The Bristol
Medico-Chirurgical "
Scire est
Journal
nescire, nisi id
me
Scire alius sciret
SPRING,
1935.
THE PROBLEM OF MAN'S ORIGIN. "Cbe iprcsi&ential Bbbress, fcelivercS on lOtb October, 1934, at tbc opening of tbe 5irt$=seconl> Session of tbe DBrtstol /n>e&ico=(Ibirurgical Society. BY
A. Rendle
Short, M.D., F.R.C.S.,
Professor of Surgery
Surgeon,
1927,
at
Association, c?uld be
in the
Bristol
University of Royal Infirmary.
Bristol ;
Address of the British Sir Arthur Keith said that this problem a
Presidential
definitely settled ; man is derived I1?t, living anthropoid ape such as the gorilla or chimpanzee, but from an ape-like ancestor. The common stem giving rise to man and the apes probably diverged in Miocene times, and our regarded
as
of course, from any
immediate ancestors were between modern man and view is very
intermediate in structure No doubt this the ape.
widely accepted, especially by the older anatomists and by the writers of orthodox text-books ?f science ; no doubt it is commonly taught in nearly every university in the world. Very many facts and B
V?L. LII.
No. 195.
%
Mr. A. Rendle Short
observations way of we are
seem
upsetting beginning
I propose
and
But Science has
to confirm it.
our
"
settled conclusions
to feel
and
just
a
when
about them, before you this
happy bring evidence
to
"
secure
evening, not to establish an alternative theory?apparently the time has not yet come for that to be done?but to show that though Sir Arthur Keith declared that Darwin's theory of the ascent of man Mr. would never be shaken, it is being shaken. Pyecraft, one of the Zoologists at the Natural History Museum, South Kensington, wrote recently concerning the Theory of Natural Selection generally : We seem "
to be threatened with over
the Darwinian
recrudescence of the controversy theory. But now the conflict is a
not to be between learned one
but
professors of biology on the people on the other,
side and the Church and the an
internecine
warfare, that is
to say, between like fifty years to
It has taken
ourselves.
something orthodoxy among the elect; might now all is to be thrown into the melting-pot again." The same appears to be true with regard to the ape theory of man's origin. The doubts about it are beginning to percolate down to the newspapers. The Morning Post wrote, just about the time when England secure
what
we
call
"
went off the Gold Standard
:
There
are
disturbing
signs that the scientific world may have to go off the ape standard. Speeches at last week's meeting of the British
Association
suggested whether the stability
that
are
physical evolution can be maintained, and now Professor Sergio Sergi, at the World's Anthropological Congress, seems to be depressing the value of the missing link.' Owing to the general uneasiness that prevails, it is impossible to give authentic quotations for the evolution theory, but) personally I am getting into something else as soon uncertain
'
of
scientists
The Problem as
I
can
!
Telegraph,
"
And in
in
a
a
more
review of
3
Man's Origin
of
a
serious vein, the Daily book we shall presently "
be quoting from, said in December, 1933 : Since the first flush of enthusiasm which followed the enunciation of the Darwinian
theory of evolution, the tempo of the science of anthropology has suffered a surprising slowing up. This branch of knowledge has advanced But from certainty to perplexity." It may be said : this is only the opinion of newspaper men." We turn, "
therefore, Let
us
to the scientists.
begin by reviewing
line of descent.
the evidence for the ape greatest argument, of
The first and
course, is the very close anatomical similarity between the human body and that of the gorilla or chimpanzee.
The likenesses !t would be
them, they nothing more
are so numerous
and
well known that
so
tedious and unnecessary to enumerate obvious that in the opinion of many
are so
be brothers.
have generally ^ut there
need be said
Amongst
and the ape must bodily resemblances
man
been taken to prove blood-relationship, there is another side to the matter. Although are
hairy
t?e is
coat, and
a
there
also very The human brain is far larger
striking resemblances,
constant differences. and more developed. a
;
animals
are
The ape has a projecting muzzle, foot quite unlike ours ; the great
a thumb. Man has no vibrissse, opposable (tactile hairs) ; every other mammal has them. The apes have no hymen. No doubt it will be replied that these are merely the differences between species or genera, but a much more considerable point is next to be mentioned. The trend of modern zoological research goes to show that likeness of bodily structure 18 no proof of common descent or blood-relationship. There is a phenomenon amongst animals, living and extinct, known by the name of Convergence ;
like
"
"
Mr. A. Rendle Short
4
totally unrelated animals, widely different in their geological history and zoological relationships, may have a strangely similar bodily structure or individual two
And this
organs, if their mode of life is similar. Convergence is not an occasional and
phenomenon; examples of it widespread. Let me remind you the
exceptional
are
numerous
of
few.
a
and
How like
newt, that divides its time between
common
stream and
shore, is the crocodile, whose habits in
that
are
and
respect the
similar !
newt
Yet the crocodile is Their
amphibian.
an
a
reptile
zoological
very far apart; their resemblance is due to the suitability of that particular pattern of
relationships legs,
tail
betwixt
are
and land
general and
conformation for The
water.
vertebrates, e.g. toad, is, down
to
a
life
spent
spermatozoon of minute details, like
free-swimming, lowly form of life called Trichomonas. no one imagines that vertebrates are descended from Trichomonas. The extinct (Mesozoic) plants a
But
called Bennettitales show
a
flower, with male
sort of
and female elements and
pollen, but they are Gymnosperms, allied to modern Cycads, and cannot possibly be ancestors of modern flowering plants. Common wheat exists in several
varieties, bearded
and beardless ; white, red or black eared ; winter and spring. But just the same varieties are found of other
wheats, spelt, rye and barley.
This
must
be
an
grain ; it cannot be chance. The Dipnoi (air-breathing fish living in mud or water) cannot be the ancestors of frogs, toads, etc., but they share with them the paired lungs, the partitioned auricle (of the heart) and many other characters. The eyes of the octopus are just like those of mammal, with cornea, iris, ciliary body, lens and
inherent law of
retina
;
but the
octopus is
not the ancestor of the
The Problem
vertebrates.
(amphioxus)
Two animals
are
Man's Origin
vertebrates
Lowly or a
of
5
have
no
eyes
very elementary eye (the hag fish). known that have eyes like an old
the upper half to see m air and the low in water, but one is a fish and the other is a beetle.
gentleman's bifocal
spectacles,
Three
types of fish, the electric eel, Torpedo and Malapterurus, can give powerful electric shocks, but
they
of
a
are
scorpion
The claws of
unrelated.
quite
are on
and the
the
and
same
Australasia. Africa.
