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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

The simulated approval and affection with which parents and teachers are often urged to solve behavior problems are counterfeit. So are flattery, backslap-ping, and many other ways of “winning friends.
B. F. SKINNER

Affection Friendship Parents Problem Win
A permissive government is a government that leaves control to other sources.
B. F. SKINNER

Control Government Leaving Source
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
I’ve often said that my rats have taught me much more than I’ve taught them.
B. F. SKINNER

Animal Learning Myself Teaching
But restraint is the only one sort of control, and absence of restraint isn’t freedom. It’s not control that’s lacking when one feels ‘free’, but the objectionable control of force.
B. F. SKINNER

Absence Control Feeling Force Freedom
Society already possesses the psychological techniques needed to obtain universal observance of a code – a code which would guarantee the success of a community or state. The difficulty is that these techniques are in the hands of the wrong people-or, rather, there aren’t any right people.
B. F. SKINNER

Community Difficult Hands Need People Right Success Wrong
Let men be happy, informed, skillful, well behaved, and productive.
B. F. SKINNER

Happiness Man Production Skill
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
In a world of complete economic equality, you get and keep the affections you deserve. You can’t buy love with gifts or favors, you can’t hold love by raising an inadequate child, and you can’t be secure in love by serving as a good scrub woman or a good provider.
B. F. SKINNER

Children Deserve Economic Gift Goodness Love Quality Serve Woman World
A permissive government is a government that leaves control to other sources.
B. F. SKINNER

Control Government Leaving Source
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
A permissive government is a government that leaves control to other sources.
B. F. SKINNER

Control Government Leaving Source
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
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
The speaker does not feel the grammatical rules he is said to apply in composing sentences, and men spoke grammatically for thousands of years before anyone knew there were rules.
B. F. SKINNER

Feeling Man Rule Talk
Men build society and society builds men.
B. F. SKINNER

Architect Build Men Society
I will be dead in a few months. But it hasn’t given me the slightest anxiety or worry. I always knew I was going to die.
B. F. SKINNER

Anxiety Death Myself Worry
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
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.
B. F. SKINNER

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

Control Himself Men
A person’s genetic endowment, a product of the evolution of the species, is said to explain part of the workings of his mind and his personal history the rest.
B. F. SKINNER

Explanation History Mindset Person Work
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
A scientist may not be sure of the answer, but he’s often sure he can find one. And that’s a condition which is clearly not enjoyed by philosophy.
B. F. SKINNER

Enjoyment Philosophy Science
If you’re old, don’t try to change yourself, change your environment.
B. F. SKINNER

Age Change Environment Try Yourself
We do not choose survival as a value, it chooses us.
B. F. SKINNER

Choice Survive Value
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

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.

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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.

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Popular Authors

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