The Science and Philosophy of the Organism

It will soon appear how important this statement is. If only simple stimuli are concerned in instinctive life, the relation between the medium and the instinct may easily be explained on the analogy of a machine, at least in principle. But what are we to say if typical complicated stimuli, if " individualised " stimuli, as we shall call them, also awaken instinctive movements ? Let us first try to show, by the aid of a simple instance, what is meant by our two contrasted classes of stimuli : Lloyd Morgan 1 performed a series of very fine experiments in order to show whether chickens, just hatched from the

egg, react to the specific bodies forming their food or not. Putting them in front of a dish which contained peas and other small bodies of the most different kinds mixed together, he saw them pick up these little bodies most accurately. But they took all kinds of them, and experience alone taught them to discriminate between what was food and what was not. On the other hand, it had often been pointed out that young poultry had an instinctive fear of the hawk and the hawk's cry. Lloyd Morgan showed that young poultry are frightened by any large body in motion and by any very shrill sound. Thus these fine experiments teach us two things : they teach us what simple and what individualised stimuli are, and that, as far as experimentally ascertained, only simple stimuli are the external stimuli of instincts. Indeed, all cases of instincts which have been the subject of experimental work hitherto have proved to be due to simple external stimuli exclusively. The instinctive antipathy between dog and cat is probably also the effect of chemical compounds, of a " smell," if we choose to speak a little less accurately, and not of an individualised stimulus, not of the cat or the dog as being " seen."

But the experiments about this important question are not at all numerous, and it can by no means be categorically asserted that instincts, in the true sense of the word, are never called forth by a specific body which psychologically would be called a " seen " one,1 or, speaking more generally, by a stimulus of the individualised type. 1 Elise Hanel (Zeitschr. f. allg. Physiol. iv. 1904) has shown, following the line of certain experiments of Ch. Darwin, that the earthworm reacts specifically to the specific form of leaves or pieces of paper, always trying to draw them into its tube-like cave by their most pointed edge ; the earthworm, in fact, can be stimulated by a typical sequence of different singularities,

Now it is very important to notice that, if an actual case of a specific individualised stimulus of an instinct should become known, the limits of the possibility of a mechanical explanation would be exceeded. They would be exceeded, and an autonomic or vitalistic factor would be at work, because it could by no means be understood how the specifically combined or " individualised " stimulus could be received by the organism in such a way as to become the cause of a specific and fixed series of motions in the organism. Sup posing that any organism were specifically affected in its instinctive movements by the mere sight of any other typical organism, say of the same species but of the other sex,1 and that this affection were the same, whether the organism which forms the stimulus were seen from before or from behind, or from the side and at any angle whatever : what would follow from such a fact ? A machine could only be fitted to receive the specific complicated stimulus in a few typical positions, but how could a machine be imaginable if an infinite variety of aspects had the same invariable instinctive effect ?

which are only relatively determined, and its reaction is perfect for the very first time, that is, instinctive. New researches are required to clear up the facts that come into account here. Chickens are well known to peck their peas or corn with a right calcula tion concerning the dimension of depth the very first time they do peck. Speaking psychologically : the right idea of space is innate in them not only " a priori," in the sense of Kant, but strictly "before" all experience in the temporal sense of the word " before."

1 As regards sexuality the existence of "individualised" stimuli of instincts seems indeed highly probable. Male moths deprived of their wings were found by Mayer-Soule (Journ. exp. Zool. 3, 1906) not to be admitted to copulation by the females ; but only if the females were not deprived of their sight ! similar problem will meet us in our analysis of action, and will be fully discussed on that occasion. Moreover, the whole of our present analysis rests on a problematic basis : for nothing is known at present with absolute certainty about individualised stimuli of instinctive motions. But it seems to nie highly probable that future investigation will dis cover such cases, and the present discussion is written particularly in order to encourage research in this direction. Bees and ants especially, but vertebrates too, it seems to me, would have to be studied with respect to the question whether there are cases in which specific complicated bodies that are " seen " may be the stimuli of real instincts.1

