THE INTELLIGENCE OF MAMMALS 251 



is the syllogism in the dog's mind. The dog probably did 

 not reason the matter out in the explicit fashion indicated 

 by the words employed by Mr. Stone, and perhaps the writer 

 would not insist that he did. The bark may have made the 

 small dog aware that the large dog was out of the room and 

 that it was safe for him to seize the bone. He may not have 

 thought that therefore he could safely seize the bone, but 

 the large dog being away the small one just went after the 

 bone because he was no longer restrained. It is possible, 

 though less likely, that the bark simply served to direct the 

 attention of the small dog from whatever object it was 

 bestowed upon, and that it was then directed to the bone 

 which was seized because the large dog was out of the way. 

 Or it may be that when the small dog betook himself to the 

 corner he fell half asleep and was brought to himself by the 

 bark of the other dog. How varied are the interpretations 

 that can be made of the contents of the dog's mind! We 

 may feel convinced from our general knowledge of dog 

 behavior and the special circumstances of the case that 

 there was something in the small dog's mind corresponding 

 to " large dog outside, I can now get the bone;" but our con- 

 viction does not constitute proof. And so it goes with story 

 after story. 



While the proof of the existence of explicit inference may 

 be difficult though by no means impossible, there is a singular 

 lack of conclusiveness in the arguments sometimes employed 

 to prove its absence. It is argued by Thorndike that the 

 gradual descent of the time curves of learning in his experi- 

 ments showed the absence of reasoning. But when we 

 examine these curves it becomes apparent that their shape, 

 in a considerable proportion of cases, is far from gradual, 

 as in most of the figures on pp. 18, 20 and 24. Small finds 

 in the curves of learning of the rat that there is, as a rule, a 



