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.

B. F. Skinner

Chaos Society Genius Breeds

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Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten.

B. F. Skinner

Been Education Forgotten Learned

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Give me a child and I'll shape him into anything.

B. F. Skinner

Anything Child Give Him

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The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.

B. F. Skinner

Machines Men Problem Real

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Society attacks early, when the individual is helpless.

B. F. Skinner

Attacks Early Helpless Individual

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I did not direct my life. I didn't design it. I never made decisions. Things always came up and made them for me. That's what life is.

B. F. Skinner

Always Came Decisions Design

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We shouldn't teach great books; we should teach a love of reading.

B. F. Skinner

Books Great Love Reading

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If you're old, don't try to change yourself, change your environment.

B. F. Skinner

Change Environment Old Try

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The consequences of an act affect the probability of its occurring again.

B. F. Skinner

Act Affect Again Consequences

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The way positive reinforcement is carried out is more important than the amount.

B. F. Skinner

Amount Carried Important More

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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.

B. F. Skinner

Always Best Circumstances Failure

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When you run into something interesting, drop everything else and study it.

B. F. Skinner

Drop Else Everything Interesting

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The feeling of being interested can act as a kind of neurological signal, directing us to fruitful areas of inquiry.

B. F. Skinner

Act Area Being Directing

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Religions work for their own aggrandizement - strengthen the church and so on - and they use reinforcers of one kind or another to get obedience and so on from their communicants.

B. F. Skinner

Another Church Get Kind

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I remember when I was a freshman in college, I was still somewhat bothered by... worried... about religion. I remember going to this professor of philosophy and telling him that I had lost my faith.

B. F. Skinner

Bothered College Faith Freshman

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I believe that I have been basically anarchistic, anti-religion and anti-industry and business. In other words, anti-bureaucracy. I would like to see people behave well without having to have priests stand by, politicians stand by, or people collecting bills.

B. F. Skinner

Basically Been Behave Believe

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I won't say that I'm an agnostic, since agnosticism maintains that one cannot know... but I'm not averse to the idea of some intelligence or some organizing force that set up the initial conditions of the universe in such a way that ultimately generated stars, planets and life.

B. F. Skinner

Agnostic Cannot Conditions Force

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I don't think my mother and father ever had any doubts about what I was to be punished for or not. My parents come from a very strictly defined culture.

B. F. Skinner

Culture Defined Doubts Ever

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I don't know whether I want to improve religion or not. I prefer to get rid of it.

B. F. Skinner

Improve Know Prefer Religion

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I think my novel, 'Walden Two,' has made people stop and look at the culture they have inherited and wonder if it is the last word or whether it can be changed.

B. F. Skinner

Changed Culture Inherited Last

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You can get along very well in this world by simply coming up with a quantity of reasonably valid statements.

B. F. Skinner

Along Coming Get Quantity

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The ideal of behaviorism is to eliminate coercion: to apply controls by changing the environment in such a way as to reinforce the kind of behavior that benefits everyone.

B. F. Skinner

Apply Behavior Benefits Changing

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If you insist that individual rights are the summum bonum, then the whole structure of society falls down.

B. F. Skinner

Down Falls Individual Insist

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A person who has been punished is not less inclined to behave in a given way; at best, he learns how to avoid punishment.

B. F. Skinner

Avoid Been Behave Best

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The environment will continue to deteriorate until pollution practices are abandoned.

B. F. Skinner

Abandoned Continue Deteriorate Environment

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Behavior used to be reinforced by great deprivation; if people weren't hungry, they wouldn't work. Now we are committed to feeding people whether they work or not. Nor is money as great a reinforcer as it once was. People no longer work for punitive reasons, yet our culture offers no new satisfactions.

B. F. Skinner

Behavior Committed Culture Deprivation

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"26 B. F. Skinner Quotes & Sayings

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.

B. F. Skinner

Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten.

B. F. Skinner

Give me a child and I'll shape him into anything.

B. F. Skinner

The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.

B. F. Skinner

B. F. Skinner

I did not direct my life. I didn't design it. I never made decisions. Things always came up and made them for me. That's what life is.

B. F. Skinner

We shouldn't teach great books; we should teach a love of reading.

B. F. Skinner

If you're old, don't try to change yourself, change your environment.

B. F. Skinner

The consequences of an act affect the probability of its occurring again.

B. F. Skinner

The way positive reinforcement is carried out is more important than the amount.

B. F. Skinner

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.

B. F. Skinner

When you run into something interesting, drop everything else and study it.

B. F. Skinner

The feeling of being interested can act as a kind of neurological signal, directing us to fruitful areas of inquiry.

B. F. Skinner

Religions work for their own aggrandizement - strengthen the church and so on - and they use reinforcers of one kind or another to get obedience and so on from their communicants.

B. F. Skinner

I remember when I was a freshman in college, I was still somewhat bothered by... worried... about religion. I remember going to this professor of philosophy and telling him that I had lost my faith.

B. F. Skinner

I believe that I have been basically anarchistic, anti-religion and anti-industry and business. In other words, anti-bureaucracy. I would like to see people behave well without having to have priests stand by, politicians stand by, or people collecting bills.

B. F. Skinner

I won't say that I'm an agnostic, since agnosticism maintains that one cannot know... but I'm not averse to the idea of some intelligence or some organizing force that set up the initial conditions of the universe in such a way that ultimately generated stars, planets and life.

B. F. Skinner

I don't think my mother and father ever had any doubts about what I was to be punished for or not. My parents come from a very strictly defined culture.

B. F. Skinner

I don't know whether I want to improve religion or not. I prefer to get rid of it.

B. F. Skinner

I think my novel, 'Walden Two,' has made people stop and look at the culture they have inherited and wonder if it is the last word or whether it can be changed.

B. F. Skinner

You can get along very well in this world by simply coming up with a quantity of reasonably valid statements.

B. F. Skinner

The ideal of behaviorism is to eliminate coercion: to apply controls by changing the environment in such a way as to reinforce the kind of behavior that benefits everyone.

B. F. Skinner

If you insist that individual rights are the summum bonum, then the whole structure of society falls down.

B. F. Skinner

A person who has been punished is not less inclined to behave in a given way; at best, he learns how to avoid punishment.

B. F. Skinner

The environment will continue to deteriorate until pollution practices are abandoned.

B. F. Skinner

B. F. Skinner

B. F. Skinner Quotes & Sayings

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