3. And, finally, the peculiar position which the sociological observer occupies with reference to the phenomena puts further obstacles in the way of trustworthy observation. The sociologist has to study an aggregate in which he is himself included. He is a member of society and can not wholly free himself from the beliefs and sentiments generated by this connection.
These peculiar difficulties which beset sociology have naturally impeded the development of the department compared with other branches of knowledge. They furnish adequate explanation of the unsettled condition of sociological thought which has been described in this paper.
In conclusion, it is hardly necessary to state that in the writer's opinion sociology is not, at present, entitled to be called a science. In order to establish the right of a body of knowledge to the title of science, the claimants must be able to show that they have a definitely bounded field of investigation, that they employ recognized scientific methods, and that they have established certain truths of unquestioned value. Sociology in its present state fails to meet these conditions. Its province is not yet agreed upon, its methods have been often unscientific, and its first principles are yet to be formulated. It is not, therefore, a science.
"Sociology," says one of its critics, "no more demonstrates itsclaim to existence as a science than astronomy would if we found some astronomers insisting that the sun went around the earth and others contending that the earth went around the sun."[43]
After all, the question whether sociology deserves to be called a science or not is one of merely academic interest. It has received far more attention than it really deserves. Nor will any amount of discussion upon this point help to make sociology a science. "It is safe to say," remarks the critic from whom we have just quoted, "that no great scientific work was ever done by a man who was fretting over the question whether he was a scientist or not. The work is the thing and not what it is called. On the other hand, no name can dignify a work which is petty and futile."
It is not by talking about it, but by working over it, that a body of knowledge is developed into a science. And sociologists would do well to heed the advice of Tarde, the French writer: "Instead of discoursing upon the merits of this infant—sociology—which men have had the art to baptize before its birth, let us succeed, if possible, in bringing it forth."[44]
By LEANDER S. KEYSER.
Nothing could more clearly prove that a common law runs through the whole domain of Nature than the fact that in every division of her realm there seems to be a class of parasites. In the vegetable world, as is well known, there are various plants that depend wholly upon other plants for the supply of their vital forces. And in the human sphere there are parasites in a very real and literal sense—men and women who rely upon the toil and thrift of others to sustain them in worthless idleness.
In view of the almost universal character of this law it would be strange if these peculiar forms of dependence did not appear in the avian community. We do find such developments in that department of creation. Across the waters there is one bird which has won an unenviable reputation as a parasite, and that is the European cuckoo, which relies almost wholly on the efforts of its more thrifty neighbors to hatch and rear its young, and thereby perpetuate the species. Strangely enough, our American cuckoos are not given to such slovenly habits, but build their own nests and faithfullyperform the duties of nidification, as all respectable feathered folk should. However, this parasitical habit breaks out, quite unexpectedly it must be conceded, in another American family of birds which is entirely distinct from the cuckoo group.
In America the cowbird, often called the cow bunting, is the only member of the avian household that spirits its eggs into the nests of other birds. The theory of evolution can do little toward accounting for the anomaly, and even if it should venture upon some suggestions it would still be just as difficult to explain the cause of the evolution in this special group, while all other avian groups follow the law of thrift and self-reliance.
The cowbird belongs to the family of birds scientifically known asIcteridæ, which includes such familiar species as the bobolinks, orioles, meadow larks, and the various kinds of blackbirds, none of which, I am glad to say, are parasites. The nameMolothrushas been given to the genus that includes the cowbirds. They are confined to the American continent, having no analogues in the lands across the seas. The same may be said, indeed, of the wholeIcteridæfamily. It may be a matter of surprise to many persons that there are twelve species and subspecies of cowbirds in North and South America, for most of us are familiar only with the common cowbird (Molothrus ater) of our temperate regions. Of these twelve species only three are to be found within the limits of the United States, one is a resident of western Mexico and certain parts of Central America, while the rest find habitat exclusively in South America. A fresh field of investigation is open to some enterprising and ambitious naturalist who wishes to study several of these species, as comparatively little is known of their habits, and indeed much still remains to be learned of the whole genus, familiar as one or two of the species are. Their sly, surreptitious manners render them exceedingly difficult to study at close range and with anything like detail.
Are all of them parasites? It is probable they are—at least to a greater or less degree—except one, the bay-winged cowbird of South America, which I shall reserve for notice later on in this article. We might assert that our common cowbird is the parasitepar excellenceof the family, for, so far as I can learn from reading and observation, they never build their own nests or rear their own young, but shift all the duties of maternity, save the laying of the eggs, upon the shoulders of other innocent birds.
These avian "spongers" have a wide geographical range, inhabiting the greater part of the United States and southern Canada, except the extensive forest regions and some portions of the Southern States. The center of their abundance is the States borderingon the upper Mississippi River and its numerous tributaries. They occur only as stragglers on the Pacific coast west of the Cascade and Sierra Nevada Mountains. The most northern point at which they have been known to breed is the neighborhood of Little Slave Lake in southern Athabasca. In the autumn the majority of these birds migrate to southern Mexico, although a considerable number remain in our Southern States, and a few occasionally tarry for the winter even as far north as New England and southern Michigan.
The male cowbird looks like a well-dressed gentleman—and may have even a slightly clerical air—in his closely fitting suit of glossy black, with its greenish and purplish iridescence, and his cloak of rich metallic brown covering his head, neck, and chest. He makes a poor shift as a musician, but his failure is not due to lack of effort, for during courtship days he does his level best to sing a variety of tunes, expanding and distorting his throat, fluffing up his feathers, spreading out his wings and tail, his purpose evidently being to make himself as fascinating as possible in the eyes of his lady love. One of his calls sounds like the word "spreele," piped in so piercing a key that it seems almost to perforate your brain.
One observer maintains that the cowbirds are not only parasitical in their habits, but are also absolutely devoid of conjugal affection, practicing polyandry, and seldom even mating. This is a serious charge, but it is doubtless true, for even during the season of courtship and breeding these birds live in flocks of six to twelve, the males almost always outnumbering the females. However, if their sexual relations are somewhat irregular, no one can accuse them of engaging in family brawls, as so many other birds do, for both males and females seem to be on the most cordial terms with one another, and are, to all appearances, entirely free from jealousy. Who has ever seen two cowbirds fighting a duel like the orioles, meadow larks, and robins? Their domestic relations seem to be readily adjusted, perhaps all the more so on account of their lax standards of sexual virtue.
In obtruding her eggs into the nests of other birds Madame Cowbird is sly and stealthy. She does not drive the rightful owners from their nests, but simply watches her opportunity to drop her eggs into them when they are unguarded. No doubt she has been on the alert while her industrious neighbors have been constructing their domiciles, and knows where every nest in the vicinity is hidden. Says Major Charles Bendire: "In rare instances only will a fresh cowbird's egg be found among incubated ones of the rightful owners. I have observed this only on a single occasion." From one to seven eggs of the parasite are found in the nests of the dupes. In most cases the number is two, but in the case ofground builders the cowbird seems to have little fear of overdoing her imposition. Major Bendire says that he once found the nest of an ovenbird which contained seven cowbird's eggs and only one of the little owner's.
If parasitism were the only crime of the cowbird one would not feel so much disposed to put her into the avian Newgate Calendar; but she not only inflicts her own eggs upon her innocent victims, but often actually tosses their eggs out of the nests in order to make room for her own. Nor is that all; she will sometimes puncture the eggs of the owners to prevent their hatching, and thus increase the chances of her own offspring. Whether this is done with her beak or her claws is still an open question, Major Bendire inclining to the belief that it is done with the claws.
