Type-level map over list of types

If you absolutely have to do this kind of thing, Shapeless can make it both cleaner and safer: import shapeless._ def findByType[T](xs: Seq[Any])(implicit t: Typeable[T]) = xs.flatMap(t.cast).headOption Note that unlike your implementation, this one won't give wrong answers on many of the standard library's generic types: scala> findByType[List[String]](Seq(List(1), List("a"), 'foo)) res3: Option[