Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-kw2vx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-29T02:44:29.790Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

B. F. Skinner - The Butcher, the Baker, the Behavior-Shaper

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2022

Richard F. Kitchener
Richard F. Kitchener*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, Colorado State University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Once upon a time in the land of Psi there lived a very famous baker named Fred. Fred the baker was known from far and wide as the very best baker in the land. His skill at baking was unmatched for he could produce loaves of any size or shape - long and thin bread sticks, round Kaiser rolls, crescent-shaped croissants, twisted oval loaves, and so on. His famous motto was: “Give me the unkneaded dough and in time I can produce any kind of loaf of bread desired.” Fred called this process ‘shaping’.

There was a limit, of course, to what even Fred could do: he could not, for example, create whole-wheat bread from white flour. But this was a small flaw in an otherwise unblemished character, and although Fred frequently admitted the importance of the kind of flour one began with, rumor had it that he was even working on the possibility of overcoming this limitation.

Type
Part II Philosophical Problems of Biology and Psychology
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1972 , 1972 , pp. 87 - 98
Copyright
Copyright © 1974 by D. Reidel Publishing Company

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

This is a slightly revised version of a paper read to the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association Convention in Lansing, Michigan, on October 27, 1972. I am indebted to Gene D'Amour, John Hebert, Pat McKee and Bernie Rollin for reading and commenting on an earlier draft of this paper.

References

Agassi, J., ‘Sensationalism’, Mind 75 (1966) 1-24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Agassi, J., ‘The Confusion between Science and Technology in Standard Philosophies of Science’, Technology and Culture 7 (1966) 348-366.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benjamin, A. C Science, Technology and Human1 Values, University of Missouri Press, Columbia, 1965.Google Scholar
Bingham, W. V., ‘On the Possibility of an Applied Psychology’, Psychological Review 30(1923) 289-305.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bixenstein, V., ‘Empiricism in Latter-Day Behavioral Science’, Science 145 (1964) 464-467.Google Scholar
Bunge, M., ‘Technology as Applied Science’, Technology and Culture 7 (1966) 329-347.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Conant, J., Modern Science and Modern Man, Doubleday, New York, 1952.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feibleman, J., ‘Pure Science, Applied Science, Technology, Engineering: An Attempt at Definitions’, Technology and Culture 2 (1961) 305-317.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feibleman, J., ‘Technology as Skills’, Technology and Culture 7 (1966) 318-328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gruender, D. C, ‘On Distinguishing Science and Technology’, Technology and Culture 12(1971) 456-463.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaufman, A., ‘The Aims of Scientific Activity’, Monist 52 (1968) 374-389.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leeper, R. W., ‘Theoretical Methodology in the Psychology of Personality’, Theories in Contemporary Psychology (ed. by Marx, M.), MacMillan Company, New York, 1963, pp. 389-413.Google Scholar
London, P., ‘The End of Ideology in Behavior Modification’, American Psychologist 27 (1972) 913-920.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meehl, P., ‘On the Circularity of the Law of Effect’, Psychological Bulletin 4,1 (1950) 52-75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scriven, M., ‘A Study of Radical Behaviorism’, Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, Vol. 1 (ed. by Feigl, H. et al), University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1956.Google Scholar
Skinner, B. F., ‘The Concept of the Reflex in the Description of Behavior’, Cumulative Record, Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1961.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Skinner, B. F., ‘Current Trends in Experimental Psychology’, Cumulative Record, Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1961.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Skinner, B. F., The Behavior of Organisms, Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1938.Google Scholar
Skinner, B. F., ‘Are Theories of Learning Necessary?’, Cumulative Record, Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1961.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Skinner, B. F., ‘How to Teach Animals’, Cumulative Record, Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1961.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Skinner, B. F., Science and Human Behavior, MacMillan Company, New York, 1953.Google Scholar
Skinner, B. F., Contingencies of Reinforcement, Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1969.Google Scholar
Skinner, B. F., Beyond Freedom and Dignity, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1971.Google Scholar
Skolimowski, H., ‘The Structure of Thinking in Technology’, Technology and Culture 7 (1966) 371-383.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Titchener, E. B., ‘On ‘Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It”, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 53 (1914) 1-17.Google Scholar
Titchener, E. B., ‘Psychology: Science or Technology?’, The Popular Scientific Monthly 84 (1914) 39-51.Google Scholar
Verplanck, W. S., ‘Burrhus F. Skinner’, Modern Learning Theory (ed. by Estes, W.), Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1954.Google Scholar