Lola : $b or, The thought and speech of animalsKindermann, Henny
Science
Lola : $b or, The thought and speech of animals
Kindermann, Henny
Animal intelligence; Dogs -- Folklore
This it is which constitutes the first discovery, as I have called it,
of the "new zoopsychology." And on that discovery, in my opinion, are
based through various gradations its chief results, on the supposition
that at a certain moment there takes place a new specific action, the
"declanchement" of the mediumistic relationship between the animal and
the experimenter. And it may be that the development of such a very
special relationship between man and animals may be comparatively easy.
That is, it may be that the animal is relatively easily _permeable_ by
a mind provided with a reasoning intelligence (without, however, being
itself aware of the logical content of such an intelligence), exactly
because it is rather poor in logical self-conscious content--or, again,
it may be, that the animal in a certain sense is nearer than we to the
"fountains of life." (9).
The possibility of this "declanchement" would therefore constitute the
second and more serious discovery made by the educators of animals;
although without their knowing it, as is proved by all their accounts
which make no mention of it.
It is difficult to say what the precise moment is at which the grafting
of this supernormal connexion on the normal one takes place. The most
that I can say at present is this: that the grafting in question
appears relatively to be quicker as regards the mathematical results.
And this would lend an indirect support to the view that generally
mathematics must be presupposed as underlying the phenomena. But the
wonderful performances of Lola show that even so far as there is real
"intelligence" in the animal, the supernormal relationship enters very
quickly on the scene. In other words, the subject very quickly learns
to express itself by means of a true "xenoglossy," i.e. by means of a
language that may be clear to other people although it probably is not
understood by the animal or medium making use of it.
Besides, we find in Lola's case a high degree of glossolalia. The
authoress observes, e.g. on page 39: "Lola often uses words
completely incomprehensible; at one time she declared that they
belonged to a special canine language. My investigations on this
subject remained, however, without result. It is possible that
these words arise from the imagination of the animal...."[30]
Something similar was also produced by Rolf and the Elberfeld
horses.
[30] N.B.--It may also be that the "quite incomprehensible words"
have not any meaning at all, or at least, not any relation with
the mechanism of the glossolalia, but are simply the product of
taps made by the animal just for the sake of doing something.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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