ANIMAL BEHAVIOR. 



331 



we ourselves are born blind to these utilities, and only discover 

 them after a period of experience and education. The dis- 

 covery may seem to be instantaneous, but really it is a matter of 

 growth and development, the earlier stages of which conscious- 

 ness does not reveal. 



Blindness to the utilities of action no more iniplies uncon- 

 sciousness in animals than in man. It is the worst form of 

 anthropomorphism to claim that animal automatism is devoid 

 of consciousness, for the claim rests on nothing but the assump- 

 tion that there are no degrees of consciousness below the 

 human. If human organization is of animal origin, then the 

 presumption would be in favor of the same origin for conscious- 

 ness and intelligence. Automatism could not exclude every 

 degree of consciousness without excluding every form of 

 organic adaptation. 



10. The clock-like regularity and inflexibility of instinct, like 

 the once popular notion of the "fixity" of species, have been 

 greatly exaggerated. They imply nothing more than a low 

 degree of variability under normal conditions. Discrimination 

 and choice cannot be wholly excluded in every degree, even in 

 the most rigid uniformity of instinctive action. Close study 

 and experiment with the most machine-like instincts always 

 reveal some degree of adaptability to new conditions. This 

 was fliade clear by Darwin's studies on instincts, and it has 

 been demonstrated over and over again by later investigators, 

 and by none more thoroughly than by the Peckhams in the 

 case of spiders and wasps. ^ Intelligence implies varying 

 degrees of freedom of choice, but never complete emancipa- 

 tion from automatism. The fundamental identity of instincts 

 and intelligence is shown in tJieir dependence upon the same 

 structural mechajiisms and in their responsive adaptability. 



Instinct and Intelligence. 



In order to see how instinctive action may graduate into 

 intelligent action it is well to study closely animals in which 

 the instincts have attained a high degree of complexity, and 



^ Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey, Bulletin No. 2, 1898. 



