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REASON AND INSTINCT

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of reasoning as well as of bodily movements. Reasoning is also based upon experience both individual and ancestral.

Man may therefore be said to be dominated by three sets of impulses.

(1) Congenital reflexes.

(2) Acquired reflexes. (3) Reason.

The second, acquired reflexes, is a somewhat arbitrary division, and its boundaries are difficult to determine. It is the transitional form, and, altho on its upper and lower sides it merges into the two extremes, its very existence tends to emphasize the gulf between instinct and reason. This difference is thus seen to be not merely one of degree but one of kind. The hights to which human reason may mount are indeed uncomprehensible to the common mind. The vast range of phenomena which a great mind can assimilate at a glance often makes him impatient with us common mortals who have to grope our way step by step. It is frequently quoted that Bowditch, who translated one of Laplace's books, said: "Whenever his author prefaced a proposition by the words 'It is evident,' he knew that many hours of hard study lay before him, ere it became evident to him.": I

'James: Psychology.

CHAPTER II

SUMMARY

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Habit. Human instincts are transient unless developed into habits. "As the twig is bent the tree inclines" - Habits are reflex arcs, which like electric currents follow the path of least resistance. The development of habits. - The moral significance. "Man is a mere bundle of habits." —The concatenated impulse; economic value.— Professional habits. – Intelligent reading is wise skipping. The conscious and subconscious; relationship. — The "Moment Consciousness " Sleep a dissociation of few or many nerve centers. - Dreams are sleeping hallucinations; duration short. -Caused by some centripetal stimulus, somatic or external. - Infinite resources of the subconscious. - Wonderful memory; how to utilize it. A possible explanation of genius. - Geniuses not well balanced. - Mental epidemics.- Concentration: in the crowd but not of it.

HABIT

PREYER has said that instincts are observable in the human animal only in infancy. This may not be strictly true, yet the preponderance of the instinctive in early life has for us some very important lessons. The other fact of immense practical value is the transiency of these instincts. Take, for example, the sucking instinct. Every experienced nurse recognizes the importance of putting the baby to the breast before the milk comes. If this be omitted and if there be any delay in the natural food, it is often no easy task to teach a child to nurse. This is espe

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cially true of the lower animals, for there is evident in man a great lengthening of the period of infancy or helplessness.

As with the sucking instinct, immediate obedience makes continuance easy, so in a hundred ways instincts may be made permanent by carrying out the action, that is, by the establishment of a habit. The advantage of a lengthened infancy is the extension of the time of initiating habits.1

Obviously our habits are not all formed in infancy, but the difficulty of the acquisition increases with age. The longer the infancy, the longer the period of plasticity, the greater the number of lines of thought and action which can be implanted.

"As the twig is bent the tree inclines" is a principle never lost sight of by educators and reformers.

With the majority of people moral habits formed in the "teens" become dominant thru life, while the period between twenty and thirty fixes the professional habits. This general truth need not discourage us in attempting the acquisition of new habits if we have a clear conception of the actions necessary to the formation of a habit.

Without considering the question of whence, we are constantly subject to impulses. This may be an impulse to whistle. Now two courses are open, the individual may or may not carry out this impulse. Whether or not he be a free moral agent does not 'See John Fiske's Essay: The Meaning of Infancy.

concern us. Neither is the question if the impulse be good or bad.

Yielding to the impulse, doing the thing impelled, makes it very much more probable that the next time that same impulse is felt, the action will follow. This establishes a path of motor discharge, which is perhaps the best physiological definition of habit. All reflex arcs follow this law, the sensation having gotten in, the efferent impulse probably follows the path of least resistance. We can imagine that with the initial impulse, like the brook trickling from a snow-bank, the slightest obstacle may divert its course, but the grooving effect soon converts this slight obstruction into a high bank, so that nothing less than a freshet can overcome the barrier.

It is not claimed that the psychical is absolutely predestined like the physical. Were it so, effort at a change would be unavailing. Here comes in the human will, the impulse from without, if you please. Given the impulse to change a habit, or to form a new one, the one essential is the immediate action, the breaking down of the barrier for this once. As Emerson puts it: "When the divine moment of the soul comes, leave your theory like Joseph his coat in the hands of the harlot and flee." I

The next time this same impulse is felt, the previous action serves as a groove, be it ever so shallow. The moral implication is so much in evidence that it is difficult to wholly exclude it. Perhaps the I Essay on Self-reliance.

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easiest way to surmount the difficulty is to enlarge our definition of morals. Such aphorisms as "Man is a mere bundle of habits," and "Order is Heaven's first law," show that, after all, the really important thing is care in forming one's habits.

There is also an economic side to the question. Take, for example, the act of buttoning one's coat, it is really a very complicated composite of afferent and efferent impulses, and all done unconsciously. Watch the young child as he painfully learns each part of the process.

With the adult all that is necessary is the initial impulse, either conscious or unconscious. The resulting action of the contact of the finger with the buttonhole becomes the impulse for the next specific act, and so on thru the whole series. The psychological term for this is a concatenated impulse. The word is derived from con (together) and catena (a chain), meaning literally chained together.

It thus becomes apparent that, after the formation of the habit, cerebration has simply to concern itself with one impulse instead of the many to bring about a complicated series of movements. Were it not for this fact we could accomplish very little during a lifetime. But the act of yesterday becoming the habit of to-day, leaves time for further research and progress. Just in proportion as habit may become a strong ally, so it may also become a terrible enemy.

Professor James tells us that professional habits become fixed between the twentieth and thirtieth

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