MAN'S HIND LEGS
Sir,-"When man, the aloof animal, rose on his hind legs, says James Thurber, he began to chatter and develop reason." As this statement is the first sentence in The Listener’s introduction to a scientific subject, "A Study of the Mind," it might be taken as a statement of scientific fact, which it is not. We have no proof that Man ever had any hind legs to rise upon, We have had for the last hundred years or more a vast number of theories as to what early man was like, but ho conclusive proof, Isolated skulls and fragments of bone whose age has been guessed at have been dug-up, and violent scientific controversies have raged round them. The real fact is that the origin of man and the development of reason is a subject for speculation to physical science; and while it is, ddgmatic statements such as Thurber’s should be presented. as theories and nothing more.
E.
SATCHELL
(Auckland).
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19560810.2.12.5
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 888, 10 August 1956, Page 5
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162MAN'S HIND LEGS New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 888, 10 August 1956, Page 5
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