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If the world is to save any part of its resources for the future, it must reduce not only consumption but the number of consumers.

B. F. Skinner

At this very moment enormous numbers of intelligent men and women of goodwill are trying to build a better world. But problems are born faster than they can be solved.
B. F. SKINNER

Born Intelligence Man Moments Problem Solve
It is not a question of starting. The start has been made. It’s a question of what’s to be done from now on.
B. F. SKINNER

Action Inspirational Journey Start
That’s all teaching is; arranging contingencies which bring changes in behavior.
B. F. SKINNER

Behavior Change Teaching Transformation
Old age is rather like another country. You will enjoy it more if you have prepared yourself before you go.
B. F. SKINNER

Age Country Enjoy
It has always been the task of formal education to set up behavior which would prove useful or enjoyable later in a student’s life.
B. F. SKINNER

Education Enjoyment Life
The alphabet was a great invention, which enabled men to store and to learn with little effort what others had learned the hard way-that is, to learn from books rather than from direct, possibly painful, contact with the real world.
B. F. SKINNER

Effort Greatness Invention Learning Man Pain Possible Reality Word World
To say that behaviors have different ‘meanings’ is only another way of saying that they are controlled by different variables.
B. F. SKINNER

Control Deep Different Way
We shouldn’t teach great books; we should teach a love of reading. Knowing the contents of a few works of literature is a trivial achievement. Being inclined to go on reading is a great achievement.
B. F. SKINNER

Achievement Book Education Greatness Love Reading Study Teacher
We have seen that in certain respects operant reinforcement resembles the natural selection of evolutionary theory. Just as genetic characteristics which arise as mutations are selected or discarded by their consequences, so novel forms of behavior are selected or discarded through reinforcement.
B. F. SKINNER

Attitude Character Nature Novel Respect Seen Selection Theory
Some of us learn control, more or less by accident. The rest of us go all our lives not even understanding how it is possible, and blaming our failure on being born the wrong way.
B. F. SKINNER

Blame Born Education Failure Live Ourselves Understand Way Wrong
Science, not religion, has taught me my most useful values, among them intellectual honesty. It is better to go without answers than to accept those that merely resolve puzzlement.
B. F. SKINNER

Acceptance Education Honesty Intellectual Value
If freedom is a requisite for human happiness, then all that’s necessary is to provide the illusion of freedom.
B. F. SKINNER

Freedom Happiness Human Illusion Necessary
Does a poet create, originate, initiate the thing called a poem, or is his behavior merely the product of his genetic and environmental histories?
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Creation Environment Himself History Poem Poet Production
We have not yet seen what man can make of man.
B. F. SKINNER

Change Men Science See Transformation
The problem of far greater importance remains to be solved. Rather than build a world in which we shall all live well, we must stop building one in which it will be impossible to live at all.
B. F. SKINNER

Build Education Impossible Live Philosophy Problem World
A failure is not always a mistake, it may simply be the best one can do under the circumstances. The real mistake is to stop trying.
B. F. SKINNER

Education Failure Give Up Inspirational Mistake Perseverance Reality Stop Try

If the world is to save any part of its resources for the future, it must reduce not only consumption but the number of consumers.

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If the world is to save any part of its resources for the future, it must reduce not only consumption but the number of consumers.

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Popular Authors

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