There
pattern. The glow-worm deep-sea fish, are
are
the most remarkable
by the primitive type) of
furnished of
forms that mimic most of the
of the mammals of
types
There is
lobster and
also certain
firefly, luminous in the dark. One of examples of Convergence is Marsupials (pouched mammals common
a
Europe,
Asia and
volplaning opossum like a flying squirrel flying lemur, the flesh-eating Thylacine like a wolf, another marsupial like a rat, and another like a bear! Nor is it only in outward form that a
or
Convergence
is
The
crocodile, like the bird, has four-chambered heart. The extinct flying lizard, the pterosaur, had air-filled bones, and the foramen seen.
a
admitting
the air situated
Bower are
they
points
bisexual
a
calls attention extinct
to
reptiles dinosaurs with
ichthyosaurus,
flesh-eating
the
and horns
just
plants and animals scarcely credible that
is
common
Osborn
ancestor.
strange parallelism between mammals; the huge
modern
(Triceratops)
whale ; cynodonts with like
where it is in birds.
that both it
but
bisexual, have
out
a
like
a
pterosaurs, teeth
rhinoceros like
like
a
a
;
bat;
dog;
iguanodon, walking on its hind legs and tail like a kangaroo ; the turtle, armour-plated like an armadillo, ?r
the extinct
glyptodon.
Surely
all this must be
law,
6
Mr. A. Rendle Short
not chance.
Especially
when
we
find that each of these
not one, but many coincident modificathe ; e.g. heavy-headed rhinoceros must have massive legs and a strong neck; the flesh-eating
types require
tions
Thylacine, the have agility to
wolf and the extinct
cynodont
must
hunt their prey. The most recent, and one of the most eminent of writers on the descent of man is Professor Le Gros
Clarke, who of
descent
on
the whole is in favour of the
from
theory
but he
frankly ape ancestor, acknowledges the difficulties and pitfalls of the hypothesis. He says : "In the evaluation of genetic affinities anatomical differences are more important as negative evidence than anatomical resemblances are as positive evidence. It becomes apparent that if this thesis is carried to a logical conclusion, it will necessarily demand a much greater scope for the phenomenon of parallelism or convergence in evolution than has usually been conceded by evolutionists. The an
fact is that the minute and detailed researches which have been carried out
by comparative
anatomists in
parallelism in evolutionary development proceeding on a large scale, and is no longer to be regarded as an incidental curiosity which has occurred sporadically in the course of evolution. Indeed, it is hardly possible recent years have made it certain that
has been
for those who
comparative anatomists to realize the fundamental part which this phenomenon has
played We
are
are
in the
not
evolutionary process."
driven to the
conclusion, therefore, that
similarity between man and the ape may be example of Convergence ; in other words, the resemblances do not definitely prove blood-relationship.
the
another But
further,
Anatomy
in the
as
Wood Jones, the Professor of
University
of
Melbourne, has pointed
The Problem
of
Man's Origin
7
anatomical features that make it easier to believe the apes are descended from man? an impossible hypothesis?rather than man from an
out, there
are some
extinct ape.
The
course
of evolution
never
retraces
its steps (Dollo's Law). If a modification has once been made, it persists. Now in some respects man's structure is
Like early mammals, the ethmo-lachrymal, parietal articulations. more
than that of the apes. but unlike the apes, he retains
primitive
more
ethmo-sphenoid,
and
The male external
sphenogenitalia are
primitive primates than those of primitive muscles, e.g. the pyramidalis
like those of
the ape. and the
Some
pronator radii teres, the
law
are
absent in the apes.
of
Recapitulation, every According animal has to climb up its own genealogical tree, that is to say, its ontogeny repeats its phylogeny, or its to
development
in
embyro gives
evidence of its
ancestry.
throw-backs may occur, that is, pathological specimens will be born from time to time that resemble
Also,
the
Judged by either of these tests, the ape-ancestor theory stands definitely discredited. It is true the infant may have a hairy skin (lanugo), but so have nearly all mammals besides the apes. The sloped-back forehead, great eyebrow ridges, projecting muzzle, and opposable great toe are never seen in ancestor.
the human foetus a
;
in
fact, the ape foetus is
more
like
human being than vice versa. The Darwinian tubercle
the human ear, and multiple nipples, which are often quoted as proving man's animal ancestry, are nothing to the because no ape has long, pointed ears
on
point,
or
Then consider the congenital with which our profession makes us well
multiple nipples.
abnormalities acquainted
:
dislocations, spina bifida.
foot, hare lip, cleft palate, congenital naevi, supernumerary fingers or toes,
club
None of these recall the ape.
Who has
8
Mr. A. Rendle Short
ever
seen
a
human
with
toe ?
We
opposable great that the
then,
argument
projecting
a
muzzle
or
the conclusion, anatomy and develop-
come
from
to
ment is too uncertain to be relied upon. In the
opinion
of Professor Wood Jones and others man's ancestor was
not
an
and in
back, suggests
little creature called
a
described The
ape, but must be sought much farther He a much more primitive mammal.
as a
next
Tarsius, which has been
living
fossil.
main
argument for the ape descent physiology. It is maintained,
is derived from
theory for
instance, that ape's blood and human blood are identical, and differ from that of other mammals ; this is taken to prove close relationship. Far more work has been published of the
comparative anatomy comparative physiology.
primates
than
on
the their
on
The best modern summary of the latter known to me is Zuckerman's Functional
Affinities of Man, Monkeys, end of 1933.
apes cannot be animals has of the
man
and
Apes, published
He shows that the blood of a
regarded good deal in
as
common. are
and the
The blood of all
identical.
and most mammals
man
at the
The red
exactly
corpuscles
alike
under
microscope ; the haemoglobin of man and indistinguishable by the chemist.
mammals is
Nuttall showed in 1904, human
give
the
same
a
much
serum
there
are
and ape serum though for ape's is needed.
But
Human blood contains hetero-
the red
corpuscles of the ape, and it would be most dangerous to use transfusion in man. Basophile
agglutinins against vice versa, so that ape's blood for
As
serum
precipitin reaction, higher concentration
differences.
most
very scarce in human blood, are 3 per cent, of gorilla's white cells, 15 per cent, in the orang and 20 per cent, in the chimpanzee. By the
leucocytes,
which
are
The Problem of
use
anti-erythrocyte
of
Man's Origin
9
Landsteiner and Miller
sera
were able to show in 1925 that human and ape red-
blood
corpuscles
distinguished
identical
not
are
from
one
another,
and
but those of
can a
be
white
is very fairly pointed Sir Arthur Keith himself in his article on the
man and out
by origin of
(This
negro cannot.
a
man
in the last edition of the
Encyclopedia
Britannica.) They
go on to conclude: "The experiments described show that a definite and constant serological difference is demonstrable between the
bloods of
and
the
anthropoids studied, This and again : orang-outang conclusion is in agreement with the accepted view that man has not evolved directly from any of the existing species of primates, as was formerly supposed, but that the Catarrhina, anthropoids and man have man
chimpanzee
two
all sprung from
Zuckerman
physiologically
"
"
and
;
a common
further
stock."
reminds
us
that
man
different from the apes in his
use
is of
fire and tools, in his function of speech, his carnivorous diet and custom of monogamy. The last two he regards
as
related to
go about in small
females
;
find their a
living,
they own
the
one
parties,
live
mostly
food.
another. one
Anthropoid apes adult male with several
on a
When
vegetable diet, and all took to hunting for
man
females, especially if pregnant
or
nursing,
were less able to collect for themselves and had to be
fed
by the male, who could not protect all his wives from other marauding males, and did not want too many mouths to feed, so contented himself with monogamy. We
Here
the evidence of palaeontology. must definitely put out of our minds the of ape-men that appear from
turn next to
we
wholly imaginary picture fcime
to time in the illustrated London papers.
