February 2017
About Behaviorism, Chapter 2: The World Within the Skin, Quote 8
“Verbal behavior can easily become covert because it does not require environmental support. “I said to myself . . . “ used synonymously with “I thought . . . ,” but we do not say, “I swam to myself.” (p. 31) Subscribe to RSS feed here
About Behaviorism, Chapter 2: The World Within the Skin, Quote 6
“Fortunately, . . . the verbal community can to some extent solve the problem of privacy. For example, it can teach responses descriptive of internal conditions by using associated public conditions. Something of the same sort happens when a blind person is taught to name the objects he feels by a teacher who merely sees […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 2: The World Within the Skin, Quote 5
“The community can teach a child to name colors in various ways. For example, it can show him colored objects, ask him to respond with color words, and commend or correct him when his responses correspond or fail to correspond with the colors of the objects . . . The community cannot, however, follow the […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 2: The World Within the Skin, Quote 4
“We might expect that because a person is in such intimate contact with his own body he should be able to describe its conditions and processes particularly well, but the very privacy which seems to confer a special privilege on the individual makes it difficult for the community to teach him to make distinctions.” (p. […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 2: The World Within the Skin, Quote 3
“We respond to our own body with three nervous systems, two of which are particularly concerned with internal features. The so-called interoceptive system . . . The so-called proprioceptive . . . A third nervous system, the exteroceptive, is primarily concerned with seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, and feeling things in the world around us, but […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 2: The World Within the Skin, Quote 2
“We feel [the world within our skins] and in some sense observe it, and it would be foolish to neglect this source of information just because no more than one person can make contact with one inner world. Nevertheless, our behavior in making that contact needs to be examined.” (p. 24) Subscribe to RSS feed […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 2: The World Within the Skin, Quote 1
“A small part of the universe is contained within the skin of each of us. There is no reason why it should have any special physical status because it lies within this boundary, and eventually we should have a complete account of it from anatomy and physiology.” (p. 24) Subscribe to RSS feed here
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 20
“When it is important to be clear about an issue, nothing but a technical vocabulary will suffice. It will often seem forced or roundabout. Old ways of speaking are abandoned with regret, and new ones are awkward and uncomfortable, but the change must be made.” (p. 22) Subscribe to RSS feed here
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 19
“For purposes of casual discourse, I see no reason to avoid such an expression as “I have chosen to discuss . . .” (though I question the possibility of free choice), or “I have in mind . . .” (though I question the existence of a mind), or “I am aware of this fact . […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 18
“. . . it is impossible to engage in casual discourse without raising the ghosts of mentalistic theories. The role of the environment was discovered very late, and no popular vocabulary has yet emerged.” (p. 22) Subscribe to RSS feed here
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 16
“I consider scores, if not hundreds, of examples of mentalistic usage. They are taken from current writing, but I have not cited the sources . . . (I express my regrets if the authors would have preferred to be given credit, but I have applied the Golden Rule and have done unto others what I […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 15
“One writer has recently said that “mere speculation which cannot be put to the test of experimental verification does not form part of science,” but if that were true, a great deal of astronomy, for example, or atomic physics would not be science. Speculation is necessary, in fact, to devise methods which will bring a […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 14
“Much of the argument goes beyond the established facts. I am concerned with interpretation rather than prediction and control. Every scientific field has a boundary beyond which discussion, though necessary, cannot be as precise as one would wish.” (p. 21) Subscribe to RSS feed here
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 13
“When what a person does i[s] attributed to what is going on inside him, investigation is brought to an end. Why explain the explanation? For twenty-five hundred years people have been preoccupied with feelings and mental life, but only recently has any interest been shown in a more precise analysis of the role of the […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 12
“The environment made its first great contribution during the evolution of the species, but it exerts a different kind of effect during the lifetime of the individual, and the combination of the two effects is the behavior we observe at any given time.” (p. 19) Subscribe to RSS feed here
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 11
“An organism behaves as it does because of its current structure, but most of this is out of reach of introspection. At the moment we must content ourselves, as the methodological behaviorist insists, with a person’s genetic and environmental histories. What are introspectively observed are certain collateral products of those histories.” (p. 19) Subscribe to […]
About Behaviorism, Chapter 1: The Causes of Behavior?, Quote 10
“Radical behaviorism restores some kind of balance. It does not insist upon truth by agreement and can therefore consider events taking place in the private world within the skin. It does not call these events unobservable, and it does not dismiss them as subjective. It simply questions the nature of the object observed and the […]