Her finesse is still further to be seen in the fact that she usually selects some bird for a victim that is smaller than herself, so that when her young hopefuls begin to grow they will be able to crowd or starve out the true heirs of the family. In this way it is thought that many a brood comes to an untimely end, the foster parents having no means of replacing their own little ones when they have been ejected from the nest. However, I am disposed to think that the cowbird's impositions are not usually so destructive as some observers are inclined to believe. I once found a bush sparrow's nest containing one cowbird and four little sparrows, all of which were in a thriving condition. The sparrows were so well fed and active that as soon as I touched the nest they sprang, with loud chirping, over the rim of their cottage and scuttled away through the grass. They were certainly strong and healthy, in spite of the presence of their big foster brother. Before they flitted away I had time to notice how the little family were disposed. The cowbird was squatted in the center of the nest, while his little brothers and sisters were ranged around him, partly covering him and no doubt keeping him snug and warm. They were further advanced than he, for while they scrambled from the nest, he could do nothing but snuggle close to the bottom of the cup, where he was at my mercy.
A wood thrush's nest that I found contained two young thrushes and two buntings. All of them were about half fledged. Being of nearly the same size, the queerly assorted bantlings lived in apparent peace in their narrow quarters. I watched them at frequent intervals, but saw no attempts on the part of the foundlings to crowd out their fellow-nestlings. The cowbirds were the first to leave the roof-tree. Thus it appears that the intrusion of the cowbird's eggs does not always mean disaster to the real offspring of the brooding family, but of course it always prevents the laying of the full complement of eggs by the builders themselves.
Even after the youngsters have left the nest the mother cowbird does not assume the care of them, but still leaves them in charge of the foster parents. It is laughable, almost pathetic, to see a tiny ovenbird or redstart feeding a strapping young cowbird which is several times as large as herself. She looks like a pygmy feeding a giant. In order to thrust a tidbit into his mouth she must often stand on her tiptoes. Why the diminutive caterer does not see through the fraud I can not say. She really seems to be attached to the hulking youngster. By and by, however, when he grows large enough to shift for himself, he deserts his little parents and nurses and seeks companionship among his own blood kindred, who will doubtless bring him up in the way all cowbirds should walk.
It is surprising how many species are imposed on successfully by the cowbird. The number, so far as has been observed, is ninety, with probably more to be added. Among the birds most frequently victimized are the phœbes, the song sparrows, the indigo birds, the bush sparrows, and the yellow-breasted chats. Even the nests of the red-headed woodpecker and the rock wrens are not exempt. Some species, notably the summer warblers, detect the imposture and set about defeating the purposes of the interloper. This they do by building another story to their little cottage, leaving the obtruded eggs in the cellar, where they do not receive enough warmth to develop the embryo.
While it is surprising that acute birds should allow themselves to be imposed on in this way, perhaps, after all, they look upon the cowbird as a kind of blessing in disguise; at least, he may not be an unmixed evil. They may act on the principle of reciprocity—that "one good turn deserves another." What I mean is this: In my rambles I have often found the cowbirds the first to give warning of the approach of a supposed danger. Having no domestic duties of their own, they can well secrete themselves in a tall tree overlooking the entire premises, and thus play the useful rôle of sentinel. This, I am disposed to believe, is one of the compensating uses of this parasite, and may furnish the reason for his being tolerated in birdland. And heistolerated. Has any one ever seen other birds driving the cowbird away from their breeding precincts, or charging him with desperate courage as they do the blue jays, the hawks, the owls, and other predatory species? He evidently subserves some useful purpose in the avian community, or he would not be treated with so much consideration.
A young cowbird that I purloined from the nest and reared by hand did not prove a very pleasant pet. He was placed in a large cage with several other kinds of young birds. At first he was quite docile, taking his food from my hand and even allowing some ofhis feathered companions to feed him; but in a few weeks he grew so wild and manifested such a fierce desire for the outdoor world that I was glad to carry him out to the woods and give him his freedom. A young red-winged blackbird and a pair of meadow larks developed a different disposition.
The dwarf cowbird (Molothrus ater obscurus) is similar to his relative just described, except that he is smaller and his geographical range is more restricted. He is a resident of Mexico, southern Texas, southwestern Arizona, and southern California. His habits resemble those of the common cowbird. Another bunting, having almost the same range, although a little more southerly, is the red-eyed cowbird, which is larger and darker than our common cowbird and has the same parasitical habits.
In South America three species have been studied by Mr. W. H. Hudson, who, in collaboration with Mr. P. L. Sclater, has published a most valuable work on Argentine ornithology. One of these is called the Argentine cowbird (Molothrus bonariensis). It is abona fide, blue-blooded parasite, and has been seen striking its beak into the eggs of other birds and flying away with them. The males, it is said, show little discrimination in pecking the eggs, for they are just as likely to puncture the cowbird eggs as those of other birds. Every egg in a nest is frequently perforated in this way. These buntings lay a large number of eggs, often dropping them on the ground, laying them in abandoned nests, or depositing them in nests in which incubation has already begun, in which cases all of them are lost. However, in spite of this wastefulness the birds thrive, thousands of them being seen in flocks during the season of migration.
And, by the way, a description of their habits by Mr. Hudson has thrown an interesting light on the subject of migration in the southern hemisphere. South of the equator the recurrence of the seasons is the exact reverse of their recurrence north of the equator, and therefore the breeding season of the birds is in the autumn instead of the spring; the flight from winter cold occurs in the spring instead of in the autumn, and is toward the north instead of toward the south. Thus, in February and March the Argentine cowbirds are seen flying in vast battalions in the direction of the equatorial regions—that is, northward—in whose salubrious clime they spend the winter. As our northern autumn draws near and the southern summer approaches these winged migrants take the air line for their breeding haunts in the Argentine Republic and Patagonia. At the same time the migrants of the northern hemisphere are pressing southward before the blustering mien of old Boreas. It all seems wonderful and solemn, this world-wide processional of the seasons and the birds.
Naturally, one would expect to find some other eccentricities in this aberrant family besides that of parasitism, and in this expectation one is not disappointed. There are two other species of cowbirds in the Argentine country—the screaming cowbird (Molothrus rufoaxillaris) and the bay-winged cowbird (Molothrus badius). The latter is only partly a trencher on the rights of other birds—that is, it is only half a parasite. Indeed, it sometimes builds its own nest, which is quite a respectable affair; but, as if to prove that it still has some remnants of cowbird depravity in its nature, it frequently drives other birds from their rightful possessions, appropriates the quarters thus acquired, lays its eggs into them, and proceeds to the performance of its domestic duties like its respectable neighbors. Its virtue is that it never imposes the work of incubation and brood rearing on any of its feathered associates, even though it does sometimes eject them from their premises.
But what is to be said of the screaming cowbird? Instead of inflicting its eggs on its more distant avian relatives it watches its chance and slyly drops them into the domicile of its bay-winged cousins, and actually makes them hatch and rear its offspring! This seems to be carrying imposture to the extreme of refinement, or possibly developing it into a fine art, and reminds one of those human good-for-naughts who "sponge" off their relatives rather than go among strangers. One can scarcely refrain from wondering whether grave questions of pauperism and shiftlessness ever enter into the discussion of "the social problem" in the bird community.
By Prof. D. S. MARTIN.
The Columbus meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science was looked forward to with considerable interest as the first in the new half century of that body. Would the impression and stimulus of the great semicentennial gathering at Boston last year be found to continue, or be followed by a reaction? The meetings west of the Alleghanies are always smaller than the eastern ones, and the brilliancy of the Boston meeting could not be looked for in any interior city. The general expectation was for an "off-year" gathering.
But only in point of attendance was this impression verified. The register of those present showed three hundred and fifty-three names—a good number for an interior meeting, very fewof the Western gatherings having exceeded it. In all other respects the general feeling of the members indicates that the meeting was notably successful and enjoyable, and the remarks made by the writer a year ago as to the real value of the smaller and less conspicuous meetings he feels to have been well exemplified. It was a scientific working meeting, with enough of social intercourse and attentions to be delightful, but not distracting. In these aspects the "golden mean" was markedly preserved.
The arrangements of the local committee for the convenience of the members and the success of the meeting in general were remarkable in their completeness. Nothing seems to have been overlooked, and some advances were made upon any previous year. The daily programmes were well printed and on hand early every morning—a most important point, not always heretofore attained. A complete telephone service between the section rooms and the central hall was a feature of special advantage, each section reporting to headquarters every paper as it was taken up. This was then posted on a bulletin, so that any one could know at any time what was going on in each section. A great amount of delay and disappointment, that has often been felt by members anxious to hear certain papers in different sections, was thus entirely obviated. Columbus has set an example in this feature that must be followed in the arrangements for all future meetings. The entire service on these telephones was rendered not by professional operators, but by young lady students of the university, and it was well and gracefully done.