As
10
Me. A. Rendle Short "
The missing-link says : must be deleted from our minds, and I find
Professor
Wood
Jones
pictures occupation less worthy of the science of anthropology
no
than the not
business of
modelling, nightmare products of
unfashionable
and
these
painting drawing imagination, and lending them in the process an utterly false value of apparent reality." He compares it with the pseudo-science of the oJd phrenological charts. Confining ourselves to real evidence, although
the whole world has been ransacked in the search for "
the actual discoveries have been few, and have taken unexpected forms. When the first skulls of Neanderthal man were found, with his huge
missing links,"
brow
and head sunk
ridges
on
the
chest, it seemed
as
if the true ape-man was before us. But Neanderthal man had nothing else ape-like about him. His brain was as big as ours ; his teeth were tru]y human ; he used
tools, lit fires &nd buried his dead.
Rhodesian
appears to be closely allied to the type, and so does the Galilee skull. On
man
Neanderthal the other
So-called
hand, the Tauungs skull, called Australo-
" pithecus, also first described as a missing link," is really that of a young anthropoid ape (Keith). A better case can be made out for three other fossil
types, yet all with serious reservations. I append a very brief summary (the details are taken from the
writings of Sir Arthur Keith). First in the field was Pithecanthropus erectus, found in 1894 at Trinil, in Java, by Dubois. These remains consist of the top of
a
some
skull, three teeth, and, found 15
possibly, were
yards, a
found
a
piece are
femur.
of
a
at
a
distance of
To these is to be
added,
The beds in which these
jaw.
considered to be late Pleistocene.
probably early Ice Age ; Pliocene
is the
Pliocene, or more (Pleistocene means the
geological time-period
next
The Problem
of
Man's Origin
The skull has been
earlier.) that of
a
Kollman), (Dubois,
variously
11
described
large extinct ape (by Virchow, or intermediate between man
as
Bumuller, and
ape
Keith and
others). Next in order is Eoanthropus dawsoni, found by
Mr. Charles Dawson at Piltdown in Sussex in 1911? 1912. The geological level, again, may be late Pliocene
early Pleistocene, and again there is a discrepancy between the skull, which has the shape and brain capacity of modern man (Keith), and the jaw found near it, which is ape-like. A piece of worked elephant or
bone
was
More
also discovered close in
recently,
1928-29,
a
by. nearly complete
fossil
skull with several fragmentary jaw bones and teeth has been found near Peking by Mr. Pei, and described
by the late Dr. Davidson Black. These also are dated early Pleistocene. The skull has a brain capacity equal to that of a human, but is shaped rather like
Pithecanthropus.
The
mediate between
jaws and teeth, also, and ape,
man
determined from the scanty The find is called
so
far
are
as
inter-
can
be
nature of the evidence.
Sinanthropus pekingensis.
Worked
flints with evidences of fire have been discovered in ?lose association with the remains. To
up, there have undoubtedly been some types of mankind on the earth in prehistoric
sum
strange times, but
that
they
link
man
with the ape is open to
question. It is clear that Eoanthropus was truly human ; it is possible, but not certain, that the jaw belonged to
the
same
individual.
They
were
found
not
close
certain that the femur (human) and the cranium (ape-like) of Pithecanthropus have anything to do with one another. Peking man
together.
^as
truly
It is
by
human.
no means so
Several
"
episodes
"
show how
12
Mr. A. Rendle Short
cautiously this palseontological evidence ought to be interpreted. In 1922 Professor Gregory, in America, found a single tooth which he thought was from a man-like ape, and called it Hesperopithecus?" the evening of the apes ! The London papers, of course, came out with the usual imaginary drawings, half-ape, "
In
half-man.
1927 it turned out that the tooth
belonged to neither ape nor man, but to an extinct peccary ! In 1926, at Gardar, in Greenland, parts of a human skull and jaw were found, more ape-like in some
respects than
even
the
It
Rhodesian skull.
missing link, but for the Norwegian twelfth-century Christian graveyard ! According to Professor Hansen, who described it, it is a throwback to primitive man. Sir A. Keith, with far greater probability, concluded that it is the result of acromegaly. But that raises would have been fact that it
the
came
beautiful
a
from
a
question whether the other abnormal skulls may
not be due to disease also.
The
real
ape-like
remains to be
of
ancestor
discovered, if he
man,
ever
therefore,
existed.
With
this agree the candid words of Sir A. Keith, written " The fossil forms which represent this stage in 1931 : in the evolution of been found
;
anthropoid
and
man
have not
yet
their existence is inferred."
unexpected part of the palieontological evidence, however, remains to be mentioned; the The most
farther back ourselves he
we
look for
appears
to
early be.
man
the
more
When skulls
like
with
a
capacity equal to that of a modern European, and in all respects undeniable members of the species Homo sapiens, were discovered at Galley Hill, and at Calaveras in geological deposits at least as old as those in which Pithecanthropus erectus was found, it was felt that the evidence must be lying, and it was more or
cranial
The Problem
less discredited.
But
Oldoway, Kanam,
Leakey
and
of
Man's Origin
during the past year or two Kanjera, in East Africa, Dr.
has obtained skulls of the
early Pleistocene,
13
which
are
modern in
and associated with worked flints of human
facture.
These conclusions
were
L.
great age, type,
same
definitely
at
manu-
verified last year
four committees of experts, anatomists and
by geologists,
sitting simultaneously. In 1925
a
similar find
was
made in the
London in digging the foundations for We thus reach the is
as
ancestors,
so
sapiens words,
the
something
surprising
a
City of building.
conclusion that Homo
old as, or older than, any of his alleged far as at present discovered. In other
palseontological
evidence reduces itself to
not far removed from nil.
Reid Moir has
found worked flints in East Anglia in earlier beds still, the Pliocene, which present evidences of the work of
intelligent people. Very briefly, let us have a psychologists. Some of them have an
word
with
the
been inclined to
adopt the attitude that the ape at his best is as good as man at his worst. They emphasize the cleverness of the tricks which a chimpanzee may be taught, profess
to
would have
be us
ape language, and believe that the Australian aboriginal
able to
recognize
Central African native has
barely the intelligence a beast. But, as Zuckerman points out, it is very doubtful if, according to exact experiment, the chimpanzee is any more intelligent than a baboon, or, ?ne might add, making due allowance for anatomical differences, a dog or a horse. And as for the African or Australian native, it is at length being recognized that you must not judge intelligence by that of the adult brought up in the wilds, but rather by that of the child given a proper education. Granted this, the
?r
?f
Mr. A. Rendle Short
14
best of the native children will be at least
as
good
as
the worst of the
European. September, 1932, tested two large in schools Kenya, the one consisting of native boys and the other of the children of European settlers. He found that the average intelligence of the natives was only 85 per cent, that of the Europeans, but 14 per cent, of the natives surpassed the European average. It is noted that the Europeans were of good stock, probably higher than the average at home. In assessing the relative brain power of Africans and Europeans, it must not be forgotten that the standard of bodily health in the white man is as a Dr. Oliver in
better, and this is found
rule far
to have
an
effect
on
Sequeira, in his admirable April, 1932, drew attention astonishing multiplicity of diseases in the Dr. J. H.
learning capacity.
