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. SKINNERThe real question is not whether machines think but whether men do. The mystery which surrounds a thinking machine already surrounds a thinking man.
More B. F. Skinner Quotes
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When we say that a man controls himself, we must specify who is controlling whom.
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An important fact about verbal behavior is that speaker and listener may reside within the same skin.
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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.
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A permissive government is a government that leaves control to other sources.
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To say that behaviors have different ‘meanings’ is only another way of saying that they are controlled by different variables.
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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.
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Somehow people get the idea I think we should be given gumdrops whenever we do anything of value.
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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.
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We have not yet seen what man can make of man.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Your liberals and radicals all want to govern. They want to try it their way- to show that people will be happier if the power is wielded in a different way or for different purposes. But how do they know? Have they ever tried it? No, it’s merely their guess.
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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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Something doing every minute’ may be a gesture of despair-or the height of a battle against boredom.
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