead authors of an article recently published in the Journal of Human Evolution that proposes a new paradigm for understanding the role of carrion in the subsistence of human populations throughout their evolution.

This is a multidisciplinary synthesis work in which paleontologists, archaeologists and ecologists from the CENIEH, the Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social (IPHES), the Instituto de Investigación en Recursos Cinegéticos (IREC-CSIC), the Instituto Pirenaico de Ecología (IPE-CSIC), the Universidad Miguel Hernández, as well as the Universities of Alicante, Granada and Málaga, reviewed the advantages and disadvantages of carrion consumption for a hominin.

According to the authors, the main advantage of scavenging is that it requires far less effort to obtain food than hunting. As for the disadvantages, it has long been said that scavenging is a scarce and unpredictable resource, that consuming carcasses always carries a high risk of pathogen transmission, and that it involves the danger of being attacked by a predator when trying to access an animal’s corpse.

However, findings from ecological research present a very different scenario, challenging the disadvantages that have traditionally been associated with scavenging. Carrion is more dependable than previously thought and tends to be available during periods when other food sources are scarce, making it a crucial resource for surviving times of food shortage.

When large terrestrial and marine mammals die, they provide tons of easily accessible food, enabling many scavenger species to coexist and feed at the same time.

Ana Mateos, lead author
Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH)
Paseo Sierra de Atapuerca,
Burgos, Spain.

Scavenging animals also exhibit behaviors that minimize the likelihood of contracting a pathogen when consuming or coming into contact with carrion.

Humans have been anatomically, physiologically, behaviorally and technologically adapted from our origins to be efficient scavengers. The acidic pH of the human stomach can act as a defense against pathogens and toxins, and, moreover, the risk of infection was significantly reduced when we began using fire to cook. Furthermore, humans can travel long distances with relatively little energy expenditure compared to other mammals, which is essential for locating enough carrion.

Ana Mateos.

Language, even in its beginnings, allowed us to communicate and organize ourselves to look for the corpses of large animals or snatch the prey from a large predator, which we could drive away by throwing projectiles (or simply stones). Even the simplest flake tools can be used to cut through the thick hide of large mammals, reach their interior, and efficiently scrape off the remaining meat from an abandoned carcass, while stones used as hammers could break the bones to access the fat and marrow inside.

Jesús Rodríguez, co-author.
Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH)
Paseo Sierra de Atapuerca,
Burgos, Spain.

The authors conclude that, beyond being a fundamental activity for early hominins, humans have always resorted to scavenging as an alternative, highly efficient way of obtaining food, complementary to hunting and gathering plants.

One more eating behavior

When evidence emerged in African archaeological sites in the 1960s showing that early hominins consumed meat, it sparked an intense debate over whether the animals had been hunted by the hominins themselves or had died from other causes and were subsequently scavenged by them.

Carroñeo/Eduardo Saoiz

From that point on, archaeologists and paleoanthropologists devoted their efforts to finding the earliest evidence that hominins were capable of hunting large prey. This gave rise to the notion of a linear progression in human behavior, suggesting that hominins quickly abandoned scavenging once they developed the technological ability to hunt large prey.

This debate was influenced by the view of large predators as the pinnacle of the food chain, with humans taking a place among them, while scavenging has historically been associated with a marginal and less “noble” activity, characteristic of subordinate and primitive species. This view has been refuted by studies carried out by ecologists in recent decades.

Today we know that carrion plays a fundamental role in ecosystems and that all carnivorous species consume it to a greater or lesser extent. Moreover, many current human hunter-gatherer groups continue to practice scavenging, as one more eating behavior. If it has long been said that ‘eating meat made us human,’ one could equally say that eating carrion made us human.

Ana Mateos.

Publication:
Mateos, Ana; Moleón, Marcos; Palmqvist, Paul; Rosell, Jordi; Sebastián-González, Esther; Margalida, Antoni; Sánchez-Zapata, José Antonio; Arilla, Maite; Rodríguez, Jesús (2025)
Revisiting hominin scavenging through the lens of optimal foraging theory Journal of Human Evolution 209 103762 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2025.103762

Highlights

Carrion is a highly nutritious resource exploited by all carnivorous species.
Hunting and scavenging are not mutually exclusive foraging strategies.
Scavenging is part of the human foraging repertoire from early Homo till today.
Scavenging is particularly advantageous during periods of plant food scarcity.
Hominins are behaviorally and physiologically adapted for efficient scavenging.

Abstract
Scavenging has been a key topic in human evolution for decades, mainly focused on the ‘hunting vs. scavenging’ debate and the role of meat in the diet of early hominins. Scavenging is frequently considered a marginal activity by archaeologists; however, recent theoretical developments and experimental observations in the field of carrion ecology suggest that this is a misconception that should be addressed. Here, we analyze hominin scavenging in the framework of optimal foraging theory and compare the assumptions made in archaeology and paleoanthropology based on current ecological knowledge. We discuss the constraints and opportunities for hominins as facultative scavengers across ecological contexts, both in Africa and beyond. Hominins exhibited several anatomical, physical, and behavioral adaptations that enabled them to detect carcasses from a long distance, reach them relatively quickly, confront other scavengers, if necessary, and process the carcass to obtain food. Carrion should be considered a high-quality resource that is ubiquitous and more predictable than previously assumed. Particularly relevant is the abundant carrion from sources other than predation, especially from megaherbivores. Moreover, hominins likely benefited from carrion partitioning strategies and interspecific facilitation—especially with vultures—which have traditionally been overlooked in archaeological and paleoanthropological research. Thus, we propose that carrion was a valuable resource exploited by all hominin species and populations to varying degrees, especially during periods of food shortage in seasonal environments. We conclude that the ‘hunting vs scavenging’ dichotomy is no longer supported as hominins are omnivorous, exploiting animal food through hunting or scavenging depending on environmental conditions and their technological and cognitive capacities.

Mateos, Ana; Moleón, Marcos; Palmqvist, Paul; Rosell, Jordi; Sebastián-González, Esther; Margalida, Antoni; Sánchez-Zapata, José Antonio; Arilla, Maite; Rodríguez, Jesús (2025)
Revisiting hominin scavenging through the lens of optimal foraging theory Journal of Human Evolution 209 103762 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2025.103762

© 2025 Elsevier Ltd.
Reprinted under the terms of s60 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Once again, we see clear evidence exposing the falsity of creationist beliefs — beliefs so demonstrably wrong that it remains astonishing anyone can still cling to them. Yet, creationists hold onto these fictions with the desperate grip of a drunk clinging to a lamp-post: not for illumination, but for support.

This behaviour reflects what a recent study by psychologists has shown — that clinging to obviously false beliefs can be a way for insecure individuals to project an illusion of strength by refusing to “give in” to evidence and reason.

The overwhelming weight of scientific evidence shows that modern humans are the product of a long evolutionary process in which meat-eating played a major role — beginning hundreds of thousands of years before the supposed “Creation Week” just a few thousand years ago, when everything was supposedly conjured into existence and all creatures lived as vegetarians.

For those genuinely interested in truth, rather than propping up a fragile self-image with comforting fictions, the evidence is there to examine: not in the myths of ignorant Bronze Age storytellers arbitrarily declared to be the inerrant word of a god, but in the fossil record, the archaeological evidence, and our own anatomy and physiology.

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