NOTE ON THE CONTROVERSY OVER HUMAN MISSING LINKS 



Few subjects are so interesting as the origin of man. Doctor Miller's pains- 

 taking and judicial assemblage of the facts concerning the two sets of fossils 

 which have been most widely discussed in this connection and the diversity of 

 inferences therefrom must merit wide reading. In the author's opinion " we 

 should not hesitate to confess that in place of demonstrable links between man 

 and other mammals we now possess nothing more than some fossils so frag- 

 mentary that they are susceptible of being interpreted either as such links or 

 as sometliing else." He adds : " Supei-ficial or prejudiced readers might regard 

 this confession as having an important bearing on the subject of organic evolu- 

 tion in general and of man's origin in particular ; but no conclusion could be 

 more unjustified. The idea that all existing plants and animals are derived 

 through some process of orderly change from kinds now extinct is supported 

 by an array of facts too great and too well established to be weakened by 

 doubts cast on alleged family records of any one creature." His outstanding 

 conclusion, in his own words, is this : " The things most needed now are more 

 fossils and many of them." He also remarks: "As the result of 70 years of 

 effort these tireless workers have made exactly two ' finds ' — no more. . . ." 

 In such a case how great is the inducement to continue with more adequate 

 means, more exact methods, and more expert selection of localities the search 

 for the earliest relics of the human race ! 



C. G. Abbot, 

 Secretary Smithsonian Inst it iit ion. 



THE CONTROVERSY OVER HUMAN "MISSING LINKS" 



By Gerrit S. MiLLf:R, Jr. 

 Curator, Division of Mammals, U. 8. National Museum 



[With five plates] 



The ordinary nonscientifie person can not be expected to embrace, 

 and ought not to be expected to embrace, any scientific opinion until it 

 may be asserted of that opinion that the genuine scientific world is 

 fairly unanimous in giving its adherence to it. (Sir Bertram C. A. 

 Windle, Darwin and Darwinism, p. 7, 1912.) 



Among recent subjects of animated scientific and popular contro- 

 versy both in and out of print there is perhaps none that has aroused 

 more widespread interest than the discussion of human " missing 

 links." Is man a creature unconnected with the rest of animate 

 nature ? Or is he a direct descendent from ancestors which were not 

 human? And in the latter event can we point to any links which 

 actually connect him with a nonhuman ancestral stock and which 



413 



