Although I do not agree with Dr. Watson in thinking this principle
alone sufficient, I do agree that it is a principle of very great
importance. It is the modern form of the principle of “association”.
The “association of ideas” has played a great part in philosophy,
particularly in British philosophy. But it now appears that this is
a consequence of a wider and more primitive principle, namely, the
association of bodily processes. It is this wider principle that is
asserted above. Let us see what is the nature of the evidence in its
favour.
Our principle becomes verifiable over a much larger field than the
older principle owing to the fact that it is movements, not “ideas”,
that are to be associated. Where animals are concerned, ideas are
hypothetical, but movements can be observed; even with men, many
movements are involuntary and unconscious. Yet animal movements and
unconscious involuntary human movements are just as much subject to
the law of association as the most conscious ideas. Take, _e.g._ the
following example (Watson, p. 33). The pupil of the eye expands in
darkness and contracts in bright light; this is an involuntary and
unconscious action of which we only become aware by observing others.
Now take some person and repeatedly expose him to bright light at
the same moment that you ring an electric bell. After a time the
electric bell alone will cause his pupils to contract. As far as can be
discovered, all muscles behave in this way. So do glands where they can
be tested. It is said that a brass band can be reduced to silence by
sucking a lemon in front of it, owing to the effect upon the salivary
glands of its members; I confess that I have never verified this
statement. But you will find the exact scientific analogue for dogs in
Watson, p. 26. You arrange a tube in a dog’s mouth so that saliva drops
out at a measurable rate. When you give the dog food it stimulates the
flow of saliva. At the same moment you touch his left thigh. After a
certain length of time the touch on the left thigh will produce just
as much saliva without the food as with it. The same sort of thing
applies to emotions, which depend upon the ductless glands. Children
at birth are afraid of loud noises, but not of animals. Watson took a
child eleven months old, who was fond of a certain white rat; twice at
the moment when the child touched the rat, a sudden noise was made just
behind the child’s head. This was enough to cause fear of the rat on
subsequent occasions, no doubt owing to the fact that the adrenal gland
was now stimulated by the substitute stimulus, just like the salivary
glands in the dog or the trumpet player. The above illustrations show
that “ideas” are not the essential units in association. It seems that
not merely is “mind” irrelevant, but even the brain is less important
than was formerly supposed. At any rate, what is known experimentally
is that the glands and muscles (both striped and unstriped) of the
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