Chadwick Lecture of 28th the
to
native, whose person in presents the picture of a pathological individual
in
in
most
instances
museum.
Thus
investigation large district 94-8 per cent, of the children under 10 years of age showed symptoms an
one
of chronic malarial infection in
a
reformatory
75 per cent, of the boys revealed infestation with hookworm ; ;
yaws is almost universal, and is a very disabling disease ; syphilis is relatively unimportant; human
tuberculosis, because of the absence of bovine infection,
Europe; pneumonia of pneumococcal origin is an especially fatal disease in natives and is very widespread. It is generally believed
is
less
common
than
in
that the natives of Australia human was
intelligence good enough a
cricket;
another
as
any, but
year is
Central African natives
scopic
are as
or
an
low in the scale of
Australian
two ago to
an can
play
aboriginal
in first-class
eminent
mathematician.
be
to make micro-
taught parasites.
slides and find malarial
To talk
The Problem
of
Man's Origin
15
about the ape being as intelligent as man is too puerile to be taken seriously. A curious experiment has lately been carried out
by Professor and Mrs. Kellog of Indiana University. They brought up their own child, aged ten months, and a chimpanzee, aged seven and a half months, born in captivity, on exactly the same lines, down to the minutest details.
clothed, bathed,
The animal
fed upon
was
fondled and
a
bottle,
the
same given exactly was put in a perambulator due course taught to walk
treatment
as the baby. It and wheeled about, and in and to feed itself with a spoon. Its mistakes were corrected, as one corrects the mistakes of a child.
But the chimpanzee remained child
a
though
child. it
was
It
hungry
make It
put
brought
was
to say,
rapid strides is generally
intelligence
It is
to the animal's credit
it would bite the
The experiment months, that is
shows
and the
chimpanzee
definitely inferior in learning, respond to 58 different words
was
able to
and the child to 68.
that if
a
trousers !
professor's
to
an
just when
a
end after nine child
begins
to
in its education.
granted that human progressive development: that
taken a
for
modern man is far cleverer than his Neolithic ancestors, and these again than the cave-man and the flint-
chipper course,
of our
(early Palaeolithic) times. Of civilization is immensely more complicated. Chellean
Our machines and marvel to
the ancient Britons.
that therefore
fallacious.
medical
our
we
have
better
skill
would be
But the brains
a
argument is
entirely
have laboured and we have entered into their labours ; other men have invented and observed, and we have learned what they had to
teach.
Other
Some
discoveries
were
of
men
the
made
most so
long
remarkable
of
ago that their
human
origin
is
16
Mr. A. Rendle Short
lost in the mists of
Who
antiquity.
the preof the year,
were
geniuses who counted the days properties of opium, learned
historic
discovered the
make cheese and and
bronze,
the
push
inquiry intelligence
to the
boomerang,
the first bow and
or
tamed the first horse ?
or
arrow,
combined copper and tin into the smelting of iron ore ?
[soap,
invented
Who made the first
how to
Indeed,
we
may
farther back of the
man
and learned the secret of
still, and pay tribute who first chipped flints,
making
fire.
As Mr. Reid
Moir, the great authority on Palaeolithic man in East Anglia, has recently stated, the very earliest worked flints known to us, the pre-Chellean, present such differences that
must have been
they
made
by
an
intelligent and well-cultured people, who had, moreover, a great fight to maintain mastery over the numerous wild beasts that shared the lordship of the world with them.
the earliest
No wonder
brains
as
big
as
In this connection
we may of Harvard
Professor
McDougall, authority on psychology the
that
strict
evolution is
intelligibly save
...
widely recognized theory of organic
now
It finds
itself,
at the
with mind upon its hands remainder or surd, that cannot
be
brought into the scheme, or ignored, absurdity of the whole scheme." conclude with a few quotations from first-
us
authorities.
class
advocate of the
however, '
we
lower
by
'
Professor
Le
ape-descent theory,
Gros writes
Clarke, :
"
an
While,
may accept the thesis of man's descent forms of life, there is by no means a
among biologists as to the precise human the which family arrived at its present
consensus
route
It is
at the cost of the
Let
from
"
inadequate. attempts,
enormous
an
:
quote the words of University, a leading
neo-Darwinian
conclusion of its as
known skulls had
ours.
of
opinion
The Problem
Man's Origin
of
17
what may have been the real nature of its In his opinion the common immediate progenitor."
status,
or
and the apes must have been very and quite a small animal, no larger than a It is the different structure of the foot that
ancestor of
far back,
gibbon. leads him that
man
He further
to this conclusion.
recognizes
of external forces upon a more that reacts to its environment in
primitive
play organise
obedience
to what Darwin called Natural Selection is
no
mere
adequate
to
the
explain
of
origin
man.
With this accord the words of the eminent
book
on
Produced remains
Mystery.
?f
our
an
D'Arcy Thompson, Berg's are actually species
in his introduction to
zoologist, Nomogmesis
"
:
How
unsolved riddle
Here at least is
it is
;
time will venture to on
fossil
Museum, wrote : ape ancestry is a myth and ^norance of the real
And again he writes of
behaviourism
man.
of the
"
a
widely
authority
in
Hence the idea of man's
bogey, due to
cause "
the
It is
us
to
our
previous
of human evolution."
profound
anthropoid
separate the
cleft between
recent studies of the
our
with the behaviourism of the
which compel
men
vertebrates, and head of the Natural
History
the ape and the
great
dispute."
Professor H. F. Osborn, the greatest
America
a
conclusion that few
a
apes
as
contrasted
progenitors of entire ape-stock
man
very
from the human stock."
Wood Jones comes conclusion : Man is more "
to
the
following
curious
primitive than the monkeys and apes. It follows that far from being a descendant of the apes, he may be looked upon as their ancestor. Indeed, from the point of view ?f anatomy, I conceive it to be impossible to take ...
.
.
.
any other view." And
Tilney,
in his monumental work
published two o
V?L.
LII.
No. 195.
18 or
Mr. A. Rendle Short three years ago
I
The Brain
from Ape
been destructive rather than constructive. to
to
Man,
Apes are quite as unconcerned in the origin as they are innocent of participation in it." am well aware, disconcertingly aware, that the trend of our line of investigation to-night has
says : of man main
on
"
pull
down
a
popular theory
is less
To have
pleasing
than to
build up another with a wealth of new facts and But we medical men have sufficient argument.
experience of the workings of living organisms to know that simple explanations generally prove to be inadequate. There remaineth very much land to be possessed.
