The Dawn of Reason; or, Mental Traits in the Lower Animals

Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Anne Storer and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net





Transcriber's Note: Inconsistencies in hyphenation left in as per
original text.

       *       *       *       *       *

THE
DAWN OF REASON

OR

MENTAL TRAITS IN THE
LOWER ANIMALS

BY
JAMES WEIR, JR., M.D.

New York
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD.
1899

_All rights reserved_

       *       *       *       *       *

COPYRIGHT, 1899,
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.


Norwood Press
J. S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith
Norwood Mass. U.S.A.

       *       *       *       *       *

To My Father

WHO, WHILE NOT A SCIENTIST, HAS YET TAKEN

AN INTELLIGENT AND APPRECIATIVE

INTEREST IN MY WORK

THIS BOOK IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED

       *       *       *       *       *




PREFACE


Most works on mind in the lower animals are large and ponderous volumes,
replete with technicalities, and unfit for the general reader; therefore
the author of this book has endeavored to present the evidences of mental
action, in creatures lower than man, in a clear, simple, and brief form.
He has avoided all technicalities, and has used the utmost brevity
consistent with clearness and accuracy. He also believes that metaphysics
has no place in a discussion of psychology, and has carefully refrained
from using this once powerful weapon of psychologists.

Many of the data used by the authors of more pretentious works are
second-hand or hearsay; the author of this treatise, however, has no
confidence in the accuracy of such material, therefore he has not made
use of any such data. His material has been thoroughly sifted, and the
reader may depend upon the absolute truth of the evidence here
presented.

The author does not claim infallibility; some of his conclusions may be
erroneous; he _believes_, however, that future investigation will
prove the verity of every proposition that is advanced in this book. These
propositions have been formulated only after a twenty-years study of
biology in all of its phases.

Some of the data used in this volume have appeared in _Appleton's Popular
Science Monthly_, _Lippincott's Magazine_, _Worthington's Magazine_, _New
York Medical Record_, _Recreation_, _Atlantic Monthly_, _American
Naturalist_, _Scientific American_, _Home Magazine_, _Popular Science
News_, _Denver Medical Times_, and _North American Review_; therefore the
author tenders his thanks to the publishers of these magazines for their
kindness in allowing him to use their property in getting out this work.

"WAVELAND," OWENSBORO, KY.,
January 9, 1899.

       *       *       *       *       *




CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

CONSCIOUS AND UNCONSCIOUS MIND

                                                                       PAGE
Definition of mind--The correlation of physiology, morphology, and
  psychology--The presence of nerve-elements in _monera_--Conscious
  and unconscious mind--Unconscious ("vegetative") mind in the
  jelly-fish--Anatomy, physiology, and psychology of the jelly-fish
  --The origin of conscious mind.                                         1


CHAPTER I

THE SENSES IN THE LOWER ANIMALS

The sense of touch--The senses of taste and smell--Actinophryans having
  taste--The sense of sight--Modification of sight organs by surroundings
  --Sight in Actinophryans--Blind fish sensitive to light--Blind spiders
  --Blind man--Primitive eyes in _Cymothoe_--In the jelly-fish, sea-urchin,
  _Alciope_, _Myrianida_--The sight organs of the snail--Power of vision
  in the snail--Eyes of crayfish--Compound eyes--Vision in "whirligig
  beetle"--In _Periophthalmus_--In _Onchidium_--In _Calotis_--Organs of
  audition--In _Lepidoptera_--_Hymenoptera_--_Orthoptera_--_Diptera_
  --_Hemiptera_--_Dyticus marginalis_--_Corydalus_--Ears of grasshopper
  and cricket--Of the "red-legged locust"--Of flies--Of gnats--Auditory
  vesicles of horse-fly--Ears of butterflies--Cerambyx beetle--Long-horned
  beetle--_Cicindelidæ_--_Carabidæ_.                                      7


CHAPTER II

CONSCIOUS DETERMINATION

Definition--How conscious determination is evolved from the senses--The
  presence of nerve-tissue in _Stentor polymorphus_--The properties of
  nerve-tissue--Romanes' experiment with anemone--Action of stimuli on
  nerve-tissue--Reflection--Origin of consciousness--Time element in
  consciousness--Conscious determination in _Stentor polymorphus_--In
  _Actinophrys_--In _Amoeba_--In _Medusa_--In a water-louse--In a garden
  snail--In the angle-worm--In oysters--In a ground wasp.                39


CHAPTER III

MEMORY

Discussed under four heads, viz. _Memory of Locality_ (_Surroundings_),
  _Memory of Friends_ (_Kin_), _Memory of Strangers_ (_Other animals not
  kin_), and _Memory of Events_ (_Education_, _Happenings_, etc.)--Memory
  of locality in _Ac