Julius was given four days' rest before being presented with problem 2.
He was occasionally fed in the apparatus, but regular continuation of
training was not necessary to keep him in good form. During this rest
interval, locks were attached to the doors of the apparatus so that the
experimenter by moving a lever directly in front of him could fasten
either one or both of the doors of a given box by a single movement. On
May 13 Julius was given opportunity to obtain food from each of the
boxes in turn, and trial of the locks was made in order to familiarize
him with the new situation. He very quickly discovered that the doors
could not be raised when closed, and after two days of preliminary work,
he practically abandoned his formerly persistent efforts to open them.
The locks worked satisfactorily from a mechanical point of view as well
as from that of the adaptation of the animal to the modified situation.
Problem 2 was regularly presented for the first time on May 17, on which
day a single series was given. The period of punishment adopted was
twenty seconds, and for each successful choice a small piece of banana
was given as a reward. After the first trial in this series, in which
Julius repeatedly entered the first box at the left, that is box 7,
there was but slight tendency to reënter the first box at the left of
the group. Instead, Julius developed the method of moving box by box
toward the right end of the group. The choices were made promptly, and
their systematic character enabled the animal to obtain his reward
fairly quickly, in spite of the large number of mistakes.
In the second series, the orang utan developed the interesting trick of
quickly dodging out of the wrong box before the experimenter could lower
the door behind him. This he did only after having been punished for
many wrong choices to the point of discouragement. The trick was easily
broken up by the sudden lowering of the entrance door as soon as he had
passed under it.
There appeared on May 21 an unfavorable physical condition which
manifested itself, first of all through the eyes which appeared dull and
bloodshot. On the following day they were inflamed and the lids nearly
closed. Julius refused to eat, and experimentation was impossible. Until
June 2 careful treatment and regulation of diet was necessary. He passed
through what at the time seemed a rather startling condition, but
rapidly regained his usual good health, and on June 3, although somewhat
weak and listless, he again worked fairly steadily.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account