Medico-Chirurgical "
Scire est
Journal
nescire, nisi id
me
Scire alius sciret
SPRING,
1935.
THE PROBLEM OF MAN'S ORIGIN. "Cbe iprcsi&ential Bbbress, fcelivercS on lOtb October, 1934, at tbc opening of tbe 5irt$=seconl> Session of tbe DBrtstol /n>e&ico=(Ibirurgical Society. BY
A. Rendle
Short, M.D., F.R.C.S.,
Professor of Surgery
Surgeon,
1927,
at
Association, c?uld be
in the
Bristol
University of Royal Infirmary.
Bristol ;
Address of the British Sir Arthur Keith said that this problem a
Presidential
definitely settled ; man is derived I1?t, living anthropoid ape such as the gorilla or chimpanzee, but from an ape-like ancestor. The common stem giving rise to man and the apes probably diverged in Miocene times, and our regarded
as
of course, from any
immediate ancestors were between modern man and view is very
intermediate in structure No doubt this the ape.
widely accepted, especially by the older anatomists and by the writers of orthodox text-books ?f science ; no doubt it is commonly taught in nearly every university in the world. Very many facts and B
V?L. LII.
No. 195.
%
Mr. A. Rendle Short
observations way of we are
seem
upsetting beginning
I propose
and
But Science has
to confirm it.
our
"
settled conclusions
to feel
and
just
a
when
about them, before you this
happy bring evidence
to
"
secure
evening, not to establish an alternative theory?apparently the time has not yet come for that to be done?but to show that though Sir Arthur Keith declared that Darwin's theory of the ascent of man Mr. would never be shaken, it is being shaken. Pyecraft, one of the Zoologists at the Natural History Museum, South Kensington, wrote recently concerning the Theory of Natural Selection generally : We seem "
to be threatened with over
the Darwinian
recrudescence of the controversy theory. But now the conflict is a
not to be between learned one
but
professors of biology on the people on the other,
side and the Church and the an
internecine
warfare, that is
to say, between like fifty years to
It has taken
ourselves.
something orthodoxy among the elect; might now all is to be thrown into the melting-pot again." The same appears to be true with regard to the ape theory of man's origin. The doubts about it are beginning to percolate down to the newspapers. The Morning Post wrote, just about the time when England secure
what
we
call
"
went off the Gold Standard
:
There
are
disturbing
signs that the scientific world may have to go off the ape standard. Speeches at last week's meeting of the British
Association
suggested whether the stability
that
are
physical evolution can be maintained, and now Professor Sergio Sergi, at the World's Anthropological Congress, seems to be depressing the value of the missing link.' Owing to the general uneasiness that prevails, it is impossible to give authentic quotations for the evolution theory, but) personally I am getting into something else as soon uncertain
'
of
scientists
The Problem as
I
can
!
Telegraph,
"
And in
in
a
a
more
review of
3
Man's Origin
of
a
serious vein, the Daily book we shall presently "
be quoting from, said in December, 1933 : Since the first flush of enthusiasm which followed the enunciation of the Darwinian
theory of evolution, the tempo of the science of anthropology has suffered a surprising slowing up. This branch of knowledge has advanced But from certainty to perplexity." It may be said : this is only the opinion of newspaper men." We turn, "
therefore, Let
us
to the scientists.
begin by reviewing
line of descent.
the evidence for the ape greatest argument, of
The first and
course, is the very close anatomical similarity between the human body and that of the gorilla or chimpanzee.
The likenesses !t would be
them, they nothing more
are so numerous
and
well known that
so
tedious and unnecessary to enumerate obvious that in the opinion of many
are so
be brothers.
have generally ^ut there
need be said
Amongst
and the ape must bodily resemblances
man
been taken to prove blood-relationship, there is another side to the matter. Although are
hairy
t?e is
coat, and
a
there
also very The human brain is far larger
striking resemblances,
constant differences. and more developed. a
;
animals
are
The ape has a projecting muzzle, foot quite unlike ours ; the great
a thumb. Man has no vibrissse, opposable (tactile hairs) ; every other mammal has them. The apes have no hymen. No doubt it will be replied that these are merely the differences between species or genera, but a much more considerable point is next to be mentioned. The trend of modern zoological research goes to show that likeness of bodily structure 18 no proof of common descent or blood-relationship. There is a phenomenon amongst animals, living and extinct, known by the name of Convergence ;
like
"
"
Mr. A. Rendle Short
4
totally unrelated animals, widely different in their geological history and zoological relationships, may have a strangely similar bodily structure or individual two
And this
organs, if their mode of life is similar. Convergence is not an occasional and
phenomenon; examples of it widespread. Let me remind you the
exceptional
are
numerous
of
few.
a
and
How like
newt, that divides its time between
common
stream and
shore, is the crocodile, whose habits in
that
are
and
respect the
similar !
newt
Yet the crocodile is Their
amphibian.
an
a
reptile
zoological
very far apart; their resemblance is due to the suitability of that particular pattern of
relationships legs,
tail
betwixt
are
and land
general and
conformation for The
water.
vertebrates, e.g. toad, is, down
to
a
life
spent
spermatozoon of minute details, like
free-swimming, lowly form of life called Trichomonas. no one imagines that vertebrates are descended from Trichomonas. The extinct (Mesozoic) plants a
But
called Bennettitales show
a
flower, with male
sort of
and female elements and
pollen, but they are Gymnosperms, allied to modern Cycads, and cannot possibly be ancestors of modern flowering plants. Common wheat exists in several
varieties, bearded
and beardless ; white, red or black eared ; winter and spring. But just the same varieties are found of other
wheats, spelt, rye and barley.
This
must
be
an
grain ; it cannot be chance. The Dipnoi (air-breathing fish living in mud or water) cannot be the ancestors of frogs, toads, etc., but they share with them the paired lungs, the partitioned auricle (of the heart) and many other characters. The eyes of the octopus are just like those of mammal, with cornea, iris, ciliary body, lens and
inherent law of
retina
;
but the
octopus is
not the ancestor of the
The Problem
vertebrates.
(amphioxus)
Two animals
are
Man's Origin
vertebrates
Lowly or a
of
5
have
no
eyes
very elementary eye (the hag fish). known that have eyes like an old
the upper half to see m air and the low in water, but one is a fish and the other is a beetle.
gentleman's bifocal
spectacles,
Three
types of fish, the electric eel, Torpedo and Malapterurus, can give powerful electric shocks, but
they
of
a
are
scorpion
The claws of
unrelated.
quite
are on
and the
the
and
same
Australasia. Africa.
