Examination of Some Objections. 63 



of another objection 1 which has been advanced against 

 our psychological views of animal life, namely that "the 

 antiquated views of scholastic philosophy" did not keep 

 pace with the advance of modern biology. We need 

 not enter upon this difficulty. It has been brushed 

 aside. True, our age is far superior to the middle 

 ages in the observation of nature and in detail of science. 

 A man like Thomas of Aquin would be the first to 

 candidly acknowledge and duly appreciate the results 

 of modern observation. Yet, on the other hand, it must 

 be granted that modern science can still learn from the 

 great thinkers -of antiquity and of the middle ages in 

 the line of philosophical explanations of animal life. 



We now come to a series of objections which an- 

 other critic, Dr. Aug. Forel, Professor at the University 

 of Zuerich, has raised against our psychological views 

 of animal life. 2 Forel is Professor of Psychiatry, and 

 a prominent expert in questions of ant life and of the 

 human brain. He belongs to the school which regards 

 psychology as a mere question of nerve physiology, 

 because it acknowledges no other realities than the 

 functions of brain-cells. According to Forel's "mon- 

 istic" views, the whole world is the product of the 

 nerve activity of our brain, below which lies an "im- 



!) Cf. Karl Mueller, in the periodical "Natur," 25th Oct., 1884 (p. 

 512 if.), in the discussion of our book, "Der Trichterwickler," (Rhyn- 

 chites betulae), cine wissenschaftliche Studie ueber den Thierinstinct. 



2 ) In a lecture on "Brain and Soul," in the 66th Meeting of 

 Naturalists at Vienna, 26th Sept., 1894 (p. 28 ff.). See also our reply 

 in "Biologisches Centralblatt," 15 (1895), 644. Forel has recently de- 

 veloped his views on Comparative Psychology in a work published in 

 "L'Annee psychologique," 1896: "Un apercu de Psychologic comparee." 

 But as they are essentially the same as those contained in the above 

 quoted lecture, we need not enter upon his later publication. 



