Editorial. 145 



vous system like our own, the greater becomes the merely anal- 

 ogical element, and the less trust we can place in the inference. 



But indisputable factual evidence can be brought to bear 

 for the definite answering of this question of the origin of in- 

 stinct — as to whether instinct in its simplest lines originates 

 through the automatization of volitional acts or not. That is, 

 we can obtain definite data concerning the functional and genet- 

 ic relations of instinctive and volitional processes in animals 

 which have both. The method we propose is simply this : — 

 Take an animal with well defined but comparatively simple in- 

 stincts. Make a careful study of its instincts, both as they come 

 forward in the growing animal and as they function in the adult 

 animal. Then devise a set of experiments, for the express pur- 

 pose of testing the intelligence of the adult animal, its power 

 and capacity for dealing with new conditions. In this way it 

 will be quite definitely ascertained whether the present intelli- 

 gence is such as would have sufficed for the determination of 

 the behavior of the same animal which now constitutes its in- 

 stinct. For it is a reasonable and necessary assumption that if 

 instinct arose thus through the automatization of volitional acts, 

 the present intelligence of the animal should be equal to deal- 

 ing as efficiently with similarly complex situations. For the 

 function of automatization is not to do away with intelligence by 

 rendering it useless, but to make possible its further advance by 

 providing for the ready performance of that which has been 

 learned already. This is the way it does work in our own de- 

 velopment. 



Of course great care and skill will be required in devising 

 the experimental means of this test and in carrying them out. 

 Such criticisms as those made by Professor Mills {Science, N.S., 

 191, 745.) of Dr. Thorndike in particular and of the "labor- 

 ators," as he calls them, in general, must be kept carefully in 

 mind. We must assure ourselves in every possible way, as by 

 checks and counter-checks and all possible variations, that the 

 stimulus is acting upon the animal in the way that we think it 

 is, that it is really attending in animal fashion to the situation 

 as we are thinking the situation, and that it is really feeling the 



