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A person who has been punished is not thereby simply less inclined to behave in a given way at best, he learns how to avoid punishment.
B. F. Skinner
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B. F. Skinner
Age: 86 †
Born: 1904
Born: March 20
Died: 1990
Died: August 18
Autobiographer
Ethologist
Inventor
Philosopher
Psychologist
University Teacher
Writer
Susquehanna Depot
Pennsylvania
Burrhus Frederic Skinner
Skinner BF
moiksu moiii
Way
Punishment
Avoid
Simply
Punished
Less
Inclined
Given
Thereby
Persons
Learns
Best
Psychological
Person
Behave
More quotes by B. F. Skinner
Many social practices essential to the welfare of the species involve the control of one person by another, and no one can suppress them who has any concern for human achievements
B. F. Skinner
Science, not religion, has taught me my most useful values, among them intellectual honesty. It is better to go without answers than to accept those that merely resolve puzzlement.
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The evolution of cultures appears to follow the pattern of the evolution of species. The many different forms of culture which arise correspond to the mutations of genetic theory. Some forms prove to be effective under prevailing circumstances and others not, and the perpetuation of the culture is determined accordingly.
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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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If you're old, don't try to change yourself, change your environment.
B. F. Skinner
Unable to understand how or why the person we see behaves as he does, we attribute his behavior to a person we cannot see, whose behavior we cannot explain either but about whom we are not inclined to ask questions.
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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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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 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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Overcrowding can be corrected only by inducing people not to crowd, and the environment will continue to deteriorate until polluting practices are abandoned.
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The extent to which human aggression exemplifies innate tendencies is not clear.
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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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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
Give me a child and I'll shape him into anything.
B. F. Skinner
Any single historical event is too complex to be adequately known by anyone. It transcends all the intellectual capacities of men. Our practice is to wait until a sufficient number of details have been forgotten. Of course things seem simpler then! Our memories work that way we retain the facts which are easiest to think about.
B. F. Skinner
A child who has been severely punished for sex play is not necessarily less inclined to continue and a man who has been imprisoned for violent assault is not necessarily less inclined toward violence.
B. F. Skinner
That's all teaching is arranging contingencies which bring changes in behavior.
B. F. Skinner
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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An important fact about verbal behavior is that speaker and listener may reside within the same skin.
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Something doing every minute' may be a gesture of despair-or the height of a battle against boredom.
B. F. Skinner
