Behavior is determined by its consequences.
B. F. SKINNERBehavior is determined by its consequences.
B. F. SKINNERWhen we say that a man controls himself, we must specify who is controlling whom.
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.
B. F. SKINNERThe simplest and most satisfactory view is that thought is simply behavior – verbal or nonverbal, covert or overt. It is not some mysterious process responsible for behavior but the very behavior itself in all the complexity of its controlling relations.
B. F. SKINNERWe shouldn’t teach great books; we should teach a love of reading. Knowing the contents of a few works of literature is a trivial achievement. Being inclined to go on reading is a great achievement.
B. F. SKINNERWe have not yet seen what man can make of man.
B. F. SKINNERA 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. SKINNERWhat is love except another name for the use of positive reinforcement? Or vice versa.
B. F. SKINNERWas putting a man on the moon actually easier than improving education in our public schools?
B. F. SKINNERChaos breeds geniuses. It offers a man something to be a genius about.
B. F. SKINNERThe major difference between rats and people is that rats learn from experience.
B. F. SKINNERLet men be happy, informed, skillful, well behaved, and productive.
B. F. SKINNERDeath does not trouble me. I have no fear of supernatural punishments, of course, nor could I enjoy an eternal life in which there would be nothing left for me to do, the task of living having been accomplished.
B. F. SKINNERA first principle not formally recognized by scientific methodologists: when you run into something interesting, drop everything else and study it.
B. F. SKINNERThose who have had anything useful to say have said it far too often, and those who have had nothing to say have been no more reticent.
B. F. SKINNERThe 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.
B. F. SKINNER