Abstract
IN spite of its title, this book is no addition to our rapidly multiplying collection of works on animal psychology. It cannot be called scientific in the strictest sense. Modern psychological science endeavours so far as possible to found its conclusions on experimental treatment of its subject-matter, and in the case of the lower animals, where direct introspection is impossible and analogy unsafe, it refuses to accept conclusions not obtained in this way. But no records of experiments performed on the horse are to be found in Count Cesaresco's book. Description and anecdote there is in plenty, and that of the greatest interest, but all explanation is a priori and decidedly anthropomorphic. Psychological terms are used wherever possible to give precision to a description the main value of which is independent of such adventitious adornments. Not that the psychology is necessarily incorrect; on the contrary, it appears to have probability on its side, only it cannot lay claim to the title of strict science.
The Psychology and Training of the Horse.
By Count E. M. Cesaresco. Pp. xvi+334. (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1906.) Price 10s. 6d. net.
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The Psychology and Training of the Horse . Nature 79, 158 (1908). https://doi.org/10.1038/079158a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/079158a0