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

— B. F. Skinner Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971)

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More quotes by B. F. Skinner

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

Meditations for Parents Who Do Too Much (1993)

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

It is the teacher's function to contrive conditions under which students learn. Their relevance to a future usefulness need not be obvious.

The real question is not whether machines think but whether men do. The mystery which surrounds a thinking machine already surrounds a thinking man.

Contingencies of Reinforcement: A Theoretical Analysis (1969)

Let men be happy, informed, skillful, well behaved, and productive.

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: B. F. Skinner (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.