THE WORLD OF LIVING ORGANISMS 169 



they must also be accounted among the resources of the 

 species, they will be described in a later chapter. 



SUBJECTIVE AND OBJECTIVE ANNIHILATION 

 OF THE INDICATIONS 



If we combine what we learn concerning the actions in 

 all the function-circles taken together, we may say that the 

 outcome is the annihilation of the prevailing indication that 

 led to the action, and this automatically brings the action 

 to a conclusion. 



Annihilation of the indications takes place in two kinds of 

 ways, which differ from one another in principle. An example 

 will help us to understand this better. 



A bee which finds a small drop of honey sucks it up and 

 then flies away. In this case it is obvious that the indication 

 for honey — i.e. its scent — which gives rise to the action of 

 sucking, must disappear as soon as the drop is finished. This 

 is an objective annihilation of the indication. 



Suppose, however, that there is a great quantity of honey. 

 After a time the bee stops sucking and flies away, leaving 

 the remainder untouched. In this case the indication was 

 not annihilated objectively. Why then did the bee cease its 

 action ? It has been found that if, while a bee is feeding, its 

 abdomen be carefully cut off, the insect will go on drinking 

 with the honey flowing out of it again behind. In this case 

 the action does not cease ; the bee goes on drinking like Baron 

 Miinchhausen's horse. The check set up by satiety is lacking. 



We do not know all the details concerning that check, 

 but from what we have learnt about the inner world of animals, 

 we have every reason to assume that either directly through 

 reflex mechanism, or indirectly through the chemistry of the 

 mark-organ, a threshold is reached, and thereby the indication 

 is subjectively annihilated. 



Subjective annihilation of the indication plays the chief 