It is fitting also that recognition should be given to some who have been less prominent in the local arrangements, but have had a large share in their preparation. While the public resolutions of thanks have made well-deserved mention of the local committee and its officers, especially Prof. B. F. Thomas, the indefatigable secretary, it is known in Columbus that much of the planning and arranging was the work of Prof. Edward Orton, Jr., the son of the president of the meeting, and that very much is owing to his laborious activity in the perfection of the local adjustments.
The place of meeting was eminently pleasant and suitable—the wide campus and fine buildings of the Ohio State University. To members from the East it was a matter of great interest to see this noble institution, one of the best examples of the great educational enterprises of the central States. In his address of welcome at the opening of the association the president of the university, Dr. William O. Thompson, outlined the history of public education in the West as dating back to provisions in the "Ordinance of 1787," looking to educational advantages for the great"Northwest Territory." The State University of Ohio is one of the youngest of its kind, but now one of the most important, among the States formed from that great region, although Ohio was the first to be organized into Statehood.
Among the numerous fine structures scattered over the broad area of the campus, one of the most interesting is Orton Hall, containing the collections in geology and archæology, which are very extensive, as well as the laboratories, workrooms, and classrooms of the geological department, and at present the University Library. Here the meetings of Section E (Geology and Geography) were held. In the adjacent Botanical Hall, with its greenhouses, etc., Section G held its meetings. But most of the sections met in Townshend Hall, where the telephone service above described connected all the rooms.
The Ohio State University not only welcomed and accommodated the association, but had a strong representation among the officers of the meeting. The venerable president, Dr. Orton, has long been professor of geology in the university, and his collections are displayed in the hall that so appropriately bears his name. Section C (Chemistry) and Section G (Botany) both had secretaries from the university faculty—Professors Weber and Kellerman, respectively—while the arrangements for the meeting have been already spoken of as largely due to Professor Thomas and Professor Orton, Jr.
The ladies' reception committee did everything for the comfort and convenience of the visiting ladies. Their musicale and garden party in the grounds were described as extremely enjoyable, and the provision of private carriages to convey ladies and aged members across the broad spaces of the campus to and from the entrances was a very delicate and highly esteemed convenience, especially on warm days. The association was favored in the weather, which, though somewhat hot out of doors, was not severe, and the rooms were pleasant and airy.
The excursions given to the members were all of them scientific; they were not merely pleasure trips. This point was a marked feature of the Columbus meeting, and one well worthy of future imitation as far as may be. Not every place, however, has such marked facilities in this respect. On Saturday, August 26th, three free excursions were provided to points of geological or archæological interest. They were about equally shared by the members, together with representatives of the local committee. One party left on Friday evening, passing the night at Sandusky, and going by boat thence to the celebrated islands of Lake Erie, there to see the wonderful glacial furrows in the corniferouslimestone on Kelley's Island and the recently opened strontia cave on Put-in-Bay Island. These islands are also favorite pleasure resorts for the whole neighborhood, and the trip was one of great interest and enjoyment. Another party, on Saturday morning, went to points of special importance in the coal region of the Hocking Valley, under the direction of Mr. R. M. Haseltine, chief mine inspector of Ohio. At Corning the party went down into Mine No. 8, owned by the Sunday Creek Coal Company, which has recently been equipped with electric power generated by utilizing the waste gas from neighboring gas-wells. This is said to be the first mine in Ohio to improve this natural source of power. At a depth of sixty-five feet the visiting party were taken by mine cars to a point where a remarkably fine exposure has been made of a carboniferous "forest," with upright trunks ofSigillariaand associated forms of coal vegetation finely displayed. At a point somewhat nearer the entrance, but at a lower level, lunch was served by the company, in a chamber lighted by electricity, two hundred feet underground and a mile from daylight! Another mine was visited later, and the machinery and appliances examined; this was No. 16, at Hollister, owned by the Courtright Coal Company.
The third party went to Fort Ancient to examine the great aboriginal earthworks at that place, owned by the State, and in charge of the Ohio Archæological Society. Here, on a hill widely overlooking the Little Miami Valley, are some of the most extensive prehistoric works in the country. The State has purchased two hundred and eighty-seven acres, and of these about one hundred acres are included within the walls. These ramparts, overgrown with large trees, follow closely the contour of the hills, and show that, whatever their age, there has been no change and little erosion since they were built. Their form is very irregular, consisting of two main areas—a northern one, called the "new fort," rudely square, and a southern one, called the "old fort," rudely triangular—connected by a narrow portion, called the "isthmus," with crescent-shaped transverse walls crossing it, and high conical mounds at the entrance to the "old fort." From the main gateway of the "new fort," starting from two mounds, two parallel walls can be traced, exactly eastward, for half a mile or more. Irregular as these works are, from the contour of the hills and the course of the ravines that bound them, yet there is also seen at times in their shaping a singular exactness of orientation that is striking and suggestive. Their use is problematical, but they must have been defensive, although an enormous force would be required to hold them, as their entire circumference isthree miles and a half. At one point within the "old fort," in front of the gateway to the "isthmus," was found a burial place where a number of skeletons lay as though thrown together, not carefully and separately buried. The suggestion is strongly made that this spot marks an unsuccessful attack by enemies, who were roughly buried where they fell. At other points graves have been found, some containing copper implements and overlaid with plates of mica. Great regret was felt that Mr. W. K. Moorehead, who has explored so extensively here and in the vicinity and has published such interesting accounts of Fort Ancient and similar remains, was unable to be at the meeting on account of severe illness.
The public spirit that has secured this spot for the State, and the work of the Ohio Archæological Society in caring for it properly, are matters for pride and congratulation, and evidences of the highest type of civilization. The society is clearing away the dense undergrowth so as to display the works and the trees upon them; is guarding and repairing the walls at points where injury has occurred by "washing"; has sunk a well in the "old fort," with fine water; and built a pavilion for visitors. Here lunch was served to the party, and addresses given by archæologists present and officers of the Archæological Society.
On Thursday a large number of the geologists spent most of the day in examining moraines and glacial phenomena near Lancaster, and in the evening nearly the entire association was taken by special train to see the gas-wells in the same neighborhood, at Sugar Grove, which were lighted and "blown off" for their benefit. The city of Columbus itself is to a considerable extent supplied with natural gas.
Turning to the proceedings of the meeting, there may be noted in the character of the papers certain tendencies which are independent of the association and belong to the general line of thought of the present, and doubtless yet more of the future. The papers presented may be roughly grouped into two classes: those relating to technical details, and those involving or seeking practical results and applications. Of course, there is no conflict between these two lines of thought and work—the latter, to be really attained being dependent upon the former—but there is this tendency distinctly shown, to consider scientific questions in their bearing on the welfare or the needs of humanity. Naturally, this aspect appeared more clearly in some of the sections than in others, but no one who looks over the titles in the daily programmes can fail to note it. The whole work of Section I (Social and Economic Science) is of this character, and it is marked in Sections G(Botany), D (Mechanics and Engineering), and H (Anthropology). It would be impossible to mention all the papers bearing upon such relations; a very few only can here be noted, even of those that were important. In Section I no more suggestive title has ever been presented to such a body than that of Miss Cora A. Benneson, of Cambridge, Mass., on Federal Guarantees for Maintaining Republican Government in the States. Miss Benneson is a graduate in law, and has already achieved distinction in her profession in subjects relating to questions of government. In Section G, Prof. H. A. Weber, the secretary, read a paper on Testing Soils for the Application of Commercial Fertilizers—the outcome of twelve years' intercourse with farmers' institutes and many more years of experimentation—aiming to avoid unwise and unprofitable use of fertilizers on soils to which they are not adapted, and to provide ready and accurate methods of determination as to the needs and the capacities of soils. Sections D and I united to hear a paper before the former, by Principal Morrison, of the Manual Training High School, of Kansas City, Mo., on Thermal Determinations in Heating and Ventilating Buildings, with special reference to schools. These are merely given as instances. Agriculture, electrical appliances, educational methods, and social conditions, all received important attention.
