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. SKINNERIt is not a question of starting. The start has been made. It’s a question of what’s to be done from now on.
More B. F. Skinner Quotes
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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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A vast technology has been developed to prevent, reduce, or terminate exhausting labor and physical damage. It is now dedicated to the production of the most trivial conveniences and comfort.
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Twenty-five hundred years ago it might have been said that man understood himself as well as any other part of the world. Today he is the thing he understands least.
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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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When we say that a man controls himself, we must specify who is controlling whom.
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A permissive government is a government that leaves control to other sources.
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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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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.
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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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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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To require a citizen to sign a loyalty oath is to destroy some of the loyalty he could otherwise claim, since any subsequent loyal behavior may then be attributed to the oath.
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We are only just beginning to understand the power of love because we are just beginning to understand the weakness of force and aggression.
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The mob rushes in where individuals fear to tread.
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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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What is love except another name for the use of positive reinforcement? Or vice versa.
B. F. SKINNER