-Coastal diaspora after Homo/Pan split ~5 Ma
-Human & ape evolution based on convergences: our behavior/anatomy/embryology/physiology/nutrition/DNA compared to other animals

Human features frequent in shallow-water mammals but not chimps & savanna mammals:
large brain, slow-diving skills, breath-control, flat face, small mouth, weak biting muscles (MYH16 loss), tongue bone descent, projecting nose, poor sense of smell, extreme handiness & tools, head-spine-legs in 1 line, rel.flat feet, fur loss, SC fat, squalene-rich sebum, vernix caseosa & reniculi in newborn, salt sweat/tears, less climbing, high needs of water/sodium/iodine/PUFAs/DHA..

Beachcombing-wading-diving for foods explains Homo (vs australopith/ape) traits better than forest- or plain-dwelling:
fruits/coco/nuts, turtle/bird/eggs, shell/crayfish, water(side)plants, ungulates in shallow water, stranded whales..

Pleistocene Homo populations spread along shores/lakes/rivers (>18 km oversea to Flores ~1 Ma).
Tools & fossils 2.5-0.1 Ma are found amid shells near lakes & coasts of Eurasia & Africa (although sea-level changes hinder fossilisation): Mojokerto, Dungo V Baia Farta, Terra Amata, Tafelbaai, Pakefield, Boxgrove, Eritrea, Gibraltar..
Glacials = maximal aquaticness?

Google
-Greg Laden Verhaegen
-Vaneechoutte Tobias
-pachyosteosclerosis
-econiche Homo (Littoral Theory of archaic Homo
-aquarboreal (Aquarboreal Theory of Mio-Pliocene apes/australopiths, aqua=water,arbor=tree

P.Tobias users.ugent.be/~mvaneech/outthere
Symposium 1999 Water & Human Evolution users.ugent.be/~mvaneech/Symposium
M.Westenhofer 1942 Der Eigenweg des Menschen. Mannstaede
A.Hardy 1960 Was Man more aquatic in the past? NS 7:624
M.Roede..1991 The Aquatic Ape: Fact or Fiction? Souvenir
E.Morgan 1997 The Aquatic Ape Hypothesis. id.
M.Verhaegen..2002 Aquarboreal ancestors? TREE 17:212
S.Cunnane 2005 Survival of the Fattest. World Scient.
M.Vaneechoutte..2011 Was Man more aquatic in the past? Bentham eBook