The Universal KinshipMoore, J. Howard (John Howard)
Philosophy
The Universal Kinship
Moore, J. Howard (John Howard)
Evolution; Human beings; Sociology
Animals of experience (including men) are more skilful in adjusting
themselves to environmental exigencies than the young and
inexperienced, because of their store of initial impressions. It is
a matter of common observation that young animals are more easily
caught or killed or otherwise victimised than the old and
experienced. Many animals, however, (and a good many men) are able
to profit by a single impression. One dose of tartar emetic is
generally sufficient to cure an egg-sucking dog, and it is a very
stupid canine indeed that does not understand perfectly after one or
two experiences with a porcupine or an unsavory skunk. ‘The burnt
child dreads the fire,’ but so does the burnt puppy. Rengger
states that his Paraguay monkeys, after cutting themselves only once
with any sharp tool, would not touch it again, or would handle it
with the greatest caution.[1] Older trout are more wary than young
ones, and fishes that have been much hunted and deceived become
suspicious of traps. Rats, martins, and other animals cannot long be
trapped in the same way, and partridges and other birds seldom fly
against telegraph-wires the second season after the wires are put
up. These animals, however, cannot learn to avoid these dangers from
experience, for only a few of them are ever caught or struck. They
must learn it from observing their unfortunate companions. Everyone
who has read the story of Lobo, the big gray wolf of the Carrumpaw,
cannot but wonder at the remarkable shrewdness shown by this old
leader in baffling for years the tigers that hung upon his
tracks.[9] Nansen states that the seals, before man invaded the
Arctics, occupied the inner ice-floes to avoid the polar bear, but
after man came they took to living on the outer floes in order to
escape the persecutions of this new and more fearful enemy. Domestic
animals, when first turned out in new regions, often die from eating
poisonous weeds, but in some way soon learn to avoid them. Many
animals, when pursuing other animals, or when being pursued, display
a knowledge of facts very little understood by the majority of
mankind, such as of places where scent lies or is obliterated, and
the effects of wind in carrying evidence of their presence to their
enemies. The hunted roebuck or hare will make circles, double on its
own tracks, take to water, and fling itself for considerable
distances through the air as cleverly as if it had read up all the
theory of scent in a book. According to the London _Spectator_ one
of the large African elephants in the Zoological Gardens of that
city restores to its entertainers all the bits of food which on
being thrown to him fall alike out of his reach and theirs. He
points his proboscis straight at the food, and blows it along the
floor to the feet of those who have thrown it. He clearly knows what
he is about, for if he does not blow hard enough to land the food
the first time, he blows harder and harder until he does. The
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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