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: It’s tricky to find the missing link between children’s books and adult fiction.
Origin of missing link
1Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use missing link in a sentence
Would the Perfect One make a broken circle, a chain with missing links, a desire without its gratification?
Joyce's Investments | Fannie E. NewberryThere have also been discoveries of missing links among the living.
The Churches and Modern Thought | Philip VivianIt was dug out of the old red sandstone—and there are missing links!
The I.W.W. | Paul Frederick BrissendenHe would be obliged, however, even on this hypothesis, to admit that there must be a host of missing links.
The Story of the Earth and Man | J. W. DawsonWill they ever be found, the missing links, the pieces of the puzzle, the answer to the 'whys' and 'wherefores?'
Lippa | Beatrice Egerton
British Dictionary definitions for 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
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
Cultural definitions for 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.”
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.
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