Instinct and Habit

LECTURE II.
INSTINCT AND
HABIT
In attempting to understand the elements out of which mental phenomena are
compounded, it is of the greatest importance to remember that from the protozoa to
man there is nowhere a very wide gap either in structure or in behaviour. From this
fact it is a highly probable inference that there is also nowhere a very wide mental
gap. It is, of course, POSSIBLE that there may be, at certain stages in evolution,
elements which are entirely new from the standpoint of analysis, though in their
nascent form they have little influence on behaviour and no very marked correlatives
in structure. But the hypothesis of continuity in mental development is clearly
preferable if no psychological facts make it impossible. We shall find, if I am not
mistaken, that there are no facts which refute the hypothesis of mental continuity, and
that, on the other hand, this hypothesis affords a useful test of suggested theories as to
the nature of mind.
The hypothesis of mental continuity throughout organic evolution may be used in
two different ways. On the one hand, it may be held that we have more knowledge of
our own minds than those of animals, and that we should use this knowledge to infer
the existence of something similar to our own mental processes in animals and even in
plants. On the other hand, it may be held that animals and plants present simpler
phenomena, more easily analysed than those of human minds; on this ground it may
be urged that explanations which are adequate in the case of animals ought not to be
lightly rejected in the case of man. The practical effects of these two views are
diametrically opposite: the first leads us to level up animal intelligence with what we
believe ourselves to know about our own intelligence, while the second leads us to
attempt a levelling down of our own intelligence to something not too remote from
what we can observe in animals. It is therefore important to consider the relative
justification of the two ways of applying the principle of continuity.
It is clear that the question turns upon another, namely, which can we know best,
the psychology of animals or that of human beings? If we can know most about
animals, we shall use this knowledge as a basis for inference about human beings; if
we can know most about human beings, we shall adopt the opposite procedure. And
the question whether we can know most about the psychology of human beings or
about that of animals turns upon yet another, namely: Is introspection or external
observation the surer method in psychology? This is a question which I propose to
discuss at length in Lecture VI; I shall therefore content myself now with a statement
of the conclusions to be arrived at.
We know a great many things concerning ourselves which we cannot know nearly
so directly concerning animals or even other people. We know when we have a
toothache, what we are thinking of, what dreams we have when we are asleep, and a
host of other occurrences which we only know about others when they tell us of them,
or otherwise make them inferable by their behaviour. Thus, so far as knowledge of
detached facts is concerned, the advantage is on the side of self-knowledge as against
external observation.
But when we come to the analysis and scientific understanding of the facts, the
advantages on the side of self-knowledge become far less clear. We know, for
example, that we have desires and beliefs, but we do not know what constitutes a
desire or a belief. The phenomena are so familiar that it is difficult to realize how little
we really know about them. We see in animals, and to a lesser extent in plants,
behaviour more or less similar to that which, in us, is prompted by desires and beliefs,
and we find that, as we descend in the scale of evolution, behaviour becomes simpler,
more easily reducible to rule, more scientifically analysable and predictable. And just
because we are not misled by familiarity we find it easier to be cautious in interpreting
behaviour when we are dealing with phenomena remote from those of our own minds:
Moreover, introspection, as psychoanalysis has demonstrated, is extraordinarily
fallible even in cases where we feel a high degree of certainty. The net result seems to
be that, though self-knowledge has a definite and important contribution to make to
psychology, it is exceedingly misleading unless it is constantly checked and controlled
by the test of external observation, and by the theories which such observation
suggests when applied to animal behaviour. On the whole, therefore, there is probably
more to be learnt about human psychology from animals than about animal
psychology from human beings; but this conclusion is one of degree, and must not be
pressed beyond a point.
It is only bodily phenomena that can be directly observed in animals, or even,
strictly speaking, in other human beings. We can observe such things as their
movements, their physiological processes, and the sounds they emit. Such things as
desires and beliefs, which seem obvious to introspection, are not visible directly to
external observation. Accordingly, if we begin our study of psychology by external
observation, we must not begin by assuming such things as desires and beliefs, but
only such things as external observation can reveal, which will be characteristics of
the movements and physiological processes of animals. Some animals, for example,
always run away from light and hide themselves in dark places. If you pick up a
mossy stone which is lightly embedded in the earth, you will see a number of small
animals scuttling away from the unwonted daylight and seeking again the darkness of
which you have deprived them. Such animals are sensitive to light, in the sense that
their movements are affected by it; but it would be rash to infer that they have
sensations in any way analogous to our sensations of sight. Such inferences, which go
beyond the observable facts, are to be avoided with the utmost care.
It is customary to divide human movements into three classes, voluntary, reflex and
mechanical. We may illustrate the distinction by a quotation from William James
("Psychology," i, 12):
"If I hear the conductor calling 'all aboard' as I enter the depot, my heart first stops,
then palpitates, and my legs respond to the air-waves falling on my tympanum by
quickening their movements. If I stumble as I run, the sensation of falling provokes a
movement of the hands towards the direction of the fall, the effect of which is to
shield the body from too sudden a shock. If a cinder enter my eye, its lids close
forcibly and a copious flow of tears tends to wash it out.

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LECTURE II.

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