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Chuman. The missing Chomosome. In the first decades of the last century, captivated by the many questions left open by Darwinism and by the ethical and philosophical implications of the evolution theory, some scientists launched a very intriguing as bold project: crossing humans and apes to obtain an “apeman”, the perfect missing link between the two species. While the troubled waters that lead to World War II, with its trail of violence and death, were already seething under the ashes of the Great War, these biotechnology pioneers were challenging nature. They were facing strong opposition as well, first of all by the Church, but also by Hitler, for example, who deemed these experiments an offence to the supremacy of the Aryan race. Herman Marie Bernelot Moens, a Belgian professor and zoologist, was the first scientist who contemplated an experiment on cross-fertilization between humans and apes. In 1908, he proposed to inseminate a female chimpanzee with human semen (preferably from a black man, thus from an “inferior” race according to the opinions of the time). His studies met with some interest by the German scientific community. However, after many uncertainties, the idea, taken up also by other scientists, was never implemented due to the onset of the economic crisis in Germany, in 1920. » cont |
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