Intelligence is a scale created by man. It allows man to reward himself and praise himself on his supposed intellectual explorations. However, instinct is a form of intelligence. The dog realizes the danger of the situation in which the dog and the man are involved. The dog is not hampered by this supposedly superior intelligence.
Instinct is the animal s strongest ally, an ally that the man lacks use of.
These types of scenarios are played throughout the entire story. London condemns not only this man of being ignorant, but also the man s ancestors. This man did not know cold. Possibly all the generations of his ancestry had been ignorant of cold, of real cold, of cold one hundred and seven degrees below freezing point. The dog is more in tune with nature than is the man.