If we like to give up for a moment our strictly scientific language and allow ourselves the use of the common pseudo-psychological terminology, we may say that all cases in which individualised stimuli were at work would require the assumption of a something that would be nearly related to the " innate ideas " refuted by Locke in another sense. Physiologists of the old school of the German " Naturphilosophie " often have spoken of a sort of dreaming as being the foundation of instinctive life. It would be this sort of dreaming that we should meet here, and the only difference between the old investigators and ourselves would be one of terminology : we should not speak of dreaming or of innate ideas, but, as naturalists arguing from the stand point of critical idealism, we should say that an autonomic,

1 In a former publication (Die, " Seele") 1 distinguished two classes of "reflexes," the fixed and the " freely combined " ones ( " frei-combiniert ") — the word "reflex" being used in a wider sense than in the present book. All " freely combined " reflexes, it seems to me, might present quite the same set of analytical problems as true instincts do, in every respect — provided they are not simple forms of "acting," as indeed the righting reactions of the starfish are (see page 31 f.).

an entelechian natural factor was found to be at work in instinctive life, as far as the reception of stimuli is concerned. Our mention of the old physiologists may serve us as a stepping-stone to the analysis of the second chief problem which instincts offer to theoretical biology. Here also the main point must remain problematic, as facts are too scanty at present for a definite statement. But here also the analysis of possibilities may serve to give an impulse to future research.

The old physiologists, such as Treviranus and Johannes Miiller, often compared morphogenesis with instinctive life, and it is to Schopenhauer that the most thorough comparison between the phenomena of instinctive movements and embryological processes is due. Instincts are regarded by this school as being in some way the continuation of morphogenesis, as growing upon the same ground, as governed by the same reason, viz. the vital principle. As we have said already, we do not know at present whether such a view is fully legitimate or not ; further investigation will determine that. But we can make use of the comparison between morphogenesis and instinct to raise another question, besides the problem of the nature of the instinctive stimuli, the answer to which may one day enable us either to admit the autonomic nature of instincts or to deny it.

Certainly instincts are comparable with morphogenetic phenomena for the simple and descriptive reason that they occur completely and purposefully the very first time they go on in the individual. Might not there be another point of similarity ? Morphogenetic processes,' as we know, are liable to be regulated on the largest scale : disturbances of the organisation or of the morphogenetic process itself are followed by atypical processes leading again to the typical result. Are there any true regulations known among instincts ?

Regulations in instincts, of course, would hardly be ac cessible to observation if there were not any visible effects of the instinctive activity : but that does not happen very often. Regulation occurs, in fact, in all cases of so-called technical or artistic instincts, as known among birds, among spiders and among bees, ants, and some other insects. The in stinctive activity of these animals ends in a certain specific state of the medium. Let us disturb the state, say of a nest or a bee's hive, let us change the material offered to a bird for its nest, and let us see what will happen.

Unfortunately not a single experiment except one has been carried out with the special purpose of determining the kind and degree of regulability of instinctive movements as such. Such knowledge as we have has been gained almost entirely in the field of so-called natural history, and without a full analytical discussion. It is important to notice once more at the very beginning, that we are not dealing here with the possibility of a modi fication of instinctive life by so-called "experience." Our question is this : Are instinctive acts liable to regulative modifications in the same manner, complete and purposeful from the beginning, as are embryological processes ?

after disturbances ; they, moreover, may change the style of building them, to suit the requirements of space, and they also may build their house in an abnormal direction with respect to gravity, should circumstances require it : instead of building from above to below, they may also build from below to above, and also sideways. The silkworm is said not to form its web of silk if it is cultivated in a box contain ing tulle, and some species of bees which normally construct tunnels do not do so if they find one ready made in the ground, they then only perform their second instinctive act : separating the tunnel into single cells.

In all of these cases, except the one relating to gravity, the state of affairs seems to be the following. What has been changed from without is either the perfect result of the full sequence of instinctive acts, or it is what might be called an embryological state somewhere in this sequence, that is, some state in the sequence that leads to the perfect result. And the artificial change of the second class may again be of two kinds : either something may be taken away from what the animal had accomplished already, or something may be added to the result of its activity, some thing, of course, that would occur in the process of normal construction. In all these cases the animal will adjust its instinctive movements to the actual state of matters, no matter whether it has to do more or less than normally — more, if parts of its own construction are taken away, less, if parts are added to it artificially.