Another paper of great practical moment was read before Section C by Prof. H. W. Wiley, chemist to the United States Department of Agriculture, and Mr. H. W. Krug, on New Products from Maize Stalks. Careful analyses of the pith and stalks of corn, and important suggestions as to their great utility in various ways, were presented. Some of these were very surprising, not only pointing out the value of these substances as fodder, when properly prepared and used, but in the realm of war as well as in peace, for protecting the sides of naval vessels as a light and most effective armor, and in the manufacture of smokeless powder of a superior quality. Professor Wiley claimed that from these hitherto almost waste products of American farms immense results may be obtained.
Very naturally, the recent war and questions connected with it called forth some striking contributions. Prof. William S. Aldrich, of the University of Illinois, addressed Section D and a large proportion of members from other sections on Engineering Experiences with Spanish Wrecks, and the story of the Maria Teresa. Professor Aldrich was connected with the United States repair-ship Vulcan, and described the remarkable character of that vessel—an entire novelty in naval warfare—with her complete outfit of engineering tools and machinery, even to brass and ironfurnaces of large capacity. Never before, he said, had such castings been made on board ship, or a foundry operated on the ocean. The effects of the American rapid-fire guns on Admiral Cervera's ships were fully described and illustrated, and the paper closed with a vivid and detailed account of the floating of the Maria Teresa, her repairing by the crew of the Vulcan through five weeks of most difficult work, and the unsuccessful attempt to bring her to Norfolk, ending in her abandonment and loss. The public lecture of Wednesday evening was by Prof. C. E. Monroe, of Washington, D. C., on the Application of Modern Explosives, very fully illustrated. Detailed accounts were given of the manufacture of gun cotton and various recent forms of high explosives and smokeless powders. In regard to the use of the latter, Professor Monroe emphasized the fact that France and Germany had adopted smokeless powders in 1887, and Italy and England a year or two later, and characterized as "unpardonable" the fact that our own service was unprovided with any such material when we began the war with Spain. He further discussed recent and very important experiments in the matter of throwing from ordinary guns shells charged with high explosives, especially that known as Joveite, with which tremendous effects have been produced in penetrating the heaviest plating.
Very different in character was the interesting and pleasing programme carried out by the Section of Botany in memory of two eminent workers in bryology who were long identified with Columbus—Dr. William S. Sullivant and his colaborer, Prof. Leo Lesquereaux, who was eminent also in fossil botany. Wednesday was set apart as "Sullivant day," and was marked by an extensive display of portraits, books, and specimens, and a series of memorial addresses, with notes on the progress of bryology. Twelve North American species of mosses have been named for Dr. Sullivant, and specimens of all these, with drawings made by him, were loaned for this occasion from his collection, now at the museum of Harvard University. Sets of duplicates of these species, from the herbarium of Columbia University, were prepared and presented as souvenirs to the botanists in attendance. Some members of Dr. Sullivant's family were present, and naturally felt a very deep sense of gratification at such a tribute to his name and fame.
The address of the retiring president, Prof. F. W. Putnam, had a special interest in that it was the last official appearance of one who has been for so many years closely and prominently identified with the association as its permanent secretary, and whose presence and personality have seemed an essential element inevery meeting. Professor Putnam, in opening, paid an especial tribute to the late Dr. D. G. Brinton, of Philadelphia, a former president and leading member of the association, devoted to the same branch of research with himself—North American ethnology—although holding different theories therein. Professor Putnam dealt with the prehistoric peoples of this continent, and argued for distinct racial types as expressed in the remains that they have left, and for resemblances as due to intercourse and mingling of tribes, and not to autochthonous development of arts and customs as the result of corresponding stages of evolution without contact or outside influence—the view maintained by Dr. Brinton.
There is not space here to dwell further upon many valuable papers and discussions. The Section of Geology had a full and interesting session, in which glacial phenomena, especially as displayed in Ohio, bore a considerable part. One of the papers had a very wide and painful interest for all Americans—that of Mr. E. H. Barbour, on the Rapid Decline of Geyser Activity in the Yellowstone Basin. Careful and extended comparison of the present state of the geysers and hot springs with that to be seen a few years ago shows that these wonderful and impressive phenomena have greatly decreased in both the amount and the frequency of their manifestations, and Mr. Barbour warned all who desire to witness anything of their grandeur to visit the region without delay, as the indications point to their speedy cessation as probable if not inevitable.
In reference to the future of the association, it is gratifying to observe that the various special societies, whose relations to the association were considered in the article by the present writer a year ago, have not only continued to hold their summer sessions in connection with that of the association, but have shown a very cordial spirit of co-operation, and that some others are proposing to affiliate in a similar way. This is as it should be; but there is in it also the suggestion of a broader and more definite relationship of all these special societies to each other through the medium of the association. The tendency is apparently toward affiliation and co-operation among them, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science could have no more fitting or useful function than as a sort of federative or representative body for all the others.
The next meeting is to be held in New York, two months earlier than usual—at the end of June. Both the place and the time were determined by the Paris Exposition. It was thought best to arrange the meeting so that it might easily be attendedby the large number of scientists from all over the country who will be going abroad next summer. This plan is doubtless wise, although it is much to be regretted that the time—the last week in June—will cut off from attendance almost all the members who are teachers in public schools, who will be just then in the pressure of their closing days and examinations. The peculiar circumstances of the year, however, justify what would otherwise be a most unfortunate time. New York will do her best, and give the association a welcome worthy of the great metropolis of America.
By LEWIS R. HARLEY.
Philadelphia has long been regarded as the home of medical science in America. Here was founded the first medical school in the United States, among whose alumni are numbered some of the most brilliant names in the profession. The spirit of scientific research has always been most active in Philadelphia. Here Franklin made his experiments in electricity, and Rittenhouse observed the transit of Venus; while Rush, Morgan, Williamson, and Physick gave the city a name abroad as a great medical center. Each generation has contributed something to her fame as the abode of scientific culture.
In recent times no name has been so closely associated with the intellectual progress of the city as that of the subject of this sketch. Dr. William Pepper was reared in a scientific atmosphere. His father, William Pepper, the elder, was born in Philadelphia, January 21, 1810. He graduated with first honors at Princeton in 1829. He afterward studied medicine for a time with Dr. Thomas T. Hewson, and in 1832 graduated in medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He then spent two years in study in Paris, and in 1834 he entered upon his profession in Philadelphia, where he rose rapidly in reputation. He was physician to the Pennsylvania Hospital for twenty-six years. In 1860 he was elected Professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine in the University of Pennsylvania. He held this position until the time of his death, October 15, 1864. Dr. Pepper had two sons, who became distinguished in the medical profession. The eldest son, George, was born April 1, 1841, and died September 14, 1872. He graduated from the college department of the University of Pennsylvania in 1862, and completed the course in the Medical School in 1865. He served with distinction in the civil war, and died atthe beginning of a successful professional career. Another son, Dr.William Pepper, the subject of this sketch, was born in Philadelphia, August 21, 1843.
Dr. Pepper received his educational training solely in the city of his birth, having graduated from the college department of the University of Pennsylvania in 1862, in the same class with Provost Charles C. Harrison, Thomas McKean, Dr. Persifor Fraser, and many other men prominent in university circles. He graduated from the Medical School in 1864, and at once began the practice of medicine. His connection with the University of Pennsylvania began in 1868, when he was appointed lecturer on morbid anatomy. From 1870 to 1876 he was lecturer on clinical medicine. In 1876 Dr. Pepper was given a full professorship of clinical medicine, in which he continued until 1887, when he succeeded Dr. Alfred Stillé in the chair of the Theory and Practice of Medicine.
