Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T05:09:57.106Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The Simian Basis of Human Mechanics or Ape to Engineer*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Earnest A. Hooton*
Affiliation:
Peabody Museum, Harvard University

Extract

My subject should not be construed by the refined as a malicious innuendo, nor by the vulgar(unrepresented here, of course) as a ‘ dirty dig ’. The transition from ape to engineer is from the ridiculous to the sublime-or, at any rate, from a little short of one to a little short of the other. This handsome statement must serve as my panegyric on mechanical science. As an anthropologist, I am perturbed by the fact that human invention has outstripped man's organic development, and his control of nature his control of himself. So I propose to discuss the organic basis of mechanical achievement and the cause of man's physical and social lag in relation to his material progress.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1938

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 The Mentality of Apes, by Köhler, , pp. 139172, N.Y., 1925.Google Scholar

2 The Great Apes, by Yerkes, Robert M. and Yerkes, Ada W., p. 513, New Haven, 1929.Google Scholar