black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

We do not choose survival as a value, it chooses us.

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
When we say that a man controls himself, we must specify who is controlling whom.
B. F. SKINNER

Control Himself Men
We do not choose survival as a value, it chooses us.
B. F. SKINNER

Choice Survive Value
Do not intervene between a person and the consequences of their own behavior.
B. F. SKINNER

Attitude Judgement Person
Society attacks early, when the individual is helpless.
B. F. SKINNER

Attack Help Society
A fourth-grade reader may be a sixth-grade mathematician. The grade is an administrative device which does violence to the nature of the developmental process.
B. F. SKINNER

Development Mathematics Nature Process Reading Violence
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
A child who has been severely punished for sex play is not necessarily less inclined to continue; and a man who has been imprisoned for violent assault is not necessarily less inclined toward violence.
B. F. SKINNER

Children Men Necessary Play Punishment Sex Violence
What is love except another name for the use of positive reinforcement? Or vice versa.
B. F. SKINNER

Deep Love Positive
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
Give me a child and I’ll shape him into anything.
B. F. SKINNER

Children Education Himself Myself
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
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
Men build society and society builds men.
B. F. SKINNER

Architect Build Men Society
The only geniuses produced by the chaos of society are those who do something about it. Chaos breeds geniuses. It offers a man something to be a genius about.
B. F. SKINNER

Born Breed Education Genius Men Production
The real question is not whether machines think but whether men do. The mystery which surrounds a thinking machine already surrounds a thinking man.
B. F. SKINNER

Men Question Reality Technology Thinking

We do not choose survival as a value, it chooses us.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

We do not choose survival as a value, it chooses us.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More B. F. Skinner Quotes