During this early period of his career Dr. Pepper labored with untiring zeal in the practice of his profession, and he also became eminently successful as a teacher. In 1877 he set forth his views on higher medical education in an address at the opening of the one hundred and twelfth course of lectures in the University Medical School.[45]At that time a very low standard existed in the medical schools of our country, and Dr. Pepper, in his address, urged the following reforms:
1. The establishment of a preparatory examination.
2. The lengthening of the course to at least three full years.
3. The careful grading of the course.
4. The introduction of ample practical instruction of each student both at the bedside and in laboratories.
5. The establishment of fixed salaries for the professors, so that they may no longer have any pecuniary interest in the size of their classes.
It was a source of gratification to Dr. Pepper that he lived to see all these reforms in medical education adopted. On the extension of the medical course to four years he subscribed $50,000 toward a permanent endowment of $250,000. As early as 1871 he began to urge the establishment of a university hospital, the subject being first discussed in a conversation with Dr. H. C. Wood and Dr. William F. Norris. An appeal was made to the public, and Dr. Pepper was made chairman of a finance committee. By May, 1872, a splendid site and $350,000 for building and endowment had been secured. Dr. Pepper was selected as chairman ofthe building committee, and work on the hospital was pushed so rapidly that it was ready for patients on July 15, 1874.
When Dr. Charles J. Stillé resigned the provostship of the university in 1881, Dr. Pepper was elected as his successor. The executive abilities which he had displayed in connection with the founding of the new hospital made him the natural choice of the trustees. Although his private practice had increased to immense proportions, besides being occupied with his duties as a clinical professor, Dr. Pepper accepted the provostship. To the duties of this office he devoted the best years of his life. The extent of his practice and the demands made upon his time by the university would have appalled an ordinary man, but his capacity for labor appeared to be without limit, his working day often exceeding eighteen hours. His administration was characterized by the unification of the various schools of the university, besides the founding and equipment of several new departments. In one of his annual reports Dr. Pepper defined the broad policy of the university in the following appropriate language: "The university is truly the voluntary association of all persons and of all agencies who wish to unite in work for the elevation of society by the pursuit and diffusion of truth."[46]In other words, Dr. Pepper regarded the functions of the university as not simply an institution of instruction, but also of research. To this end every effort was made to open up new fields of investigation and to widen the scope of the university. During his provostship thirteen new buildings were erected, and the following departments, or schools, were organized:
Dr. Pepper took particular interest in the Department of Archæology and Paleontology connected with the university. For a number of years he was president of its board of trustees, while itwas largely through his efforts that the Babylonian Exploration Fund was formed.[47]It was Dr. Pepper's ambition to have at the university well-equipped laboratories that would offer an opportunity for original investigation in medical science. The establishment of the Laboratory of Hygiene, in 1892, was the first step in this direction, soon to be followed by Dr. Pepper's gift of the Laboratory of Clinical Medicine. This laboratory was founded in memory of his father, the late Dr. William Pepper. The gift is unique in that it is made for the purpose of promoting and stimulating original research, and improving the methods of diagnosing and treating the diseases of human beings. Another field of work in the laboratory is that of giving advanced and special instruction to men who have already obtained the degree of Doctor of Medicine. At the opening of the laboratory in 1895 Dr. William H. Welch, of Johns Hopkins University, said, "To the small number of existing clinical laboratories the William Pepper Laboratory of Clinical Medicine is a most notable addition, being the first laboratory of the kind in this country, and it is not surpassed by any in foreign countries."[48]
Dr. Pepper realized more and more every year that the vast extent of the university interests demanded the undivided activity of its head. In 1894 he resigned the office of provost, stating at the time that, as it became necessary for him to choose between administration work and medical science, his devotion to the latter determined his choice. His administration was an eventful one, during which the university evolved from a group of disconnected schools to a great academic body. In 1881 its property in land amounted to fifteen acres, while in 1894 it controlled fifty-two acres in a continuous tract. In 1881 the university property was valued at $1,600,000; in 1894 it exceeded $5,000,000. The teaching force in 1881 numbered 88 and the students in all departments 981; in 1894 the former were 268, and the attendance had reached 2,180, representing every State in the Union, as well as thirty-eight foreign countries.
Dr. Pepper became well known as an author on medical subjects. He founded the Philadelphia Medical Times, and was its editor for two years. In 1885 he edited a System of Medicine by American Authors, a work that has been considered a leading authority on medical subjects. He also edited a book of medical practice by American authors, and, with Dr. J. F. Meigs, issueda work on Diseases of Children. He was Medical Director of the Centennial Exposition in 1876, and for his services he received from the King of Sweden the decoration of Knight Commander of the Order of St. Olaf.
Dr. Pepper showed an unbounded interest in behalf of any movement that would benefit the community in general. He was one of the first to realize the advantage that would accrue to Philadelphia should she become a museum center. The Philadelphia Commercial Museum was established in October, 1893, with Dr. Pepper as president of the board of trustees. The old offices of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company were leased, and exhibits were secured from the Latin-American countries, Africa, Australia, Japan, and India, forming the largest permanent collection of raw products in existence. Referring to the great value of the museum, Dr. Pepper spoke as follows in his address of welcome at the first annual meeting of the advisory board:
"It would seem clear, however, that no method of studying industries and commerce can be scientific and complete which does not include the museum idea as now comprehended. The museum aims to teach by object lesson the story of the world, past and present. The Biological Museum presents the objects of human and comparative anatomy, arranged scientifically and labeled so fully as to constitute the best text-book for the study of those subjects. The Museum of Natural History does the same in its field. The Museum of Archæology shows the progress of the race from the most archaic times, the different types of human beings, their mode of living, their forms of worship, their games, their weapons, their implements, the natural products which they used for subsistence, in their industries, and in their arts, the objects of manufacture or of art which they produced, and the manner in which they disposed of their dead.
"The natural products and manufactured articles, which constitute the material of commerce, come necessarily into such a scheme, and the long-looked-for opportunity of establishing a commercial museum upon a truly scientific basis presented itself when, at the close of the Columbian Exposition at Chicago, it was possible, through the enlightened liberality of the municipal authorities of Philadelphia and the invaluable services of Prof. W. P. Wilson, to secure vast collections of commercial material, which was so liberally donated to the Philadelphia museums by nearly all the foreign countries of the globe."
It was Dr. Pepper's idea to have the University Museum and the Commercial Museum situated near each other, on the plan of the South Kensington Museum. To this end the City Councils,in 1896, passed an ordinance giving over to the trustees of the Commercial Museum sixteen acres of land for the erection of suitable buildings. When all the plans are carried out the city will have unrivaled facilities for the study of civilization, past and present.
One of the most enduring monuments to Dr. Pepper's zeal and generosity is the Free Library of Philadelphia. In 1889 his uncle, George S. Pepper, bequeathed the sum of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars "to the trustees of such Free Library which may be established in the city of Philadelphia." From the beginning Dr. Pepper took a warm interest in the Free Library movement. It was under his leadership that the library was organized, and he was made the first president of its board of trustees. Speaking of his activity in this direction, the librarian, Mr. John Thomson, said: "No detail was too small for his personal attention. No plan for its future growth was too large for his ambitious hope of both public and private support. The remarkable and rapid increase in the circulation of the Free Library, the multiplication of its branches, the organization of all its departments on a broad and generous plan, his success in enlisting a large number of able fellow-workers, his clear, plain statements to Councils and the city authorities, his activity in securing needed legislation at Harrisburg, were some of the results of that intelligent energy which enabled him to do so much and to do it so well." The bequest of the Pepper family has been supplemented by ample appropriations by the City Councils, and the Free Library is now one of the most important institutions in Philadelphia. The library at present has twelve flourishing branches, while the combined circulation of the system for the year 1898 was 1,738,950 volumes.
Dr. Pepper was also connected with many scientific bodies. He was Vice-President of the American Philosophical Society, and President of the first Pan-American Medical Congress in 1893. He was a Fellow of the College of Physicians; President of the Philadelphia Pathological Society from 1873 to 1876; Director of the Biological Section, Academy of Natural Sciences; President, in 1886, of the American Climatological Association; President of the Foulke and Long Institute for Orphan Girls; President of the First Sanitary Convention of Pennsylvania; and in 1882 he was a member of the Assay Commission of the United States Mint. He received the degree of LL. D. from Lafayette College in 1881, and from the University of Pennsylvania in 1893.
