Instinct and Intelligence According to Modern Zoology. 2l 



the animal as an essential criterion of intelligence, is 

 logically forced to declare that all instinctive exterior 

 actions of the animal are intelligent. But this conse- 

 quence is untenable and will hardly be admitted by any 

 rational naturalist. Therefore, the modern notion of 

 animal intelligence which involves this consequence is 

 equally untenable and false. 



A similar proof that this conception of animal in- 

 telligence leads to inextricable contradictions, could be 

 easily furnished, and illustrated by many examples. 

 But we would never come to an end and would have 

 continually to repeat the same "ceterum censeo." Let 

 one illustration suffice. For this purpose we choose the 

 so-called animal instinct of cleanliness^ because the 

 sensile experience of the pleasure caused by a given 

 action is intimately connected with this instinct and 

 closely related to the feeling or perception which excites 

 the action. This stimulus consists mostly in an irrita- 

 tion, a painful itching of the skin, which animals try to 

 soothe by such actions as licking, scratching, etc. Now, 

 any psychologist will allow that animals as well as man 

 perform these actions instinctively, when they feel the 

 irritation. Yet, a more accurate analysis of the process 

 makes it evident that the consistent zoologist ought to 

 say : "The animal begins, at least for the first time, to 

 scratch itself instinctively, but in the same moment its 

 action becomes intelligent; for the element of experi- 

 ence, the pleasure which arises from the action, is the 

 proper motive of its continuation and repetition ; and all 



*) See P. Balliou, "De 1'instinct de la propcrte chez les animaux,' 

 2d edition. Bazas, 1895. 



