THE ANIMAL AND THE PUZZLE-BOX 



the same animals under identical conditions is dis- 

 similar, or contradictory, as is that of different men. 

 There is no rigid uniformity in their behavior. "A 

 loud sound," says Professor Thorndike, " may make 

 one chick run, another crouch, another give the 

 danger-call, and another do nothing whatever." It 

 is doubtless owing to such facts as these that experi- 

 menters arrive at such different results, often con- 

 tradictory results. And we are not on any more 

 permanent ground, according to Professor James, in 

 the case of man himself: "A string of raw facts; 

 a little of gossip and wrangle about opinions; a 

 little classification and generalization on a mere 

 descriptive level; a strong prejudice that we have 

 states of mind, and that our brains condition them; 

 but not a single law, in the sense physics shows us 

 laws, not a single proposition from which conse- 

 quences can causally be deduced." 



G. Archibald Reid, speaking of the laboratory 

 method of inquiry in biology, says, in his book on 

 "The Laws of Heredity": "There is nothing es- 

 pecially magical, scientific, or accurate in data ob- 

 scured to our senses till revealed by a laboratory 

 inquiry. Such an inquiry can do no more than render 

 them as patent, but no more patent, than the ma- 

 jority of facts on which our knowledge of living 

 beings is based. ... If the reader will think over the 

 evidence on which I shall draw for the purpose of 

 the present volume, I believe he will conclude that, 

 187 