There
pattern. The glow-worm deep-sea fish, are
are
the most remarkable
by the primitive type) of
furnished of
forms that mimic most of the
of the mammals of
types
There is
lobster and
also certain
firefly, luminous in the dark. One of examples of Convergence is Marsupials (pouched mammals common
a
Europe,
Asia and
volplaning opossum like a flying squirrel flying lemur, the flesh-eating Thylacine like a wolf, another marsupial like a rat, and another like a bear! Nor is it only in outward form that a
or
Convergence
is
The
crocodile, like the bird, has four-chambered heart. The extinct flying lizard, the pterosaur, had air-filled bones, and the foramen seen.
a
admitting
the air situated
Bower are
they
points
bisexual
a
calls attention extinct
to
reptiles dinosaurs with
ichthyosaurus,
flesh-eating
the
and horns
just
plants and animals scarcely credible that
is
common
Osborn
ancestor.
strange parallelism between mammals; the huge
modern
(Triceratops)
whale ; cynodonts with like
where it is in birds.
that both it
but
bisexual, have
out
a
like
a
pterosaurs, teeth
rhinoceros like
like
a
a
;
bat;
dog;
iguanodon, walking on its hind legs and tail like a kangaroo ; the turtle, armour-plated like an armadillo, ?r
the extinct
glyptodon.
Surely
all this must be
law,
6
Mr. A. Rendle Short
not chance.
Especially
when
we
find that each of these
not one, but many coincident modificathe ; e.g. heavy-headed rhinoceros must have massive legs and a strong neck; the flesh-eating
types require
tions
Thylacine, the have agility to
wolf and the extinct
cynodont
must
hunt their prey. The most recent, and one of the most eminent of writers on the descent of man is Professor Le Gros
Clarke, who of
descent
on
the whole is in favour of the
from
theory
but he
frankly ape ancestor, acknowledges the difficulties and pitfalls of the hypothesis. He says : "In the evaluation of genetic affinities anatomical differences are more important as negative evidence than anatomical resemblances are as positive evidence. It becomes apparent that if this thesis is carried to a logical conclusion, it will necessarily demand a much greater scope for the phenomenon of parallelism or convergence in evolution than has usually been conceded by evolutionists. The an
fact is that the minute and detailed researches which have been carried out
by comparative
anatomists in
parallelism in evolutionary development proceeding on a large scale, and is no longer to be regarded as an incidental curiosity which has occurred sporadically in the course of evolution. Indeed, it is hardly possible recent years have made it certain that
has been
for those who
comparative anatomists to realize the fundamental part which this phenomenon has
played We
are
are
in the
not
evolutionary process."
driven to the
conclusion, therefore, that
similarity between man and the ape may be example of Convergence ; in other words, the resemblances do not definitely prove blood-relationship.
the
another But
further,
Anatomy
in the
as
Wood Jones, the Professor of
University
of
Melbourne, has pointed
The Problem
of
Man's Origin
7
anatomical features that make it easier to believe the apes are descended from man? an impossible hypothesis?rather than man from an
out, there
are some
extinct ape.
The
course
of evolution
never
retraces
its steps (Dollo's Law). If a modification has once been made, it persists. Now in some respects man's structure is
Like early mammals, the ethmo-lachrymal, parietal articulations. more
than that of the apes. but unlike the apes, he retains
primitive
more
ethmo-sphenoid,
and
The male external
sphenogenitalia are
primitive primates than those of primitive muscles, e.g. the pyramidalis
like those of
the ape. and the
Some
pronator radii teres, the
law
are
absent in the apes.
of
Recapitulation, every According animal has to climb up its own genealogical tree, that is to say, its ontogeny repeats its phylogeny, or its to
development
in
embyro gives
evidence of its
ancestry.
throw-backs may occur, that is, pathological specimens will be born from time to time that resemble
Also,
the
Judged by either of these tests, the ape-ancestor theory stands definitely discredited. It is true the infant may have a hairy skin (lanugo), but so have nearly all mammals besides the apes. The sloped-back forehead, great eyebrow ridges, projecting muzzle, and opposable great toe are never seen in ancestor.
the human foetus a
;
in
fact, the ape foetus is
more
like
human being than vice versa. The Darwinian tubercle
the human ear, and multiple nipples, which are often quoted as proving man's animal ancestry, are nothing to the because no ape has long, pointed ears
on
point,
or
Then consider the congenital with which our profession makes us well
multiple nipples.
abnormalities acquainted
:
dislocations, spina bifida.
foot, hare lip, cleft palate, congenital naevi, supernumerary fingers or toes,
club
None of these recall the ape.
Who has
8
Mr. A. Rendle Short
ever
seen
a
human
with
toe ?
We
opposable great that the
then,
argument
projecting
a
muzzle
or
the conclusion, anatomy and develop-
come
from
to
ment is too uncertain to be relied upon. In the
opinion
of Professor Wood Jones and others man's ancestor was
not
an
and in
back, suggests
little creature called
a
described The
ape, but must be sought much farther He a much more primitive mammal.
as a
next
Tarsius, which has been
living
fossil.
main
argument for the ape descent physiology. It is maintained,
is derived from
theory for
instance, that ape's blood and human blood are identical, and differ from that of other mammals ; this is taken to prove close relationship. Far more work has been published of the
comparative anatomy comparative physiology.
primates
than
on
the their
on
The best modern summary of the latter known to me is Zuckerman's Functional
Affinities of Man, Monkeys, end of 1933.
apes cannot be animals has of the
man
and
Apes, published
He shows that the blood of a
regarded good deal in
as
common. are
and the
The blood of all
identical.
and most mammals
man
at the
The red
exactly
corpuscles
alike
under
microscope ; the haemoglobin of man and indistinguishable by the chemist.
mammals is
Nuttall showed in 1904, human
give
the
same
a
much
serum
there
are
and ape serum though for ape's is needed.
But
Human blood contains hetero-
the red
corpuscles of the ape, and it would be most dangerous to use transfusion in man. Basophile
agglutinins against vice versa, so that ape's blood for
As
serum
precipitin reaction, higher concentration
differences.
most
very scarce in human blood, are 3 per cent, of gorilla's white cells, 15 per cent, in the orang and 20 per cent, in the chimpanzee. By the
leucocytes,
which
are
The Problem of
use
anti-erythrocyte
of
Man's Origin
9
Landsteiner and Miller
sera
were able to show in 1925 that human and ape red-
blood
corpuscles
distinguished
identical
not
are
from
one
another,
and
but those of
can a
be
white
is very fairly pointed Sir Arthur Keith himself in his article on the
man and out
by origin of
(This
negro cannot.
a
man
in the last edition of the
Encyclopedia
Britannica.) They
go on to conclude: "The experiments described show that a definite and constant serological difference is demonstrable between the
bloods of
and
the
anthropoids studied, This and again : orang-outang conclusion is in agreement with the accepted view that man has not evolved directly from any of the existing species of primates, as was formerly supposed, but that the Catarrhina, anthropoids and man have man
chimpanzee
two
all sprung from
Zuckerman
physiologically
"
"
and
;
a common
further
stock."
reminds
us
that
man
different from the apes in his
use
is of
fire and tools, in his function of speech, his carnivorous diet and custom of monogamy. The last two he regards
as
related to
go about in small
females
;
find their a
living,
they own
the
one
parties,
live
mostly
food.
another. one
Anthropoid apes adult male with several
on a
When
vegetable diet, and all took to hunting for
man
females, especially if pregnant
or
nursing,
were less able to collect for themselves and had to be
fed
by the male, who could not protect all his wives from other marauding males, and did not want too many mouths to feed, so contented himself with monogamy. We
Here
the evidence of palaeontology. must definitely put out of our minds the of ape-men that appear from
turn next to
we
wholly imaginary picture fcime
to time in the illustrated London papers.