In 1873 Dr. Pepper married Miss Frances Sargeant Perry, a lineal descendant of Benjamin Franklin, and a granddaughter ofCommodore Oliver Hazard Perry. Four sons were born, of whom three survive—Dr. William Pepper, Jr., Benjamin Franklin Pepper, and Oliver Hazard Perry Pepper. Failing in health, Dr. Pepper went to California early in the summer of 1898, where he died of heart disease on July 28th of that year. His body reached Philadelphia on August 6th. Funeral services were held in St. James's Protestant Episcopal Church, after which the body was cremated, and the ashes interred in Laurel Hill Cemetery. The American Anthropometric Society received, by the conditions of his will, Dr. Pepper's brain. Among the members of this society were Dr. Joseph Leidy, Phillips Brooks, and Prof. E. D. Cope. The articles of membership of the Anthropometric Society require that each member contribute his brain in the interests of science.
Dr. Pepper's death was followed by many expressions of sorrow from learned societies in various parts of the world. One of the most beautiful tributes was the memorial meeting held in the city of Mexico on September 12th. The leading medical and scientific societies of Mexico assembled in the hall of Congress to do honor to the work and character of Dr. Pepper. President Diaz occupied the chair, and about him were gathered the leading citizens, officials, and scientists of Mexico. Representatives of the National Medical School and the Board of Health eulogized Dr. Pepper, while Hon. Matias Romero spoke of him not as a physician, but as an "altruist who had consecrated himself to doing good for his fellow-men."
In Philadelphia, steps have been taken to erect a substantial memorial to Dr. Pepper. At a memorial meeting, held on March 6th last, a proposition was made to place a statue of the deceased scientist on the City Hall plaza, after the style of the Girard Monument. A committee was appointed with power to raise funds for the proposed statue, the cost not to exceed ten thousand dollars.
One of the letters of William Pengelly, geologist, of Torquay, England, printed in the memoir published by his daughter, gives this sketch of Babbage, the mathematician and inventor of the calculating machine: "I then called on Babbage, and could not get away until after one. He is a splendid talker. He seemed much pleased to see me, and complimented me very much on my lecture (at the Royal Institution), in which he was evidently much interested. He is the most marvelous worker I ever met with. I never saw anything like the evidence of multifarious and vast labor which his 'workshop' presents; he sticks at nothing. One drawer full of riddles, another of epigrams, one of squared words, etc.... It is appalling! And then the downright fun of the fellow; it is almost intoxicating to be with him!"
One of the letters of William Pengelly, geologist, of Torquay, England, printed in the memoir published by his daughter, gives this sketch of Babbage, the mathematician and inventor of the calculating machine: "I then called on Babbage, and could not get away until after one. He is a splendid talker. He seemed much pleased to see me, and complimented me very much on my lecture (at the Royal Institution), in which he was evidently much interested. He is the most marvelous worker I ever met with. I never saw anything like the evidence of multifarious and vast labor which his 'workshop' presents; he sticks at nothing. One drawer full of riddles, another of epigrams, one of squared words, etc.... It is appalling! And then the downright fun of the fellow; it is almost intoxicating to be with him!"
Dr. Edward Thorndike'sinteresting account, in our August number, of his investigations touching the reasoning power of animals has brought us a large number of letters questioning some of the main conclusions set forth in the article, and criticising the method of the inquiry. Not having room for all these communications, we print one of them, and add extracts from two others. These represent the principal objections urged by the various writers against the conclusions drawn by the author of the article from his experiments.
Editor Popular Science Monthly:Sir:The first reading of Dr. Thorndike's article Do Animals Reason? in the August Popular Science Monthly, gave the impression, which has been deepened by subsequent perusal, that his experiments were not only inadequate to solve the question, but unfairly chosen.A dog or a cat, utterly hungry, is placed in a box, from which it can escape "by performing some simple (?) action, such as pulling a wire loop, stepping on a platform or lever, clawing down a string, or turning a wooden button."In the first place, what tends to destroy the reasoning power more than utter hunger? This intense physical craving begets frenzy rather than reason. The more intense this primeval desire, the greater the demand upon primitive instinct for its satisfaction. In the open the cat will jump at a bird, the dog at a bone. If the bird be up a tree, the cat will climb; if the bone be buried, the dog will burrow. Climbing and burrowing are deep-rooted developments of the feline and the canine nature.Put a dog or a cat, utterly hungry, in a box and hang a piece of meat outside. Instinct prompts a jump through the bars of the box at the meat, and the greater the number of unsuccessful attempts the less the likelihood of the animal with a gnawing stomach sitting down to scrutinize the mechanical construction of the box to the point of perceiving that by stepping on a lever it will open a door. How many millions of years did it take two-legged man to arrive at the perception of the use of the lever? Did the shaggy biped arrive at that perception by sitting down when utterly hungry and looking at a lever; or did he, through countless generations, by some such chance as lifting a stone with a stick, come to the knowledge of weight and fulcrum?Put an anthropoid ape, some several degrees nearer man in intelligence than a cat, in a modern office elevator that moves by the push of an electric button, suspend the elevator between two stories, and what do you suppose that anthropoid ape will do?Put a schoolgirl fresh from belles-lettres and matinées in the cab of a locomotive and tell her to run it to the next station. She can not but know that steam will make the wheels go round, but what will she do in the maze of throttles, handles, disks, and rods that confronts her? What will she do if utterly hungry?Take a laborer from his pick and shovel on the railway embankment and put him at the desk of the general manager. He can read and write. Let the messenger boys and clerks shower him with the letters and telegrams that bombard that desk every day, and let him try to settle the questions to which they give rise.Now, why can not the schoolgirl run the locomotive, the laborer the railroad? Because the relations of things necessary to the tasks have never been imprinted upon their registering cells; because, in the latter case at least, of the lack of power of co-ordination—that is, the lack of the power of abstract reasoning that the task involves.Why can not anybody do anything as well as anybody else? Because certain relations have been more deeply impressed upon certain brains than upon others; because of the greater power of certain brains to co-ordinate certain relations, their greater ability to give concrete manifestation of the result of such co-ordination through the efferent nerves. Otherwise any one of us could design a bridge, compose a symphony, or organize a trust.The oftener relations are impressed upon the registering cells, the more readily are those relations co-ordinated, provided the brain structure be of the requisite caliber. Reiterated impression through the ages of the relations between their needs andsurrounding things, together with the development of structural capacity, has led the beaver to build his dam, the bee the honeycomb, the ant its village, the bird its nest. In each case the registered impressions have led to action made possible by long-continued contact between structure and environment; the actions are the result of development that has proceeded mite by mite through unknown time. The brain of neither bird nor beast nor man will immediately co-ordinate radically new impressions received in a radically new environment into coherent action that leads to definite result.Here is an example within the writer's immediate knowledge: At the age of seventeen a boy entered the service of one of the large railway systems as a clerk in the passenger department. Through eleven years of enthusiastic and concentrated endeavor to master the details of the service he rose to the head of the clerical force—that is, the reiterated impression upon his brain cells of the functions of the passenger service led to that co-ordination which resulted in efficient action. Then he became employed in the office of a large coal-mining company. For several days it was with the utmost difficulty that he could bring his attention to bear upon the new tasks. While seated at the desk in the coal office the old railway problems would chase through his mind; when he began to write the initials of the Pittsburg Consolidated Coal Company, he would find that he had written the initials of the Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway Company; instead of the initials of the Pittsburg, Fairport and Northwestern Dock Company, the initials of the Pittsburg, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway Company. The latter initials in each case would appear upon the paper before he knew it, actually without his knowing that he had written them. The entirely unfamiliar routine entailed by the custody of bank accounts, coal leases, deeds and contracts, reports of coal shipments, and the handling of vouchers, became adjusted in his brain bit by bit through many weeks, and it was months before he could co-ordinate the new impressions into