^1^ THE NEW EVOLUTION ^^ 



The opposable human thumb could never have grown 

 out of the partly atrophied ape thumb. 



Many other structural features tell the same story. 

 The more carefully we study the points of similarity 

 between man and the apes the more clearly do we see 

 and appreciate the importance of the differences be- 

 tween them. As Huxley truly said, the differences 

 between man and the apes are broad and striking. 



From time to time various "missing links" sup- 

 posed to connect man with the apes have been de- 

 scribed. But from what has just been said it is impos- 

 sible to believe that such "missing links" ever 

 actually existed. 



In a recent article on "missing links" Mr. Gerrit 

 S. Miller, Jr., the curator of mammals in the United 

 States National Museum, reviewed in great detail the 

 evidence and opinions regarding the "Java ape-man" 

 or "Trinil man" (Fithecanthro^us erectus) and the "Pilt- 

 down man" QEoanfbropus daivsont) which are the only 

 two finds that "can be seriously regarded as furnish- 

 ing . . . direct evidence of man's blood relation- 

 ship with animals resembling in some general manner 

 the present day gorilla and chimpanzee. ' ' Mr. Miller 

 concluded that while awaiting further discoveries 

 "we should not hesitate to confess that in place of 

 demonstrable links between man and the other mam- 

 mals we now possess nothing more than some fossils 

 so fragmentary that they are susceptible of being 

 interpreted either as such links or as something else." 

 So in the light of all the evidence available at the 

 present time there is no justification in assuming that 



' [Hi] 



