122 Kansas Academy of Science. 



hunger and cold; a perception, as the sight of food or fire at 

 a distance; or an idea stimulus, as the remembrance of a pre- 

 vious dinner or warm place brought to mind by a growl or 

 the sound of a distant " whistle. The illustrations of these 

 three kinds of stimuli are in part mine. 



Sensations and perceptions are objective stimuli to the use 

 of the organs of the body; ideas are, in some measure, sub- 

 jective stimuli; but a fourth and very important class of 

 stimuli is purely subjective. Prof. Joseph Baldwin (Interna- 

 tional Education Series, vol. vi, p. 16) calls this fourth group 

 of stimuli blind impulses implanted by the Creator, and Pro- 

 fessor James terms these subjective stimuli native aptitudes 

 for the use of the various parts of the body. 



These blind impulses, these native aptitudes, must inhere 

 in the life of the body, for life alone is static as it develops its 

 powers in the midst of the stream of matter passing through 

 the body, and life alone can inherit the capacities and tenden- 

 cies of ancestral life. 



It may be a relief to all psychologists who read this paper 

 to be reminded that the Dictionary of Philosophy and Psy- 

 chology, edited by Prof. J. Mark Baldwin, defines instinct as 

 an inherited reaction of the sensori-motor type, relatively 

 complex and markedly adaptive in character, and common to 

 a group of individuals. The dictionary further says (page 

 555) that it is definitely a biological and not a psychological 

 conception; that no adequate psychological definition of in- 

 stinct is possible, since the psychological states involved are 

 exhausted by the terms sensation (and also perception), in- 

 stinct feeling, and impulse. 



The Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology's definition of 

 instinct rules out, on the one hand, the application of the term 

 instinct to tendencies and impulses which do not have definite 

 native motor channels of discharge, and, on the other, those 

 reflexes that are simple and not adaptive. 



As the term instinct is strictly a biological term, it may be 

 modified in any way to suit the special needs of a study of life 

 activities. It has seemed wise to the writer, therefore, to 

 restrict the term "instincts" to those powers of life by which 

 the several parts of the body are used without instruction to 

 gain appropriate, beneficent ends ; and to use the term "body- 

 building instincts" to designate those powers of life by which 

 the several parts of the body were made for some beneficent 



