AN UNSOLVED MYSTERY

Evening Star, Issue 19589, 22 June 1927, Page 2

AN UNSOLVED MYSTERY

—, HOW END MAN BECOME INTELLIGENT ? The evidence that man is evolved from a common ancestor with the anthropoid ape is complete. In these words Professor Sir Arthur Keith, conservator of the Royal College of Surgeons and one of the world’s greatest anthropologists, summed up the present position of science regarding Darwin’s theory of man’s descent. In a special statement to a 1 Daily Mail ’ reporter he said that the knowledge of man had increased tenfold since Oarwin first made known his startling Discoveries. This autumn, when the British Association meets at Leeds, Sir Arthur Keith will give his presidential address on ‘ Darwin’s Theory of Man’s Descent as it Stands To-day.' Before the gathering of the greatest British scientists he will sum up the evidence. "My conclusion will be wholly in support of Darwin, and I shall gi into greater detail,” he mid to ihe interviewer. “We are writing the history of man in a new way; Darwin’s book was the beginning. We cannot yti say why the human stock' has bunded into the intelligent bemg chat man m to-day, or why ihe peer anthropoid spe should have remained so low down the scale. Neither .do we know everything about the beginning of life or its end. That is not our duty. At present one can only speculate about the beginning and the end of life. Scientists all over the world are working at this great task of compiling mams history. Professor Nuttall has shown us that the chimpanzee’s blood and that of other anthropoid apes gives the same reactions as human blood. This happens with the blood of no other animal. We know, too, that certain human diseases will also attack the anthropoid. Our work for the most part is in terms of thousands of years. Here is a tibia (leg bone) which has just come from Ipswich and is 10,000 years ol ""Educated people,” added Sir Arthur “ are prepared to believe in evolution. In the United States, however, there is a large section of the population unacquainted with what has happened, and that section refuses to bei lieve in the theory of man’s descent. In England that is not so. We are better educated here; and in the church the theory has 9, good follow* ing.”