To require a citizen to sign a loyalty oath is to destroy some of the loyalty he could otherwise claim, since any… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
The simplest and most satisfactory view is that thought is simply behavior - verbal or nonverbal, covert or overt. It is not… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
To say that... behaviors have different 'meanings' is only another way of saying that they are controlled by different variables. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
Better contraceptives will control population only if people will use them. A nuclear holocaust can be prevented only if the conditions under… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
Behavior used to be reinforced by great deprivation; if people weren't hungry, they wouldn't work. Now we are committed to feeding people… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
The simulated approval and affection with which parents and teachers are often urged to solve behavior problems are counterfeit. So are flattery,… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
To say that a man is sinful because he sins is to give an operational definition of sin. To say that he… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
Do not intervene between a person and the consequences of their own behavior. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
Many instructional arrangements seem "contrived," but there is nothing wrong with that. It is the teacher's function to contrive conditions under which… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
I may say that the only differences I expect to see revealed between the behavior of the rat and man (aside from… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
In the traditional view, a person is free. He is autonomous in the sense that his behavior is uncaused. He can therefore… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
The strengthening of behavior which results from reinforcement is appropriately called 'conditioning'. In operant conditioning we 'strengthen' an operant in the sense… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
Does a poet create, originate, initiate the thing called a poem, or is his behavior merely the product of his genetic and… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
It has always been the task of formal education to set up behavior which would prove useful or enjoyable later in a… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
A self is a repertoire of behavior appropriate to a given set of contingencies. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
The ideal of behaviorism is to eliminate coercion: to apply controls by changing the environment in such a way as to reinforce… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
Unable to understand how or why the person we see behaves as he does, we attribute his behavior to a person we… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
An important fact about verbal behavior is that speaker and listener may reside within the same skin. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
I've had only one idea in my life - a true idee fixe. To put it as bluntly as possible - the… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
I have to tell people that they are not responsible for their behavior. They're not creating it; they're not initiating anything. It's… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
That's all teaching is; arranging contingencies which bring changes in behavior. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
We have seen that in certain respects operant reinforcement resembles the natural selection of evolutionary theory. Just as genetic characteristics which arise… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
To require a citizen to sign a loyalty oath is to destroy some of the loyalty he could otherwise claim, since any subsequent loyal… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
A first principle not formally recognized by scientific methodologists: when you run into something interesting, drop everything else and study it. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
The problem of far greater importance remains to be solved. Rather than build a world in which we shall all live well, we must… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
I remember when I was a freshman in college, I was still somewhat bothered by... worried... about religion. I remember going to this professor… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
Those who have had anything useful to say have said it far too often, and those who have had nothing to say have been… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
A disappointment is not generally an oversight. It might just be the best one can do the situation being what it is. The genuine… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
The simplest and most satisfactory view is that thought is simply behavior - verbal or nonverbal, covert or overt. It is not some mysterious… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
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… — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
The people who control the condition in which we live have no reason to think beyond more than the next five or 10 years. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
I am opposed to the military use of animals. I am also opposed to the military use of men. — B. F. Skinner Copy Share Image
