Quote

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.

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
Science
Among
Puzzlement
Better
Accepting
Behaviorism
Without
Answers
Resolve
Taught
Useful
Education
Honesty
Values
Merely
Religion
Accept
Language
Intellectual

More quotes by B. F. Skinner

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A permissive government is a government that leaves control to other sources.
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Let men be happy, informed, skillful, well behaved, and productive.
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Society already possesses the psychological techniques needed to obtain universal observance of a code - a code which would guarantee the success of a community or state. The difficulty is that these techniques are in the hands of the wrong people-or, rather, there aren't any right people.
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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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To say that... behaviors have different 'meanings' is only another way of saying that they are controlled by different variables.
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The juvenile delinquent does not feel his disturbed personality. The intelligent man does not feel his intelligence or the introvert his introversion.
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We shouldn't teach great books we should teach a love of reading.
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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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That's all teaching is arranging contingencies which bring changes in behavior.
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The severest trial of oppression is the constant outrage which one suffers at the thought of the oppressor. What Jesus discovered was how to avoid the inner devastations. His technique was to practice the opposite emotion... a man may not get his freedom or possessions back, but he's less miserable. It's a difficult lesson.
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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.
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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 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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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
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Except when physically restrained, a person is least free or dignified when he is under threat of punishment, and unfortunately most people often are.
B. F. Skinner
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The way positive reinforcement is carried out is more important than the amount.
B. F. Skinner
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The problem of far greater importance remains to be solved. Rather than build a world in which we shall all live well, we must stop building one in which it will be impossible to live at all.
B. F. Skinner
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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.
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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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Fame is also won at the expense of others. Even the well-deserved honors of the scientist or man of learning are unfair to many persons of equal achievements who get none. When one man gets a place in the sun, the others are put in a denser shade. From the point of view of the whole group there's no gain whatsoever, and perhaps a loss.
B. F. Skinner