As
10
Me. A. Rendle Short "
The missing-link says : must be deleted from our minds, and I find
Professor
Wood
Jones
pictures occupation less worthy of the science of anthropology
no
than the not
business of
modelling, nightmare products of
unfashionable
and
these
painting drawing imagination, and lending them in the process an utterly false value of apparent reality." He compares it with the pseudo-science of the oJd phrenological charts. Confining ourselves to real evidence, although
the whole world has been ransacked in the search for "
the actual discoveries have been few, and have taken unexpected forms. When the first skulls of Neanderthal man were found, with his huge
missing links,"
brow
and head sunk
ridges
on
the
chest, it seemed
as
if the true ape-man was before us. But Neanderthal man had nothing else ape-like about him. His brain was as big as ours ; his teeth were tru]y human ; he used
tools, lit fires &nd buried his dead.
Rhodesian
appears to be closely allied to the type, and so does the Galilee skull. On
man
Neanderthal the other
So-called
hand, the Tauungs skull, called Australo-
" pithecus, also first described as a missing link," is really that of a young anthropoid ape (Keith). A better case can be made out for three other fossil
types, yet all with serious reservations. I append a very brief summary (the details are taken from the
writings of Sir Arthur Keith). First in the field was Pithecanthropus erectus, found in 1894 at Trinil, in Java, by Dubois. These remains consist of the top of
a
some
skull, three teeth, and, found 15
possibly, were
yards, a
found
a
piece are
femur.
of
a
at
a
distance of
To these is to be
added,
The beds in which these
jaw.
considered to be late Pleistocene.
probably early Ice Age ; Pliocene
is the
Pliocene, or more (Pleistocene means the
geological time-period
next
The Problem
of
Man's Origin
The skull has been
earlier.) that of
a
Kollman), (Dubois,
variously
11
described
large extinct ape (by Virchow, or intermediate between man
as
Bumuller, and
ape
Keith and
others). Next in order is Eoanthropus dawsoni, found by
Mr. Charles Dawson at Piltdown in Sussex in 1911? 1912. The geological level, again, may be late Pliocene
early Pleistocene, and again there is a discrepancy between the skull, which has the shape and brain capacity of modern man (Keith), and the jaw found near it, which is ape-like. A piece of worked elephant or
bone
was
More
also discovered close in
recently,
1928-29,
a
by. nearly complete
fossil
skull with several fragmentary jaw bones and teeth has been found near Peking by Mr. Pei, and described
by the late Dr. Davidson Black. These also are dated early Pleistocene. The skull has a brain capacity equal to that of a human, but is shaped rather like
Pithecanthropus.
The
mediate between
jaws and teeth, also, and ape,
man
determined from the scanty The find is called
so
far
are
as
inter-
can
be
nature of the evidence.
Sinanthropus pekingensis.
Worked
flints with evidences of fire have been discovered in ?lose association with the remains. To
up, there have undoubtedly been some types of mankind on the earth in prehistoric
sum
strange times, but
that
they
link
man
with the ape is open to
question. It is clear that Eoanthropus was truly human ; it is possible, but not certain, that the jaw belonged to
the
same
individual.
They
were
found
not
close
certain that the femur (human) and the cranium (ape-like) of Pithecanthropus have anything to do with one another. Peking man
together.
^as
truly
It is
by
human.
no means so
Several
"
episodes
"
show how
12
Mr. A. Rendle Short
cautiously this palseontological evidence ought to be interpreted. In 1922 Professor Gregory, in America, found a single tooth which he thought was from a man-like ape, and called it Hesperopithecus?" the evening of the apes ! The London papers, of course, came out with the usual imaginary drawings, half-ape, "
In
half-man.
1927 it turned out that the tooth
belonged to neither ape nor man, but to an extinct peccary ! In 1926, at Gardar, in Greenland, parts of a human skull and jaw were found, more ape-like in some
respects than
even
the
It
Rhodesian skull.
missing link, but for the Norwegian twelfth-century Christian graveyard ! According to Professor Hansen, who described it, it is a throwback to primitive man. Sir A. Keith, with far greater probability, concluded that it is the result of acromegaly. But that raises would have been fact that it
the
came
beautiful
a
from
a
question whether the other abnormal skulls may
not be due to disease also.
The
real
ape-like
remains to be
of
ancestor
discovered, if he
man,
ever
therefore,
existed.
With
this agree the candid words of Sir A. Keith, written " The fossil forms which represent this stage in 1931 : in the evolution of been found
;
anthropoid
and
man
have not
yet
their existence is inferred."
unexpected part of the palieontological evidence, however, remains to be mentioned; the The most
farther back ourselves he
we
look for
appears
to
early be.
man
the
more
When skulls
like
with
a
capacity equal to that of a modern European, and in all respects undeniable members of the species Homo sapiens, were discovered at Galley Hill, and at Calaveras in geological deposits at least as old as those in which Pithecanthropus erectus was found, it was felt that the evidence must be lying, and it was more or
cranial
The Problem
less discredited.
But
Oldoway, Kanam,
Leakey
and
of
Man's Origin
during the past year or two Kanjera, in East Africa, Dr.
has obtained skulls of the
early Pleistocene,
13
which
are
modern in
and associated with worked flints of human
facture.
These conclusions
were
L.
great age, type,
same
definitely
at
manu-
verified last year
four committees of experts, anatomists and
by geologists,
sitting simultaneously. In 1925
a
similar find
was
made in the
London in digging the foundations for We thus reach the is
as
ancestors,
so
sapiens words,
the
something
surprising
a
City of building.
conclusion that Homo
old as, or older than, any of his alleged far as at present discovered. In other
palseontological
evidence reduces itself to
not far removed from nil.
Reid Moir has
found worked flints in East Anglia in earlier beds still, the Pliocene, which present evidences of the work of
intelligent people. Very briefly, let us have a psychologists. Some of them have an
word
with
the
been inclined to
adopt the attitude that the ape at his best is as good as man at his worst. They emphasize the cleverness of the tricks which a chimpanzee may be taught, profess
to
would have
be us
ape language, and believe that the Australian aboriginal
able to
recognize
Central African native has
barely the intelligence a beast. But, as Zuckerman points out, it is very doubtful if, according to exact experiment, the chimpanzee is any more intelligent than a baboon, or, ?ne might add, making due allowance for anatomical differences, a dog or a horse. And as for the African or Australian native, it is at length being recognized that you must not judge intelligence by that of the adult brought up in the wilds, but rather by that of the child given a proper education. Granted this, the
?r
?f
Mr. A. Rendle Short
14
best of the native children will be at least
as
good
as
the worst of the
European. September, 1932, tested two large in schools Kenya, the one consisting of native boys and the other of the children of European settlers. He found that the average intelligence of the natives was only 85 per cent, that of the Europeans, but 14 per cent, of the natives surpassed the European average. It is noted that the Europeans were of good stock, probably higher than the average at home. In assessing the relative brain power of Africans and Europeans, it must not be forgotten that the standard of bodily health in the white man is as a Dr. Oliver in
better, and this is found
rule far
to have
an
effect
on
Sequeira, in his admirable April, 1932, drew attention astonishing multiplicity of diseases in the Dr. J. H.
learning capacity.
