The Curious Cat is a journey where I aim to reconnect with my inner-child and explore my curiosity. I pinpoint themes & topics I’ve been interested in within the last 7 days, ask myself questions about them and then write about them. I hope you find value within this issue and have a fantastic day doing what you love.
What if I were to tell you that hobbits do actually exist?
They very well might.
I recently travelled to the island of Flories. Flores is most famous for beng the home of Homo Floresiensis - an extinct species of human which was noticeably smaller than all other hominids, weighed between 30-40kg and rocked tiny weeny brains. They are also referred to as ‘the hobbit people,’ borrowing the term from Tolkein.
Today, we are going to explore the mystery of another small humanoid from Flores, the ‘Ebu Gogo.’
Per the Naghae language of central Flores:
Ebu → Grandmother
Gogo → Eats anything
No footage has ever been captured of one, so all counts of the Ebu Gogo have been purely word-of-mouth. But that shouldn’t be a surprise given humans have inhabited the island for +30,000yrs, while Flores has only had digital technology for a mere century. It is also thrice the size of Bali, yet has 1/3 of the population, so plenty of room for the Ebu Gogo to live in solitude away from our cameras.
In terms of their appearance, they have been described to be around 1m in height, covered in hair and rather ugly. As for their behaviour, the folklore claims they steal food and even small children from villages. Those who have encountered Ebu Gogo cite them communicating in a mumbling-like language. There I was hoping they would sound like Chewbacca, but unfortunately, they probably sound more like Ewoks.
Claims of Ebu Gogo are usually shut down with arguments like ‘they are just monkeys’ and ‘they are the product of Chinese whispers, originally about Homo Floriensis, passed down thousands of years.’
“To experts, ebu gogo was about as real as the tooth fairy”
However, there is a chance that Ebu Gogo does indeed exist. But instead of it being Ebu Gogo, what witnesses actually see are Homo Floresiensis (HF).
What? How? HF died out 12,000 years ago! Or did they?
Similarities between HF & Ebu Gogo:
Both are around 1m tall with long arms
Both dark looking
Both bi-pedal
Females of both are said to have especially droopy boobs
Both are hairy
Both from Flores
Our best estimate is that HF fell extinct 12,000 years ago. Why then? Because that is the newest fossil we have found. And prior to finding that one, we assumed they died out 30,000 years ago; so they keep getting younger. We only discovered HF in 2003; and in that time only 7 individuals have been found! We remain very much naive to our long-lost brother HF and could be blindly living alongside them today.
The large Kouprey was thought to be extinct for 1,000 years…until one was spotted in the deep jungle of Cambodia.
A Chacoan Peccary was found in 1930, after centuries of assuming it had died out
Goblin sharks are the same. Presumed extinct, until found.
If these less-intelligent species found a way to survive in unchartered environments, what’s stopping HF?
One interesting count comes from 1977 when 3 scientists ventured into the jungles of Flores to study birds. But only one came out alive, Dr. Timothy Darrow. The corpse of one of the other scientists was recovered. It had bone fractures, a smashed skull and a blade embedded within one of the cuts. The courts then concluded that Dr Darrow cannibalised his two counterparts. But he claims that his companions were killed by the Ebu Gogo, pleading innocence. This was before the discovery of HF. Now that we know small humanoids did indeed live in Flores, does Dr Darrow’s case grow in legitimacy?
One question I asked myself was: why were HF so small compared to other species of humans? Supposedly, there were few predators on the island of Flores; so in hope of preserving energy and minimising the required food intake, evolution ensured this species remained small. The predator which forced HF into supposed extinction was us, Homo Sapiens. As long as HF distanced itself from Homo Sapiens, they could absolutely survive until today. Especially when you consider that they lived on Flores for circa 1 million years. These guys were social distancing long before March of 2020.
Stories of small forest creatures aren’t just limited to Flores Island. On the ‘nearby’ island of Sumatra, there are similar rumours of ‘Orang Pendek’ which has been recognised by locals, Dutch colonists and Western scientists.
I do hope that Homo Floriensisis is still alive today. Thus far we know of at least 8 other human species (Neanderthals, Homo Erectus etc) and we supposedly killed the last of them 12,000 years ago. If HF managed to survive, it would be an incredibly humbling lesson and a friendly reminder to revisit the ‘Pessimistic Induction from the History of Science…’ which I think I also mentioned in the last edition of this rag.
The discovery of HF highlighted a few things:
(1) Our evolutionary history is even more bizarre and nuanced than we thought.
(2) We lived alongside other hominids longer than we thought.
(3) Dr Timothy Darrow might be innocent, serving two unjust life sentences.
(4) Now we know hobbits once lived on a remote Indonesian island, what else is possible? What else is left for us to discover?