There can be no doubt that the term " regulation " is justified in these cases. What then does this mean, and what can it teach us as to our question about the autonomic character of instincts ? Of course, the actual state of affairs, artificially modified from what had been performed by the organism, must be transmitted in some way to the latter, in order that its future behaviour may correspond to this actual state. It seems to me that it is from the possible or probable nature of this transmission that an analytical discussion of our problem must start. The instinctive motions concerned in all sorts of constructions form a consecutive chain of single performances, which normally seem to be called forth one by the other, but which, as experiments show, may also be called forth independently. So we again meet the problematic question as to the " calling forth " of instinctive motions, as to the instinctive stimulus. Normally the whole sequence of a constructive instinct may go on as follows. The elemental act a results in the state of construc tion A ; the next state of construction is B ; B is due to an instinctive process b ; b may be set going only because a is finished, but it also may be called forth by the existence of At which, of course, is something very different. The mere fact of regulation, as we have described it, seems to show that the second alternative meets the case : that it is the existence of A, the constructive result of the first elemental instinctive act, that is the stimulus of I, for in the case of the regulation b goes on without a or after b itself has already once taken place : without a, if the result of the in stinctive act was changed by the adding, and after a previous b, if it was changed by the removing of anything. It is here that we meet the problem of how the state of A as such may be transmitted to the organism in order to determine what is to go on, and it is clear that this is precisely the problem of the nature of the stimulus calling forth b,

regarded as an independent instinctive phase. Is this stimulus simple or is it individualised, that is to say, specifically combined of elements ? It is not very pleasant to be again obliged to leave our question unsolved, but nothing has been done in an exact manner towards answering it. It may seem, of course, as if only typically combined or " individualised " stimuli could suffice to explain the modification of the instinctive acts in exact correspondence with what is required ; but this is only probable, nothing more.

I once more feel obliged to say that the evidence of the mere fact of regulation among instincts is very scanty at present. Indeed even what we have mentioned about observations of this kind is hardly as well established as it ought to be, and I freely confess that I have treated socalled " facts " here as if they were a little better established than they probably are, simply in order to get a basis for our analytical discussion. It remains, however, a mere discussion of possibilities. For not one of the observations which we have mentioned, regarding the regulability of instincts, has been made with the special purpose of studying that particular point.

Let us shortly mention the only experimental case in which our problem has been studied with full and careful attention. The entomologist Ch. F. Schroeder,1 in studying the behaviour of certain caterpillars by the aid of experi ments, has found that these animals are able to adapt their instinctive acts of spinning most accurately to the real state of the product formed so far; he not only saw them repairing their weaving, after it had been disturbed inten-

tionally, but his caterpillars also formed typical tissues by using leaves of abnormal forms intentionally prepared, or by using leaves of plants that are not normally employed. It is to be hoped that future research will follow in the track of the one last mentioned, that is to say, that entomologists will observe the behaviour of their insects with the full appreciation of the bearing of the study upon the problems of theoretical biology, and not only in the interests of natural science proper.1

Here, then, we may close our discussion of instinctive movements. It has yielded some indications of vital autonomy in the field of instinctive life, but no real, absolute proofs ; for the facts are too scanty at present to allow any definite answer to the chief problems appearing in this field, viz. the problem of the nature of the stimuli and of the regulability of instincts, the latter problem being reducible to the former. It is probable that both these problems will be answered some day in favour of vitalism, that, as matters stand, no machine can in fact be imagined capable of accounting for what happens.

1 Once more I call attention to the "turning over" of animals when put into an abnormal position, though we are not accustomed to speak of instincts proper in these cases (see page 31 f. ). No doubt the process of turning in its single phases is exclusively made up of "regulations." Are they of such a type that the "whole " of the actual abnormal state enters in some way, or are they mere sums of single acts, purposeful only on account of their per former's general organisation ? Certain experiments of Preyer's seem to me to deserve more attention with regard to our question than they have generally received (Mitt. zool. Station Neapel, vii., 1886. See also Jennings, Behaviour of the Lower Organisms).

