CHAPTER XVI.

DO ANIMALS REASON?

WE which I have prefixed as a heading to this chapter.

are now in a position to consider the question

It is obvious that before attempting to answer the question we must be quite clear as to what we mean by reasoning. If we apply the term "reasoning" to the process by which an animal, profiting by experience, adapts his actions to somewhat varying circumstances, there can be no hesitation whatever in giving an affirmative answer to the question. But if by reasoning we mean the process of drawing a logical inference; if we define reason in such a way that it is necessary for the reasoning being as such, to think the therefore, then we cannot answer the question so readily. Let it be clearly understood that I use the word in the latter and narrower sense. Using it, then, in this narrower sense, I may paraphrase the question with which this chapter deals, and ask-Do animals focus the therefore? Do they think the why?

Once more I draw attention to the canon of interpretation adopted at the outset of our inquiries concerning other minds than ours, namely, that in no case is an animal activity to be interpreted as the outcome of a higher psychical faculty, if it can fairly be interpreted as the outcome of faculties which are lower in the psychological scale. Our question then becomes: Are there animal activities the performance of which is inexplicable if the animal in question does not perceive the why and think the therefore?

Tony, the fox-terrier, already introduced to my readers,

when he wants to go out into the road, puts his head under the latch of the gate, lifts it, and waits for the gate to swing open. Now an observer of the dog's intelligent action might well suppose that he clearly perceived how the end in view was to be gained, and the most appropriate means for effecting his purpose. The following chain of ideas might be supposed to pass through the dog's mind, not, indeed, in a clear-cut logical form, but at anyrate in a rough and practically serviceable way: "Why does that gate remain shut? The latch holds it. I'll lift the latch. Now it is no longer held, therefore it swings open." But is it necessary to assume that there were ideas involving, even in the most rudimentary way, the why and the wherefore? May not the action be quite well explained on the hypothesis that the dog acted under the sole guidance of sense-experience? I think it not unlikely that two chance observers, both witnesses of the action, might long discuss it from different standpoints: the one contending that it was probably based on practical experience, and therefore intelligent as I use this word; the other asking, in reply, what practical experience the dog could have had of gates swinging open of themselves when the latch was raised, insisting on the purposive nature of the action, and asserting that it unquestionably involved a clear perception of the relationship of the how of the gates opening, and, as it swung back when the latch was raised, of the therefore involved. Eventually the two observers might agree to differ, and each go on his way, more convinced than ever of the correctness of his own view, and of the fact that preconceived ideas may blind a man to the most obvious conclusions.

But if, now, one had an opportunity of seeing how such a clever trick originated, if one had watched all the stages of its genesis, then one would presumably be in a better position to offer an opinion in the matter than either of the chance observers who saw it only in its final and perfected

form. With regard to this particular trick of Tony's I am in that position. I watched from the first the development of the habit. The facts are as follows: I may premise that the gate is of iron, and has iron bars running vertically with interspaces of five or six inches between. On either side is a wall or low parapet, on which are similar vertical rails. The latch of the gate is at a level of about a foot above that of the top of the low wall. When it is lifted the gate swings open by its own weight. The gate separates a small garden, of only a few square yards area, from the road. When the dog is put out of the front door he naturally wants to get out into the road, where there is often much to interest him; cats to be worried, other dogs with whom to establish a sniffing acquaintance, and so forth. I said just now that I watched the development of the habit from the beginning. This perhaps is a slight exaggeration. I was sitting at a window above the garden, and heard the dog put out of the door. I therefore watched him. He ran up and down the low wall, and put his head out between the iron bars, now here, now there, now elsewhere, anxiously gazing into the road. This he did for quite three or four minutes. At length it so happened that he put out his head beneath the latch, which, as I have said, is at a convenient height for his doing so, being about a foot above the level of the wall. The latch was thus lifted. He withdrew his head, and began to look out elsewhere, when he was swinging open, and out he bolted. I took him out, I shut the gate in his he opened it for himself and joined me. any assistance in any way, but just waited and watched, sometimes putting him back and making him open it again. Gradually he went, after fewer pokings of his head out in the wrong place, to the one opening at which the latch was lifted. But it was nearly three weeks from my first noticing his actions from the window before he went at once and

T

found that the gate After that, whenever face, and waited till I did not give him

with precision to the right place and put his head without any ineffectual fumbling beneath the latch. Even now he always lifts it with the back of his head and not with his muzzle which would be easier for him.

With regard to this particular trick, then, I venture to affirm that, when we know the whole history of it, Tony's action is quite similar in kind to that of my little chick, Blackie, which, profiting by a chance experience, pulled down the corner of the newspaper and escaped from my experimental poultry-yard. As it stands, it is quite within the range of sense-experience; nay more, it affords a very pretty example of the application of sense-experience to new circumstances. It is typically intelligent.

Here again the

One of my own students, Mr Edward J. Shellard, informs me of a case which fell within his own observation, of an action which "appeared at first to be the result of thought," but which on closer investigation was clearly seen to be the outcome of sense-experience. A Scotch staghound living in a yard was often shut out, and in order to enter raised the latch of the door opening into the yard. chance observer would be likely to fix upon the fact of the latch being purposely raised, but the investigator would seek to know the exact manner in which the action was performed, and how the habit was acquired. In this instance the manner was as follows: The staghound "at first raised his paws to the door and scratched violently, manifesting various signs of impatience. His scratches, which extended from the top of the door downwards and over the whole area, would thus inevitably at some time or other reach the handle of the latch, which was thus struck forcibly downwards, the latch itself rising upwards. The door would then open from the weight of the dog pushing against it. The dog always opened the door in this manner from the time when the incident was first noticed until he left, a period of about three years. The door was opened with no greater ease at

the expiration of that period than at the commencement. His paws would strike various parts of the door, and he never appeared to exercise any degree of judgment in the localization of his strokes, the fact of his paws striking the handle of the latch being a necessary result, provided the dog had sufficient patience and strength to continue."

Now what I am particularly anxious to enforce is, not the adoption of the usage of the word " reason " in its narrower sense, though I think that this is desirable; nor the hypothesis that animals do not reason in this sense, though I think that this is probable; but rather that what we need is careful investigation in place of anecdotal reporting. Unfortunately the opportunities for investigation are not numerous. One may keep dogs and other animals for years, and find few opportunities of investigating what has even a semblance of reasoning. And if a friend tells one of the clever performance of his dog, the time for investigation may have passed. No one, by observing Tony opening the gate now, could ascertain the stages of the development of this intelligent action. Still opportunities do present themselves; and if those who take a scientific interest in zoological psychology will endeavour to utilize to the full these opportunities, and will record the results of experimental investigation, we shall acquire a better acquaintance with the psychological processes in animals than we could gain by a thousand anecdotes. zoological psychology we have got beyond the anecdotal stage, we have reached the stage of experimental investigation.

In

Without such investigation the anecdote, however interesting in itself, is of little service so far as the question of intelligence or reason is concerned. Take, for example, the case of a dog which enters a stream at a point higher than that which he wishes to reach on the opposite side, thus allowing for the force of the current. This may be the result of practical experience and an example of intelligent inference.