348 Animal Life and Intelligence. 



abstract ideas of qualities apart from the constructs of 

 which these qualities are elements ? Can we say, with 

 Mr. Romanes,* "All the higher animals have general 

 ideas of ' good-for-eating ' and ' not-good-for-eating,' ijiiit<' 

 apart from any particular objects of which either of these 

 qualities happens to be characteristic " ? Or with Leroy,t 

 that a fox "will see snares when there are none; his 

 imagination, distorted by fear, will produce deceptive 

 shapes, to which he will attach an abstract notion of 

 danger " ? 



Now, this is a most difficult question to answer. But 

 it seems to me that, if we take the term " abstract idea " in 

 the sense in which I have used the word " isolate," we 

 must answer it firmly, but not dogmatically (this is the 

 last subject in the world on which to dogmatize), in the 

 negative. Fully admitting, nay, contending, that this is a 

 matter in which it is exceedingly difficult to obtain anything 

 like satisfactory evidence, I fail to see that we have any 

 grounds for the assertion that the higher animals have 

 abstract ideas of "good-for-eating" or "not-good-for- 

 eating," quite apart from any particular objects of which 

 either of these qualities happens to be characteristic 4 



The particular example is well chosen, since the idea of 

 food is a dominant one in the mind of the brute. There 

 can be no question that the quality of eatability is built in 

 by the dog into a great number of his constructs. But I 

 question whether this quality can be isolated by the dog, 

 and can exist in his mind divorced from the eatables which 

 suggest it. If it can, then the dog is capable of forming a 

 concept as I have defined the term. I can quite understand 



* " Mental Evolution in Man," p. 27. 



t " Intelligence of Animals," p. 121. 



J Mr. Romanes also says ("Mental Evolution in Animals," p. 235), 

 " This abstract idea of ownership is well developed in many if not in most 

 dogs." By an abstract idea of ownership I understand a conception of owner- 

 ship which, to modify Mr. Romanes's phrase, is quite apart from any objects 

 or persons of which such ownership happens to be characteristic. Even if we 

 believe that a dog can regard this or that man as his owner, or this or that 

 object as his master's property, still even this seems to me a very different 

 thing from his possessing an abstract idea of ownership. 



