Abstract
THE very valuable contribution to Psychology made by Mr. Spalding in his paper on Instinct (Macmillaris Magazine for February), and the letters and article which have lately appeared in this Journal, will no doubt stimulate research, and lead to some rational explanation of what has hitherto been enveloped in a mist of metaphysics. Mr. Spalding has not only proved himself an acute thinker, he has shown a rare ability in devising experiments, and we may fairly expect that his researches will mark an epoch. I am the more grateful to him because his instructive results, though seeming to contradict, do really furnish experimental confirmation of the views put forth in my work, now in the press, wherein it is argued that Instinct is lapsed Intelligence: that what is now the fixed and fatal action of the organism, was formerly a tentative and discriminating (consequently intelligent) action: in a word that what is now a connate tendency was formerly acquired experience.
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LEWES, G. Instinct . Nature 7, 437–438 (1873). https://doi.org/10.1038/007437a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/007437a0