Intelligence
and Instinct
The Tenuous Border
Branches
of Science that appeared in the XIXth Century Allow Us a New
Understanding with Respect to the Border between Intelligence and
Instinct
English version
revised by Ann Leslie Goldman
(originally
published by Casa
Editora O Clarim in the December 2003 issue of Revista
Internacional de
Espiritismo)
The
issue
Intelligence and Instinct is developed in the Spiritist Codification
from Question 71 to Question 75 in The Spirits’ Book and, in more
detail, from Item 11 to Item 19 in Chapter III of Genesis. The space
available in an article like this doesn’t allow me to reproduce the
questions, the answers given by the Spirits and Kardec’s reasoning,
neither making it possible for me to present my comments on them.
However, a clear understanding of this article would not be possible
without such a previous study. On that account, I encourage our dear
reader to seriously study the aforementioned references before
proceeding to read this article.
As
stated in my
article published in the May issue of this magazine, the present
knowledge stage of the study of animal behavior is the result of the
maturation of two scientific approaches, Associative Psychology and
Ethology, that started in the 1920’s and 1930’s. The first one was born
in the USA and was carried out by psychologists, who focused on the
behavior of individuals tested in controlled laboratory experiments,
associating such behaviors to learning. The second one started in
Europe and was carried out by zoologists, who focused on
species-specific behaviors observed in natural habitats, associating
such behaviors to genetically inherited innate instincts. For a certain
time there was a debate among the followers of the two approaches, a
debate that was known as “the nature verses nurture controversy”.
Nowadays however the predominant notion is that animal behavior must
always be studied according to its two components, the instinctive and
the learned, which are used one and the other in larger or lesser
degree according to circumstances.
Before
proceeding in our study I must make a remark. As the reader must have
noticed, neither of the two approaches to the study of animal behavior
that originated the present stage of scientific knowledge had yet
appeared at the time the Spiritist Codification was written. As a
consequence of that, all that I am going to say from now on are
observation elements that were missing when Allan Kardec wrote about
intelligence and instinct in the Codification.
“Mechanical
actions are all instinctive … An instinctive action lacks the character
of an intelligent action …” (GE III, 12)
The
names
instinctive and innate behavior are used to designate those behaviors
that are inherited and genetically controlled, according to etologists
or, according to us spiritists, those that are a property of the soul.
An instinctive behavior is characterized when all the animals of a
certain species perform the same sequence of actions when facing the
same environmental situation. Instinctive behaviors can be of three
types: taxes, which are automatic movements of an organism toward or
away from a stimulus, as moths do relative to a light; reflexes, which
are involuntary responses of an organism to a stimulus, as when the
hand quickly moves away after touching a hot source; and fixed action
patterns (FAP) or instincts, which are sometimes complex but usually
inflexible behavior patterns that are performed by the entire body of
the animal and may need a stimulus to happen. Simple examples are when
bird couples feed open mouths even when such mouths are not those of
their offsprings, an animal’s escape reaction from predators and its
fleeing or attacking response to aggression in general. A more complex
example is when a spider repeats with very little variation each time a
series of thousands of movements when making its always similarly
looking web.
The name learned
behavior is used to designate changes that occur in behavior as a
result of the experience of the individual organism. There are several
types of learned behavior: Imprinting is a type of behavior that
although learned has an innate mechanism. Imprinting is acquired during
a specific and limited period of the organism’s life. Ducklings, for
instance, will identify as their parent (protector) and similar species
individual any moving and calling object that they see from the moment
of their birth to a very short period after. From then on they will
follow the object to wherever it moves. Imprinting lasts for the whole
life of the individual. This kind of behavior is called imprinting
because it looks as if the behavior was imprinted forever on the
organism. Only less evolved species are subject to imprinting.
Habituation is when there is a reduction in a previously shown response
to a stimulus when no reward or punishment follows. If a watchdog hears
a strange sound it becomes alert. If the same noise keeps happening at
the same time and under the same conditions, the watchdog will get used
to it after a certain amount of time and will no longer become alert
when it hears the noise. Classical conditioning consists in associating
a pre-existing response to a new or substitute stimulus. It’s important
in modifying Fixed Action Patterns so that the animal can more
precisely adapt to environmental circumstances. If a dog’s owner rings
the bell before serving its meal, the dog will be conditioned to
salivate whenever it hears the bell although the sound of a bell has
nothing to do with food. Operant conditioning or trial and error
learning is that which involves modifying pre-existing responses or
creating new responses to stimuli. It happens for instance when the
animal learns which foods are tasty and which are not. Examples of
tests designed to evaluate if the animal is able to learn by trial and
error are mazes where the animal has to find its way to a food it
likes. Once the animal succeeds in finding the food it usually
memorizes the solution and from then on always goes straight to the
food, showing to have learned a logical and visual sequence. Insight
learning is a kind of behavior that undoubtedly requires intelligence
since the animal has to analyze the situation, examine which elements
are available and then create an entirely new solution to achieve its
aim. An example of this behavior is when a chimpanzee stacks crates
underneath a reward that has been put out of its reach so that it can
reach it. Another one is when a New Caledonian crow bends a wire with
its beak in order to get food placed inside a tube after having seen
another crow achieve the same aim making use of the only hooked wire
available.
“Intelligence
reveals itself by actions that are voluntary, pondered, premeditated
and combined, according to what circumstances present.” (GE III, 12)
Now
that we have
learned the names used to identify the several kinds of animal
behavior, it’s important for us to know that animal behavior under each
specific set of circumstances may be a combination of several of those
kinds, where each one of them will take a smaller or greater part in
it.
“By
the way,
instinct and intelligence are usually perceived in the same action.”
(GE III, 13)
When a beaver
builds a dam, for instance, it’s assumed that the dam building solution
is a fixed action pattern. The knowledge that dam building is a good
solution to provide a deep enough lake so that it can build its lodge
protected from predators and its food cache reachable in winter, when
the surface of the lake is frozen, is something present in the genetic
memory of the species, according to scientists or in the soul’s memory
of the species, according to the Spiritist understanding. However, both
the realization that the depth of lake needs to be increased as well as
the wisdom needed to choose the material that will be used to
accomplish this task and to build the food cache and the lodge were
learned by trial and error when the animal was an adult but surely some
learned earlier from the animal’s parents.
Another
example
is nest building by birds, an activity where the animal has to adapt to
the material and overall conditions of the places to where it moves.
Most of the possible interactions in a certain environment are far too
complex for fixed action patterns to deal with. Therefore, learning
behavior by trial and error and insight is very important for animals
that constantly move from one environment to another.
Contrary
to
instincts, which are consolidated in a species and transferred between
generations, large periods with the same conditions is required for
behaviors learned under those conditions to consolidate. That’s how
communities of a certain species may change little by little to form a
new species centuries after having migrated to another region, having
their instincts changed in order to adapt to the different conditions
found. The changing of instincts due to consolidated learned behavior
suggests to scientists that a genetic change may have taken place in
the species whereas to us spiritists it indicates that more knowledge
was added to its soul’s assets.
As
we have seen
the border between intelligence and instinct is rather tenuous. Not
only because many behaviors previously thought to be instinctive are
now understood as learned, but also for the fact observed by scholars
that behavior learned by trial and error and insight, although
requiring intelligence to happen, may after several generations
consolidate as instincts. Therefore, instinct or at least the amount of
it that is acquired after individuality is formed is something that can
be seen as a sort of fossil intelligence buried in the deepest layers
of the mind.
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______,
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