broad and well-defined reasoning. If he had been utterly hungry through all the period of the new service, it might have taken years.Now, what can be expected of a dog or a cat, whose mental processes have been adjusted by inheritance and experience to life in the fields and jungles, when placed in a box, utterly hungry, to study mechanical contrivances? It is manifest that if the brain of a dog or a cat would become adjusted to the radically unfamiliar steps necessary to release it from such a radically unfamiliar environment, that adjustment could only come by extremely slow degrees. Voluntary perception is almost beyond the limits of expectation, and the leading of the animal through the necessary steps would have to be repeated time after time before the impressions upon its brain would reach any degree of permanence, especially as its brain would be lacking in attention, and the repeated handling be an annoyance to it. But that by such tutelage the animals, or a proportion of them, arrived at a knowledge of the means necessary to escape from the box is shown by Dr. Thorndike himself. "If one repeats the process, keeps putting the cat back into the box after each success, the amount of useless action gradually decreases, the right movement is made sooner and sooner, until finally it is done as soon as the cat is put in." But he says: "This sort of a history is not the history of a reasoning animal. It is the history of an animal who meets a certain situation with a lot of instinctive acts.... Little by little the one act becomes more and more likely to be done in that situation, while the others slowly vanish. This history represents the wearing smooth of a path in the brain, not the decisions of a rational consciousness."Wherein, however, does this differ from the manner in which hundreds of clerks in offices finally learn routine work and mechanically go through the motions necessary to its performance? Do not the actions of thousands of laborers in field and factory seem to proceed from a wearing smooth of a path in the brain, rather than from rational consciousness? Yet they can not be said to be devoid of reason. Is not a great proportion of the daily actions of any one of us gone through from force of habit, almost by instinct?The word reason does not apply alone to the mental processes of a Helmholtz, but to the co-ordination, however slight, of relations that result in definite action even of a humble organism. Herbert Spencer has clearly shown that instinct and reason differ in degree and not in kind.Dr. Thorndike lays stress upon the fact that a "cat which, when first put in, took sixty seconds to get out, in the second trial eighty, in the third fifty, in the fourth sixty, in the fifth fifty,in the sixth forty," etc., and remarks: "Suppose the cat had, after the third accidental success, been able to reason? She would then have, the next time and all succeeding times, performed the act as soon as put in." Not long ago the writer and a man whose high intelligence can not be questioned, in moments of relaxation were trying to do one of the familiar ring puzzles—endeavoring to separate a ring from two others of peculiar shape and then to join the three. After repeated trials, one would loosen it, but could not replace it; the other finally succeeded in replacing it, but could not loosen it. Then the one could replace it, but not loosen it; the other loosen, but not replace it, and each was closely watching the other all the time. It was half an hour or more before either could both loosen and replace the ring, occasional successful attempts not being repeated until after several succeeding failures. Contrast the relation of the brain of the dazed and indifferent and peculiarly bedeviled cat to the puzzle presented to it by the inside of the box with the earnest effort of the two men to solve the ring puzzle. Who has not found a task more difficult the fifth or sixth time than the second or third, and has only performed it with ease after repeated attempts of varying degrees of success and failure?In conclusion, the writer begs leave to relate an incident, which has not before appeared in print, that profoundly impressed him with the belief that at least in one instance one particular animal displayed reason. One Sunday morning, a dozen years or more ago, he was standing on the bank of the Ohio River at the Sewickley Ferry. A family group, accompanied by a large Newfoundland dog, hailed the ferryman and got in his boat, leaving the dog, which persuasively barked and wagged his tail, on the bank. As the boat pulled out into the stream the dog whined, and then made ready to leap in after it. Then he stopped at the water's edge, and, with head down, gazed intently at the river for several seconds—it seemed a minute or more. Then he ran up the bank more than a hundred feet, stopped, looked at the receding boat, plunged into the stream, and swam vigorously. The current, bearing him down, made his course diagonal to the bank. A boy standing by my side said: "Isn't that a smart dog? If he'd been a crazy dog he'd have jumped in where he was, but he ran up the bank so the current wouldn't wash him down away from the boat."But the dog, swimming with all his vigor, was borne past the boat when within twenty feet or so of it; he endeavored to straighten his course without success, and then, in a long semicircle, swam around to the near bank, landing two or three hundred feet below the place whence the ferryboat had started.What this dog would have done if placed, utterly hungry, in a box from which he could only liberate himself by stepping on a platform or turning a wooden button, I do not know.Logan G. McPherson.Pittsburgh,August 3, 1899.
Editor Popular Science Monthly:
Sir:The first reading of Dr. Thorndike's article Do Animals Reason? in the August Popular Science Monthly, gave the impression, which has been deepened by subsequent perusal, that his experiments were not only inadequate to solve the question, but unfairly chosen.
A dog or a cat, utterly hungry, is placed in a box, from which it can escape "by performing some simple (?) action, such as pulling a wire loop, stepping on a platform or lever, clawing down a string, or turning a wooden button."
In the first place, what tends to destroy the reasoning power more than utter hunger? This intense physical craving begets frenzy rather than reason. The more intense this primeval desire, the greater the demand upon primitive instinct for its satisfaction. In the open the cat will jump at a bird, the dog at a bone. If the bird be up a tree, the cat will climb; if the bone be buried, the dog will burrow. Climbing and burrowing are deep-rooted developments of the feline and the canine nature.
Put a dog or a cat, utterly hungry, in a box and hang a piece of meat outside. Instinct prompts a jump through the bars of the box at the meat, and the greater the number of unsuccessful attempts the less the likelihood of the animal with a gnawing stomach sitting down to scrutinize the mechanical construction of the box to the point of perceiving that by stepping on a lever it will open a door. How many millions of years did it take two-legged man to arrive at the perception of the use of the lever? Did the shaggy biped arrive at that perception by sitting down when utterly hungry and looking at a lever; or did he, through countless generations, by some such chance as lifting a stone with a stick, come to the knowledge of weight and fulcrum?
Put an anthropoid ape, some several degrees nearer man in intelligence than a cat, in a modern office elevator that moves by the push of an electric button, suspend the elevator between two stories, and what do you suppose that anthropoid ape will do?
Put a schoolgirl fresh from belles-lettres and matinées in the cab of a locomotive and tell her to run it to the next station. She can not but know that steam will make the wheels go round, but what will she do in the maze of throttles, handles, disks, and rods that confronts her? What will she do if utterly hungry?
Take a laborer from his pick and shovel on the railway embankment and put him at the desk of the general manager. He can read and write. Let the messenger boys and clerks shower him with the letters and telegrams that bombard that desk every day, and let him try to settle the questions to which they give rise.
Now, why can not the schoolgirl run the locomotive, the laborer the railroad? Because the relations of things necessary to the tasks have never been imprinted upon their registering cells; because, in the latter case at least, of the lack of power of co-ordination—that is, the lack of the power of abstract reasoning that the task involves.
Why can not anybody do anything as well as anybody else? Because certain relations have been more deeply impressed upon certain brains than upon others; because of the greater power of certain brains to co-ordinate certain relations, their greater ability to give concrete manifestation of the result of such co-ordination through the efferent nerves. Otherwise any one of us could design a bridge, compose a symphony, or organize a trust.
The oftener relations are impressed upon the registering cells, the more readily are those relations co-ordinated, provided the brain structure be of the requisite caliber. Reiterated impression through the ages of the relations between their needs andsurrounding things, together with the development of structural capacity, has led the beaver to build his dam, the bee the honeycomb, the ant its village, the bird its nest. In each case the registered impressions have led to action made possible by long-continued contact between structure and environment; the actions are the result of development that has proceeded mite by mite through unknown time. The brain of neither bird nor beast nor man will immediately co-ordinate radically new impressions received in a radically new environment into coherent action that leads to definite result.
