Evolution and the Darwinian theory of human descent viewed from the standpoint of a multiple primate ancestry by Charles K. Mills : papers and discussion of the paper by Dr. Mills / Dr. Francis X. Dercum, Dr. William B. Cadwalader, Dr. J. Hendrie Lloyd and Dr. J. Parsons Schaeffer.

  • Mills, Charles K. (Charles Karsner), 1845-1931
Date:
[1928]
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Evolution and the Darwinian theory of human descent viewed from the standpoint of a multiple primate ancestry by Charles K. Mills : papers and discussion of the paper by Dr. Mills / Dr. Francis X. Dercum, Dr. William B. Cadwalader, Dr. J. Hendrie Lloyd and Dr. J. Parsons Schaeffer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    / anthropoids. The discovery of Australopithecus, which occurred only a little more than two years ago, has opened up great vistas in the history of both anthropoid and human evolution. Dart estimated the cranial capacity of Australopithecus at 625 cc.; he regards Australopithecus as intermediate between the chimpanzee and Pithecanthropus. After Pithecanthropus, one would come to a man at the level of the Piltdown man, Eoanthropus (Dawson), then to the Heidelberg man, the Neanderthal man, the Rhodesian man, the Cromagnon man and, finally, modern man. It is not claimed, of course, that all of these forms are ancestrally related to each other; but that they represent stages and periods in the history of human evolution there can be no doubt. The Role of the Catalysts in Evolution. Dr. Francis X. Dercum. In his address on “Darwin’s Theory of Man’s Descent, as it Stands Today,” read before the British Association for the Advancement of Science on Aug. 31, 1927, Sir Arthur Keith called attention to the possible role of the hormones in evolution. In my address, “On the Dynamic Factor in Evolution,” delivered April 28, 1927, at the Inauguration of the Bicentenary of the American Philo¬ sophical Society, I expressed myself on this theme as follows: It has long been known that certain substances may induce changes in other substances merely by their presence, they themselves not undergoing any change what¬ ever. For instance, dilute sulphuric acid added to starch will convert the latter into glucose, the acid itself neither qualitatively nor quantitatively undergoing any change. Again, hydrogen peroxide is decomposed by soluble alkalis, also by the mere presence of insoluble substances such as metallic silver or metallic platinum; these substances, as before, do not undergo any change. A similar statement applies to the action of platinum in bringing about the oxidation of alcoholic vapor and to the action of spongy platinum in bringing about the union of hydrogen and oxygen. Similar truths apply to both gold and silver, though neither are as active as platinum. The various substances enumerated, it should be mentioned, may perform the role, on the one hand, of reducing agents or on the other, of constructive agents, the chem¬ ical bodies resulting being either more simple or more complex in structure. Such action, I need hardly state, is termed catalysis. It implies more especially the setting in motion or the precipitating of possible or impending chemical changes. The action is one in which given substances by their presence alone set into activity chemical processes otherwise dormant without themselves suffering any chemical change. Some facts are especially suggestive; for instance, in the union of hydrogen and oxygen, brought about by the presence of spongy platinum, the enormous increase of surface in the spongy platinum is the immediate causative factor of the union. Such facts as these, so well known, are, I believe, of the utmost importance in interpreting the phenomena of living matter. It is hardly necessary to call to mind the fact that when a food particle is taken into the interior of an ameba, it gradually disappears and finally becomes part of the substance of the ameba. It would appear that, as in higher animals, the protoplasm of the ameba has the power of fragmenting proteins, fats and carbohydrates. In the higher animals, protein is reduced successively into peptones, amino-acids and a series of intermediate products until the final stage of urea, uric acid and kindred substances is reached. Carbohydrates are by a long series of intermediate stages converted into carbon dioxide and water. Fats, also, are decomposed into glycerin and fatty acids and by a further reduction into simpler bodies until end-products are likewise reached. During these changes, energy is released. There is no inherent improbability in the inference that changes like or analogous to these take place in the ameba. Certain it is that the various food particles are so metamorphosed that they disappear into the general substance of the organism and after a time can no longer be distinguished. Evidently they have added to the substance of the ameba. Facts and inference both justify the statement