how does instinct work? If it’s just “baked” into an animal’s DNA, how does it “activate” and how does it “activate” successfully?
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Charles Darwin’s definition of instinct is a behaviour which is context-independent, and he gave as an example a rabbit stamping the ground when it is frightened. When other rabbits are nearby this warns them, but the rabbit stamps the ground without thinking whether there are other rabbits nearby. To Darwin, this is what classifies the behaviour as instinctive.
The linguist Chomsky and others argue that it is problematic to make any division between ‘instinctive’ versus ‘intentional’ behaviour. The example he gives is grammar in languages. Each language has its own grammar, and babies learn one particular language hearing only a few words of it, implying that there must be a finely-articulated language instinct informed by experience.
About your other questions, I like the answer which said ‘no one knows’. The ‘baking’ would occur over thousands of generations of natural selection….going up the animals’ hereditary tree into other life forms in relation with the development of each individual.
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