31 Days of B.F. Skinner
Horror Stories
Because so much education
reform rests upon Skinner’s methods and ideologies, it is time to tell the
truth. The next 31 days this blog will be posting current and historical
information about the true nature of Skinner’s “education” that has been
foisted upon our nation’s children.
“I could make a
pigeon a high achiever by
reinforcing it on a proper schedule.” –B.F. Skinner
“Almost all major
problems involve human behavior, and
they cannot be solved by physical and biological technology alone.
What is needed is a technology
of human behavior.“ –B.F. Skinner, Beyond Freedom and
Dignity
In 1968 B.F. SKINNER: THE MAN AND HIS IDEAS
by Richard I. Evans was published (Dutton and Company: New York, 1968). Here
are some key Skinner quotes with a comment by Evans:
“I could make a
pigeon a high achiever by reinforcing it on a proper schedule.”
… His [Skinner’s] concern
for what he believes to be the inadequacy of our formal education system
led to applying the principles of operant conditioning to a learning system
which he called the teaching machine, but Skinner’s approach is concerned
with more than merely methods and techniques. He challenges the very foundations
by which man in our society is shaped and controlled. (p. 10)
“[F]or the purpose
of analyzing behavior we
have to assume man is a machine.”(p. 24)
“You can induce him
to behave according to the dictates of society instead of his own selfish
interest.”(p. 42)
“I should not bother
with ordinary learning theory.… I
would eliminate most sensory psychology and I would give them no cognitive psychology
whatsoever [meaning the students, ed.].”(p. 91)
“ It isn’t the person
who is important, it’s the method. If the practice of psychology survives,
that’s the main objective. It’s the same with cultural practices in general:
no one survives as a person.”(p. 96)
“It does bother me
that thousands of teachers don’t understand, because immediate gains are
more likely in the classroom than in the clinic. Teachers will eventually
know—they must [understand]—and I am more concerned with promoting my theories
in education [operant conditioning].”(p. 96)
“I should like to see
our government set up a large educational agency in which specialists
could be sent to train teachers.”(p. 109)
In 1953 Skinner wrote Science and Human Behavior (Macmillan & Co.: New York, 1953), within which is found the following quote:
“A rather obvious
solution is to distribute the control of human behavior among many agencies
which have so little in common that they are not likely to join together in a
despotic unit. In general this is the argument for democracy against totalitarianism.
In a totalitarian state all agencies are brought together under a single
super-agency.”
Obviously, even
before the U.S. Department of Education was established and organized
teacher in-service training had taken a behaviorist (performance-based)
turn, Skinner was advocating these very operant conditioning methods in
all phases of education. Beginning in 1965, the federal government implemented
several teacher education programs based on performance
—performance-based teacher education—which would fulfill Skinner’s plan. Skinner
was always more concerned with “how” teachers teach than with “what” teachers teach.
One must never forget
that this is all about our children. Stay tuned in the next 31 days!
For the full context of these remarks and quotes above, see my book the deliberate dumbing down of america, available freely online as a downloadable document.
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Source: http://agenda21news.com/2014/10/skinner-horror-files/
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