-=> Quoting Laurie Appleton to 25martin Goldberg <=-

LA> "The missing link between man and the apes, whose absence has
LA> comforted religious fundamentalists since the days of Darwin,
LA> is merely the most glamorous of a whole hierarchy of phantom
LA> creatures."
LA> "In the fossil record, missing links are the rule: ....The
LA> more scientists have searched for the transitional forms that
LA> lie between species, the more they have been frustrated."
LA> (Newsweek, 3rd. November, 1980, p. 54)

"The notion that there was a creature, yet undiscovered, who represents a `missing link' between man and ape is of course nonsensical on its face, as a moment's thought demonstrates. The evolution of man was an enormously long and complicated process in which, obviously, no one `link' could possibly vary so much from any other that it would stand out. Further, the notion of a `missing link' is based on a misconception of Darwinian theories of evolution. Darwin neither said nor implied that man is descended from the ape, as `missing link' implies; he merely postulated that man and ape evolved from a common ancestor. In his own words, `man is the co-descendant with other mammals of a common progenitor.'" -- Tom Burnam