January 4, 19 12] 



NATURE 



Z01 



It will at once be seen how important the volume is. 

 We have here a compact and well-arranged statement 

 of the views of a classical investigator, alive with 

 the enthusiasm of their first production, and amplified 

 by the maturer judgment of their author. No better 

 book could be put into the hands of the intendint^ 

 research student, or even of the general student of 

 [ psychology interested in the bearings of the results 

 of experimental animal psychology upon psychology 

 at large. 



Thorndike's first research is the well-known one 

 upon the learning-powers of cats, dogs, and chicken, 

 as the result of which he was led to the conclusion 

 that animals at this stage of evolution make little 

 or no use of free ideas in solving the problem of a 

 \v situation, if indeed they possess such ideas at all. 

 ilungry cats and dogs shut up in cages, the doors 

 of which can be opened by the manipulation of more 

 ( r less complex mechanisms of levers, bolts, and 

 1 Littons which enable them to get at food placed 

 -t outside, learn to escape by the method of "trial 

 d error," and by that alone, as is shown by the 

 i^radual descent of the curves representing the times 

 taken to escape in successive experiments. The 

 r>^ultant pleasure of eating the food upon escape 

 t< nds to "stamp in" the immediately preceding asso- 

 ciation of the appearance of the interior of the cage 

 with the impulse and experienced muscular move- 

 ments involved in working the releasing mechanism. 

 On the other hand, the pain of failure tends to "stamp 

 rut " the corresponding misleading impulses, and to 

 vent their association with the appearance of the 

 x's interior. This is Thorndike's "sense-impulse" 

 tiieory of learning, which he finds also to apply in 

 the case of fishes and even of monkeys. With the 

 latter the learning is more rapid, but of the same type. 



Thorndike discovered no unambiguous evidence 



in his animals of the power of learning by imitation 



or by being put through the required movements, 



whence he concludes that ideas, even if present, are 



not used in solving such practical problems as he had 



'!• vised. Some of his critics have stated or tacitlv 



-umed that he denied the presence of ideas in his 



imals. This is an error. Others have suggested 



It he did not always succeed in gaining the atten- 



Mwii of the animals to the matter in hand, again a 



1 criticism which is not justified, since much space is 



voted in the memoirs to the discussion of this very 



int, and success in this is explicitly claimed. Even 



later experiments have definitely proved that the 



ver of learning by imitation is present, not only 



monkeys, but also in some of the lower animals, 



(1 that in so lowly an animal as the frog (see Sep- 



uber-October number of The Journal of Animal 



, .., Iiavior), "intelligence of a relatively high order" 



I is indicated by the great rapidity with which certain 



' i!.its may be formed, Thorndike's "trial and error" 



thod remains, if not the exclusive, yet the pre- 



niinant method of learning in all animals, including 



II himself. 



1 he book is full of interesting discussions of minor 



nts of psychology — there is, e.g., a most convincing 



icism in the "Laws and Hypotheses" chapter of 



ordinarily accepted view of so-called " ideo-motor " 



NO. 2201, VOL. 88] 



action — but space does not permit of a consideration 

 of these. Whole books have been written on Thorn- 

 dike's work, and in a limited review like the present 

 one cannot attempt to do more than summarily state 

 a personal opinion. The book is a very valuable addi- 

 tion to "The Animal Behavior Series," of which it 

 forms the third volume. William Brown. 



THE ASTROLABE A PRISME. 



Description et Usage de V Astrolabe a Prisme. By 

 A. Claude and L. Driencourt. Pp. xxx + 392. 

 (Paris : Gauthier-Villars, 1910.) Price 15 francs. 



DURING the experimental period of the astrolabe 

 a prisme the authors have from time to time 

 communicated various articles to several papers, in 

 which they have described their apparatus generally 

 and shown its practicability. But the experimental 

 period is now assuredly passed, and this ingenious 

 apparatus may be looked upon as part of a field equip- 

 ment capable of giving results of the highest precision. 

 Hence its description calls for fuller treatment, and 

 certainly no other instrument was ever awarded a 

 more satisfactory description and discussion than this 

 one is in the volume before us. The work is a 

 manual containing practically all there is to know 

 about the astrolabe a prisme, its form, its advantages 

 and defects, its adjustments, and the full treatment of 

 the errors and observed values in securing the most 

 dependable results from its use. It is characteristic 

 of the book that its publication has been several 

 times delaved because new modifications were intro- 

 duced or new results secured. 



MM. Claude and Driencourt were not the original 

 proposers of such a device, for, as they point out in 

 the introduction, the method involved was treated 

 theoretically by Dr. Beck in No. 3102 of the Astro- 

 nomische Nachrichten; but they were unaware of this 

 when they commenced the work in 1903. 



The principle involved is the determination of posi- 

 tion by the method of equal altitudes, a method in- 

 herently good in theory, but somewhat out of repute 

 among practical men by reason of the difiiculties of 

 manipulation attending the sextant. In the astrolabe 

 a prisme of the present day— a far different instrument 

 from that proposed by Dr. Beck, or those first designed 

 by the present authors— these difficulties are eliminated, 

 and portability, rigidity, and ease of manipulation 

 are now actually features of the instrument. 



After relating the history of the development of the 

 apparatus in the introduction, the authors proceed to 

 give a detailed description of the principle in chapter i. ; 

 this is no mere description, but is a very lucid and 

 masterly discussion in which it would be difficult to 

 find an omission. A discussion of the adjustments 

 then follows, and we arrive at chapter ii. only to find 

 that discussion and description are again necessary 

 because M. Jobin. the constructor, has so greatly 

 improved the instrument as a field apparatus that a 

 chapter dealing specially with his forms became neces- 

 sary. 



Having learned the principle and construction of the 

 astrolabe a prisme, we are next introduced (chapter iii.) 



