missing link
- a hypothetical form of animal assumed to have constituted a connecting link between the anthropoid apes and humans, identified by some authorities as constituting the genus Australopithecus.
- something lacking for the completion of a series or sequence.
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Origin of missing link
First recorded in 1850–55
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for missing link
Historical Examples
There does seem a missing-link somewhere, observed the girl.
Nothing But the TruthFrederic S. Isham
missing link
- the missing link (sometimes capitals) a hypothetical extinct animal or animal group, formerly thought to be intermediate between the anthropoid apes and man
- any missing section or part in an otherwise complete series
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
missing link
A supposed animal midway in evolution between apes and humans. The term is based on a misunderstanding about the theory of evolution, which does not state that humans are descended from apes, but rather maintains that both humans and apes descended from a common ancestor. Modern evolutionary scientists do not search for a “missing link.”
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The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.