16 Chapter II. 



themselves, on closer examination, into the simplest 

 instinctive processes. Altum's excellent studies on the 

 life of birds, the classical observations of H. Fabre on 

 the brooding of Hymenoptera, and quite recently the 

 researches of W. Wagner on the architecture of spiders 

 have all led forcibly to the same conclusion. 1 Our 

 only reason for quoting the "Descent of Man" is to 

 show, that in his endeavor to derive the mental faculties 

 of man from the psychic faculties of the animal, Charles 

 Darwin was preoccupied by the principles of pseudo- 

 psychology, which is unable to distinguish correctly 

 between sense perception and intelligence. Darwin 

 considers it self-evident that animals have intelligence, 

 because he takes for intelligence any combination of 

 sense representations which is brought about by in- 

 dividual experience. Consequently Wundt's verdict on 

 the want of critical method in pseudo-psychology applies 

 equally well to the "Descent of Man" by Charles 

 Darwin. 



The example of the chicken proves that the "in- 

 telligence" of modern psychology is no intelligence at 

 all. It is merely an association of sense representations 

 in which one element is derived from experience. This 

 element is the feeling of pain caused by the wasp's sting. 

 According to the laws of "contact association," as 

 Wundt calls this combination of representations, it is 

 reproduced as an image in the memory at the sight of 

 any other wasp, and actuates the chicken's instinct of 

 fear to avoid the wicked insect. There is not a shadow 



x ) "L'Industrie des Araneina." Memoires de 1'Academ. Imper. 

 des Sciences de Petersbourg (7) t. 40 (1894), n. 11. See also Emery's 

 abstract in "Biologiscb.es Centralblatt," 16, No. 3, S. 118 ff. 