scheme of the co-ordination of organic movements as set forth by von Uexkuell. The elemental physiological factors of this scheme would be found to be at work also in instincts ; but there would be something else also at work, a " something " that may be said to make use of the factors of this scheme. THE way generally taken by science is from the simple to the complicated phenomena, and therefore when turning to the analysis of those organic movements which are called " actions," we might probably be expected to follow this ordinary and well-established route. But we shall not do so, and we have good reasons for so choosing our path. It might seem most natural, after having discussed the main points of the theory of reflexes and instincts, to proceed to analyse first the most simple cases of what might for any reason whatever be called " action," and, after surveying the whole series of animal organisms, to end by analysing the action of man. But there is one special point which renders a totally different arrangement of materials far more suitable and convenient. On account of a very strange feature, which, in spite of its strangeness may be pronounced the most universally known in theoretical biology, we prefer to begin our analysis of action with those cases where action is of the most complicated nature, and only to add certain remarks about its simpler forms at the very end. The reasoning and analysing naturalist is an acting organism himself — that is

the strange though universally known fact spoken of. One of our final chapters will try to deal with the most central problem, both of philosophy and of biology proper, that is established by this fact ; at present we make use of it in a purely practical manner. In observing the actions of animals and men, many more differences are revealed to us in the men than in the animals, because we understand the former and not the latter. Psychology thus, though not our aim, is becoming our means of investigation. Only by the aid of a truly objective psychology are we able to analyse action into its ultimate elements. We never could analyse the actions of any animal so far : we do not even see everything that there is to analyse in them.

By no means, of course, do we intend by our appeal to psychology to introduce that sort of pseudo-psychology which we excluded from natural science when we were studying instincts. All acting organisms, including acting men, are to us simply natural bodies in motion ; at least they are immediately presented to us as such, though analysis in its progress may introduce natural agents which would represent not motion only but also the possibility of movement. These agents or factors, however, would by no means be psychological in the introspective sense — the only sense which the word " psychological " may legitimately possess.

Our time is limited, and therefore I cannot insist more explicitly upon this methodological point ; but let me beg you always to remember that in what follows we shall deal only with such phenomena as occur on bodies in nature, called organisms, and that it will be our purpose to discover the laws according to which the motions of these bodies occur. We may end in vitalism again in this chapter ; but certainly we shall not end in pseudo-psychology.

General Definition of Action. Classes of Movements which are not Actions A few remarks about the most general definition of action, in both a positive and a negative form, seern desirable by way of preliminary. An " action " is every animal movement which depends for its specificity on the individual life history of its performer in such a manner that this specificity depends not only, as will be seen later on, on the specificity of the actual stimulus but also on the specificity of all stimuli in the past, and on their effect. No animal movement is to be called an action in which this criterion is not present at least in a certain degree. In the language of subjective psychology this criterion is called " experience." We shall presently introduce a more suitable name for it, but in this short survey the word <c experience " may be used.

There is no experience, and therefore no " action," when the final physiological elemental process in the motor organs, i.e. the process of contraction, goes on better the second or third than it did the first time : we speak of " functional adaptation " of the nervous system * in this 1 Functional adaptation of the muscles as such is, of course, another phenomenon, not belonging to the present discussion. case. Nor is there " action " in the case of so-called muscular " fatigue."

But both these phenomena, especially functional adapta tion, that is, an improvement of functioning by functioning itself, may be combined with real acting, and, indeed, there is one group of facts in which this combination is very important. You all know the process which is commonly called the mechanisation of acting ; the piano-player offers a good instance of it, but any one going down a staircase is also an example. Popular psychology says that here we see complicated motions, which, though under the control of consciousness when first learned, are freed from this control later on. It would be more correct to say that one and the same action-effect, repeated very many times, may combine with functional adaptation of some unknown part of the nervous system in such a way as to acquire almost the character of a typical reflex. This process of what is called " exercise " is by no means identical with the process of acting as such, and we have devoted these few words to it in this place in order that we may exclude it from our studies later on.

Moreover, we are not entitled to speak of an "action," if one and the same stimulus has different motor effects according to the variation of certain physiological conditions which are not concerned in the specificity of anything motorial. Such cases are well known among lower animals, and in dealing with the directive motions and with the recent discoveries of Jennings we have already mentioned a few instances in which changes in temperature or salinity, or in the degree of hunger, also change the sense of response to external stimuli. In such cases there is nothing like