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If freedom is a requisite for human happiness, then all that’s necessary is to provide the illusion of freedom.

B. F. Skinner

A disappointment is not generally an oversight. It might just be the best one can do the situation being what it is. The genuine error is to quit attempting.
B. F. SKINNER

Best Disappointment Mistake Perspective Quit Try
Give me a child and I’ll shape him into anything.
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Children Education Himself Myself
Science is a willingness to accept facts even when they are opposed to wishes.
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Acceptance Science Willing
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.
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Effort Greatness Invention Learning Man Pain Possible Reality Word World
We do not choose survival as a value, it chooses us.
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Choice Survive Value
Somehow people get the idea I think we should be given gumdrops whenever we do anything of value.
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Ideas Myself People Thinking Value
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
A piece of music is an experience to be taken by itself.
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Experience Music Pieces
Men build society and society builds men.
B. F. SKINNER

Architect Build Men Society
We admire people to the extent that we cannot explain what they do, and the word ‘admire’ then means ‘marvel at.’
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Admire Explanation Extent People Word
I don’t believe in God, so I’m not afraid of dying.
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Afraid Believe Death God Myself
The consequences of an act affect the probability of its occurring again.
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Act Chance Repeat
The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.
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Problem Reality Science Technology
It is a surprising fact that those who object most violently to the manipulation of behaviour nevertheless make the most vigorous effort to manipulate minds.
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Change Effort Mindset Violence
Unable to understand how or why the person we see behaves as he does, we attribute his behavior to a person we cannot see, whose behavior we cannot explain either but about whom we are not inclined to ask questions.
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Explanation Justice Person Question See Understand
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

If freedom is a requisite for human happiness, then all that’s necessary is to provide the illusion of freedom.

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If freedom is a requisite for human happiness, then all that’s necessary is to provide the illusion of freedom.

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Popular Authors

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