PAPERS READ TO THE MENDEL SOCIETY. 

 THE EVOLUTION OE MAN. 



(An Address delivered to the Mendel Society, 

 February, T908.) 



By J. T. CUNNINGHAM, M.A., Oxon., F.Z.S. 



The present paper is an attempt to consider some of 

 the modern conceptions of Biology in relation to the 

 human species. With regard to species in general, 

 the Darwinian theory assumed that the differences 

 between species were differences of adaptation, that 

 specific characters were useful, that species were 

 adapted to different modes of life. It has, on the other 

 hand, been maintained by later zoologists that in the 

 vast majority of specific characters there is no evidence 

 of such utility, or of correlation with useful characters. 

 The most eminent systematists distinguish now, as 

 those of pre-Darwinian days did, between diagnostic 

 characters, which are of chief systematic value, and 

 adaptive characters, which for purposes of classifi- 

 cation are often rather misleading than significant. 

 The more useless a character is the more valuable it 

 is as an indication of affinity. One modern school of 