Chadwick Lecture of 28th the
to
native, whose person in presents the picture of a pathological individual
in
in
most
instances
museum.
Thus
investigation large district 94-8 per cent, of the children under 10 years of age showed symptoms an
one
of chronic malarial infection in
a
reformatory
75 per cent, of the boys revealed infestation with hookworm ; ;
yaws is almost universal, and is a very disabling disease ; syphilis is relatively unimportant; human
tuberculosis, because of the absence of bovine infection,
Europe; pneumonia of pneumococcal origin is an especially fatal disease in natives and is very widespread. It is generally believed
is
less
common
than
in
that the natives of Australia human was
intelligence good enough a
cricket;
another
as
any, but
year is
Central African natives
scopic
are as
or
an
low in the scale of
Australian
two ago to
an can
play
aboriginal
in first-class
eminent
mathematician.
be
to make micro-
taught parasites.
slides and find malarial
To talk
The Problem
of
Man's Origin
15
about the ape being as intelligent as man is too puerile to be taken seriously. A curious experiment has lately been carried out
by Professor and Mrs. Kellog of Indiana University. They brought up their own child, aged ten months, and a chimpanzee, aged seven and a half months, born in captivity, on exactly the same lines, down to the minutest details.
clothed, bathed,
The animal
fed upon
was
fondled and
a
bottle,
the
same given exactly was put in a perambulator due course taught to walk
treatment
as the baby. It and wheeled about, and in and to feed itself with a spoon. Its mistakes were corrected, as one corrects the mistakes of a child.
But the chimpanzee remained child
a
though
child. it
was
It
hungry
make It
put
brought
was
to say,
rapid strides is generally
intelligence
It is
to the animal's credit
it would bite the
The experiment months, that is
shows
and the
chimpanzee
definitely inferior in learning, respond to 58 different words
was
able to
and the child to 68.
that if
a
trousers !
professor's
to
an
just when
a
end after nine child
begins
to
in its education.
granted that human progressive development: that
taken a
for
modern man is far cleverer than his Neolithic ancestors, and these again than the cave-man and the flint-
chipper course,
of our
(early Palaeolithic) times. Of civilization is immensely more complicated. Chellean
Our machines and marvel to
the ancient Britons.
that therefore
fallacious.
medical
our
we
have
better
skill
would be
But the brains
a
argument is
entirely
have laboured and we have entered into their labours ; other men have invented and observed, and we have learned what they had to
teach.
Other
Some
discoveries
were
of
men
the
made
most so
long
remarkable
of
ago that their
human
origin
is
16
Mr. A. Rendle Short
lost in the mists of
Who
antiquity.
the preof the year,
were
geniuses who counted the days properties of opium, learned
historic
discovered the
make cheese and and
bronze,
the
push
inquiry intelligence
to the
boomerang,
the first bow and
or
tamed the first horse ?
or
arrow,
combined copper and tin into the smelting of iron ore ?
[soap,
invented
Who made the first
how to
Indeed,
we
may
farther back of the
man
and learned the secret of
still, and pay tribute who first chipped flints,
making
fire.
As Mr. Reid
Moir, the great authority on Palaeolithic man in East Anglia, has recently stated, the very earliest worked flints known to us, the pre-Chellean, present such differences that
must have been
they
made
by
an
intelligent and well-cultured people, who had, moreover, a great fight to maintain mastery over the numerous wild beasts that shared the lordship of the world with them.
the earliest
No wonder
brains
as
big
as
In this connection
we may of Harvard
Professor
McDougall, authority on psychology the
that
strict
evolution is
intelligibly save
...
widely recognized theory of organic
now
It finds
itself,
at the
with mind upon its hands remainder or surd, that cannot
be
brought into the scheme, or ignored, absurdity of the whole scheme." conclude with a few quotations from first-
us
authorities.
class
advocate of the
however, '
we
lower
by
'
Professor
Le
ape-descent theory,
Gros writes
Clarke, :
"
an
While,
may accept the thesis of man's descent forms of life, there is by no means a
among biologists as to the precise human the which family arrived at its present
consensus
route
It is
at the cost of the
Let
from
"
inadequate. attempts,
enormous
an
:
quote the words of University, a leading
neo-Darwinian
conclusion of its as
known skulls had
ours.
of
opinion
The Problem
Man's Origin
of
17
what may have been the real nature of its In his opinion the common immediate progenitor."
status,
or
and the apes must have been very and quite a small animal, no larger than a It is the different structure of the foot that
ancestor of
far back,
gibbon. leads him that
man
He further
to this conclusion.
recognizes
of external forces upon a more that reacts to its environment in
primitive
play organise
obedience
to what Darwin called Natural Selection is
no
mere
adequate
to
the
explain
of
origin
man.
With this accord the words of the eminent
book
on
Produced remains
Mystery.
?f
our
an
D'Arcy Thompson, Berg's are actually species
in his introduction to
zoologist, Nomogmesis
"
:
How
unsolved riddle
Here at least is
it is
;
time will venture to on
fossil
Museum, wrote : ape ancestry is a myth and ^norance of the real
And again he writes of
behaviourism
man.
of the
"
a
widely
authority
in
Hence the idea of man's
bogey, due to
cause "
the
It is
us
to
our
previous
of human evolution."
profound
anthropoid
separate the
cleft between
recent studies of the
our
with the behaviourism of the
which compel
men
vertebrates, and head of the Natural
History
the ape and the
great
dispute."
Professor H. F. Osborn, the greatest
America
a
conclusion that few
a
apes
as
contrasted
progenitors of entire ape-stock
man
very
from the human stock."
Wood Jones comes conclusion : Man is more "
to
the
following
curious
primitive than the monkeys and apes. It follows that far from being a descendant of the apes, he may be looked upon as their ancestor. Indeed, from the point of view ?f anatomy, I conceive it to be impossible to take ...
.
.
.
any other view." And
Tilney,
in his monumental work
published two o
V?L.
LII.
No. 195.
18 or
Mr. A. Rendle Short three years ago
I
The Brain
from Ape
been destructive rather than constructive. to
to
Man,
Apes are quite as unconcerned in the origin as they are innocent of participation in it." am well aware, disconcertingly aware, that the trend of our line of investigation to-night has
says : of man main
on
"
pull
down
a
popular theory
is less
To have
pleasing
than to
build up another with a wealth of new facts and But we medical men have sufficient argument.
experience of the workings of living organisms to know that simple explanations generally prove to be inadequate. There remaineth very much land to be possessed.
