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…not everyone is willing to defend a position of ‘not knowing.’ There is no virtue in ignorance for its own sake.

B. F. Skinner

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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Attitude Character Nature Novel Respect Seen Selection Theory
Society attacks early, when the individual is helpless.
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Attack Help Society
Do not intervene between a person and the consequences of their own behavior.
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Attitude Judgement Person
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.
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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
That’s all teaching is; arranging contingencies which bring changes in behavior.
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Behavior Change Teaching Transformation
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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Education Failure Give Up Inspirational Mistake Perseverance Reality Stop Try
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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Born Breed Education Genius Men Production
I don’t believe in God, so I’m not afraid of dying.
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Afraid Believe Death God Myself
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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Born Intelligence Man Moments Problem Solve
If you’re old, don’t try to change yourself, change your environment.
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Age Change Environment Try Yourself
To say that behaviors have different ‘meanings’ is only another way of saying that they are controlled by different variables.
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Control Deep Different Way
Some of us learn control, more or less by accident. The rest of us go all our lives not even understanding how it is possible, and blaming our failure on being born the wrong way.
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Blame Born Education Failure Live Ourselves Understand Way Wrong
The one fact that I would cry form every housetop is this: the Good Life is waiting for us – here and now.
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Cry Goodness Life Wait
It is a mistake to suppose that the whole issue is how to free man. The issue is to improve the way in which he is controlled.
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Control Freedom Improvement Issues Men Mistake
Chaos breeds geniuses. It offers a man something to be a genius about.
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Deep Destruction Genius Mad Men
Behavior is determined by its consequences.
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Attitude Determination
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
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
We have not yet seen what man can make of man.
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Change Men Science See Transformation
What is love except another name for the use of positive reinforcement? Or vice versa.
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Deep Love Positive
A permissive government is a government that leaves control to other sources.
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Control Government Leaving Source
…not everyone is willing to defend a position of ‘not knowing.’ There is no virtue in ignorance for its own sake.
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Ignorance Position Virtue Willing
Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten.
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Education Forget Graduation Survive 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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Freedom Happiness Human Illusion Necessary
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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Development Mathematics Nature Process Reading Violence
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

…not everyone is willing to defend a position of ‘not knowing.’ There is no virtue in ignorance for its own sake.

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…not everyone is willing to defend a position of ‘not knowing.’ There is no virtue in ignorance for its own sake.

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