Here is an example within the writer's immediate knowledge: At the age of seventeen a boy entered the service of one of the large railway systems as a clerk in the passenger department. Through eleven years of enthusiastic and concentrated endeavor to master the details of the service he rose to the head of the clerical force—that is, the reiterated impression upon his brain cells of the functions of the passenger service led to that co-ordination which resulted in efficient action. Then he became employed in the office of a large coal-mining company. For several days it was with the utmost difficulty that he could bring his attention to bear upon the new tasks. While seated at the desk in the coal office the old railway problems would chase through his mind; when he began to write the initials of the Pittsburg Consolidated Coal Company, he would find that he had written the initials of the Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway Company; instead of the initials of the Pittsburg, Fairport and Northwestern Dock Company, the initials of the Pittsburg, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway Company. The latter initials in each case would appear upon the paper before he knew it, actually without his knowing that he had written them. The entirely unfamiliar routine entailed by the custody of bank accounts, coal leases, deeds and contracts, reports of coal shipments, and the handling of vouchers, became adjusted in his brain bit by bit through many weeks, and it was months before he could co-ordinate the new impressions into broad and well-defined reasoning. If he had been utterly hungry through all the period of the new service, it might have taken years.
Now, what can be expected of a dog or a cat, whose mental processes have been adjusted by inheritance and experience to life in the fields and jungles, when placed in a box, utterly hungry, to study mechanical contrivances? It is manifest that if the brain of a dog or a cat would become adjusted to the radically unfamiliar steps necessary to release it from such a radically unfamiliar environment, that adjustment could only come by extremely slow degrees. Voluntary perception is almost beyond the limits of expectation, and the leading of the animal through the necessary steps would have to be repeated time after time before the impressions upon its brain would reach any degree of permanence, especially as its brain would be lacking in attention, and the repeated handling be an annoyance to it. But that by such tutelage the animals, or a proportion of them, arrived at a knowledge of the means necessary to escape from the box is shown by Dr. Thorndike himself. "If one repeats the process, keeps putting the cat back into the box after each success, the amount of useless action gradually decreases, the right movement is made sooner and sooner, until finally it is done as soon as the cat is put in." But he says: "This sort of a history is not the history of a reasoning animal. It is the history of an animal who meets a certain situation with a lot of instinctive acts.... Little by little the one act becomes more and more likely to be done in that situation, while the others slowly vanish. This history represents the wearing smooth of a path in the brain, not the decisions of a rational consciousness."
Wherein, however, does this differ from the manner in which hundreds of clerks in offices finally learn routine work and mechanically go through the motions necessary to its performance? Do not the actions of thousands of laborers in field and factory seem to proceed from a wearing smooth of a path in the brain, rather than from rational consciousness? Yet they can not be said to be devoid of reason. Is not a great proportion of the daily actions of any one of us gone through from force of habit, almost by instinct?
The word reason does not apply alone to the mental processes of a Helmholtz, but to the co-ordination, however slight, of relations that result in definite action even of a humble organism. Herbert Spencer has clearly shown that instinct and reason differ in degree and not in kind.
Dr. Thorndike lays stress upon the fact that a "cat which, when first put in, took sixty seconds to get out, in the second trial eighty, in the third fifty, in the fourth sixty, in the fifth fifty,in the sixth forty," etc., and remarks: "Suppose the cat had, after the third accidental success, been able to reason? She would then have, the next time and all succeeding times, performed the act as soon as put in." Not long ago the writer and a man whose high intelligence can not be questioned, in moments of relaxation were trying to do one of the familiar ring puzzles—endeavoring to separate a ring from two others of peculiar shape and then to join the three. After repeated trials, one would loosen it, but could not replace it; the other finally succeeded in replacing it, but could not loosen it. Then the one could replace it, but not loosen it; the other loosen, but not replace it, and each was closely watching the other all the time. It was half an hour or more before either could both loosen and replace the ring, occasional successful attempts not being repeated until after several succeeding failures. Contrast the relation of the brain of the dazed and indifferent and peculiarly bedeviled cat to the puzzle presented to it by the inside of the box with the earnest effort of the two men to solve the ring puzzle. Who has not found a task more difficult the fifth or sixth time than the second or third, and has only performed it with ease after repeated attempts of varying degrees of success and failure?
In conclusion, the writer begs leave to relate an incident, which has not before appeared in print, that profoundly impressed him with the belief that at least in one instance one particular animal displayed reason. One Sunday morning, a dozen years or more ago, he was standing on the bank of the Ohio River at the Sewickley Ferry. A family group, accompanied by a large Newfoundland dog, hailed the ferryman and got in his boat, leaving the dog, which persuasively barked and wagged his tail, on the bank. As the boat pulled out into the stream the dog whined, and then made ready to leap in after it. Then he stopped at the water's edge, and, with head down, gazed intently at the river for several seconds—it seemed a minute or more. Then he ran up the bank more than a hundred feet, stopped, looked at the receding boat, plunged into the stream, and swam vigorously. The current, bearing him down, made his course diagonal to the bank. A boy standing by my side said: "Isn't that a smart dog? If he'd been a crazy dog he'd have jumped in where he was, but he ran up the bank so the current wouldn't wash him down away from the boat."
But the dog, swimming with all his vigor, was borne past the boat when within twenty feet or so of it; he endeavored to straighten his course without success, and then, in a long semicircle, swam around to the near bank, landing two or three hundred feet below the place whence the ferryboat had started.
What this dog would have done if placed, utterly hungry, in a box from which he could only liberate himself by stepping on a platform or turning a wooden button, I do not know.
Logan G. McPherson.Pittsburgh,August 3, 1899.
Mr. Frederic D. Bond, of 413 South Forty-fourth Street, Philadelphia, writes: Of the accuracy of Dr. Thorndike's experiments I have no doubt, but certain facts connected with them seem to deprive the observations of much of their relevance.
Dr. Thorndike states that he arranged his experiments to give reasoning every chance to display itself, if it existed, and to observe those in which the acts required and the thinking involved were not far removed from the acts and feelings of ordinary animal life. Of these experiments one of the chief was to determine whether and in what way a cat would escape from a box opening by turning a button. Now, I submit that in this and the succeeding experiments the conditions Dr. Thorndike fancied to exist by no means did so. Simple as the release of a door by a button seems to us, the apparent simplicity arises merely from our empirical knowledge of what does happen in such a situation. Actually to think out the rationale of the matter, as an animal having no experience either personally or from heredity would have to do, involves very complex mental processes. The environment of a human being is vastly different from an animal's, though of this fact we constantly lose sight in reasoning; of mechanical appliances and principles, for example, an animal knows nothing, and yet we are too apt to suppose it regarding the world with a store of ancestral and individual experiences utterly foreign to it; and then, on its failing to do what, in the light of such experience, seems to us easy, we proceed to call into question its possession of reason....
That the cats did finally learn to escape shows, according to Dr. Thorndike, "the wearing smooth of a path in the brain, not the decisions of a rational consciousness." May I ask Dr. Thorndikewhat possible reason could a cat have to suppose that what happened once must needs happen again? Does Dr. Thorndike fancy his own knowledge of a million like matters was acquired by reason, and not empirically elaborated by processes of exactly the same sort as the cats went through? Let this experiment be tried on a healthy infant of two years, and I am of the opinion that the results would be the same as with the cat; yet the infant undoubtedly carries on "thinking processes similar, at least in kind, to our own," which Dr. Thorndike implicitly denies to his cats.
The chief cause of the inability of students to reach concordant results in this matter of animal intelligence appears to lie in a certain uncritical assumption often made. That all consciousnesses have a certain field of presentations, that to this field they attain, that because of it they feel and will, are fundamental facts; but the belief that attention or feeling or will differs per se in different consciousnesses, other than as the field to which they are at the moment related, differs—this is an utterly unwarranted assumption. According to the action of its environment, each conscious being must know the world just so far as is needed to conform its existence thereto, or else it must perish; but whether such knowledge, which is acquired by experience only, be quite small, as with animals, or somewhat larger, as with man, there is no reason to suppose that the attention, feeling, or will of the animal differs in itself from the same psychological state in man.
Mr. Andrew Van Bibber, of Cincinnati, Ohio, says: Animals, and especially wild ones, have no bank account or reserve, and have to face new conditions daily, and yet they make a living where man would starve.