
Originally Posted by
skeptic
We are so badly adapted to the aquatic life style that we cannot even see clearly underwater. I have to wear a face mask when scuba diving to see things!
Try taking it off every once in a while and see what happens. My own diving experiences have shown that the eye can be trained to see 'adequate' under water. Having trained freediving since 1997, I have a habit of not wearing goggles at the start and end of a training session. At one point, I tried to dive without a mask on open water dives, first on diving vacations in Egypt, then in Scandinavian waters. On one dive, wearing only my nose clip, I noticed I was heading towards a burning jellyfish and quickly surfaced. Only afterwards I considered that I had reacted to underwater vision input without a mask.
I am not saying I can read under water, but I find no problem orientating in clear and lighted water. After a number of years training, my eyes seem to have adapted themselves to a certain degree, similar to that of the so-called Sea Gypsies. And that's an athletically average Northern European who has suffered from stigmatism since birth.
And note that some aquatic and marine mammals have poor under water eye sight, eg. sirenes and hippos.
Also check this video to widen the perspective on children's fear of water:
BBC - BBC Two Programmes - Wild, Wild Tribe - Reef Gypsies, Free-diving skills
(Not that children should be unsupervised at the beach.)
And be wary of thinking too 'European'/'Western' in these matters. We have only been a temperate primate for little over 30.000 years (Cro Magnon, not counting earlier strains of Neanderthal and Erectus). All other humans before that are tropical primates. Our behavior in colder waters may not be an indicator in this debate, and we'd be better off looking towards tropical peoples.
On the flip side, it's an ok argument that humans may be superb generalists, capable of adapting to anything even in the same generation. But I can't imagine a three day old baby and it's 95-year-old great grand mother enjoying a 'vacation' on open grassland or in a thick jungle, where as there's nothing more enjoyable for both of them but to sit all day long on the beach 'playing' in the sand and looking out over the ocean. Regardless if they descend from Africa, Europe, Asia or the Americas (granted, temperate peoples may need more sunscreen, but ...).