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From: malc@tahoe.unr.edu (Malcolm L. Carlock)
Newsgroups: sci.psychology,sci.bio
Subject: Re: Intelligent Parrots, or Self-deception and Gullibility.
Message-ID: <1182@tahoe.unr.edu>
Date: 9 Apr 88 01:42:19 GMT
References: <1988Mar4.162334.18184@utzoo.uucp> <4299@blia.BLI.COM> <1988Mar9.132722.3364@mntgfx.mentor.com> <2495@geac.UUCP> <2535@saturn.ucsc.edu> <762@actnyc.UUCP> <2231@ttidca.TTI.COM>
Reply-To: malc@tahoe.unr.edu.UUCP (Malcolm L. Carlock)
Organization: Univ. of Nev., Reno-Mathematics
Lines: 55
Keywords: learned behavior overcoming instinct, sharks not eating after shock
Summary: Learned behavior overcoming instinct

In article <2231@ttidca.TTI.COM> hollombe@ttidcb.tti.com (The Polymath) writes:
>
>There's some question whether _any_ behavior is hard-wired in any creature
>above the level of insect.  The following example is from one of my psych.
>courses:
>
>New-born chicks will begin to scratch for food almost as soon as they are
>able to stand.  This looks to be a classic example of instinct -- a
>behavior hard-wired into the organism.  However, if you take a chick and
>fit it with a harness that prevents it from pecking at the ground for
>food, then spoon feed it, the chick will _never_ scratch for food.  It
>will starve to death while standing on a pile of grain if not spoon fed.
>
>So much for _that_ hard-wired behavior.
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I don't think that Polymath's example rules out hardwired scratching behavior
in the chick.  Why couldn't it be that the scratching instinct (if it exists) is
suppressed by learned behavior, stemming from the influence of the harness?
Seems to me that the chick's "scratching instinct" might be overruled by after
the chick learned that trying to peck the ground resulted in unpleasant
sensations (choking or whatever).  This would be a case of instinct overruled
by learned behavior.

To support this, I offer a counter-example to The PolyMath's, which I
encountered in a science text during high school (or thereabouts):

  Some captured sharks (lemon or sand or somesuch) were being studied by some
  behavioralists.  One of the tests involved giving a shark an electric shock
  when it tried to eat.  I don't remember how many sharks were involved, but a
  notable result of the shock test was that the shocked shark would refuse to
  eat ever again (after just ONE shock), and eventually starve.

Given the fact that many species of sharks are known to cannibalize their
siblings after they hatch in their mother's "womb", I would say that there is
a pretty strong likelihood that shark eating behavior is basically instinctual
and NOT learned (how could they learn the behavior from Mom if they haven't
been born yet, and thus can't watch her in order to learn it?), and that the
above example (if I remembered it correctly) shows an instance of instinct
(eating, in this case) being overruled by learned behavior.

---

BTW, I would also say that the existance of pre-birth predatory behavior
among sharks shows pretty clearly that there IS such a thing as instinct in
creatures higher than insects.

---

Malcolm L. Carlock
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