WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.600 OK, let's unpack this. We are diving deep today 00:00:02.600 --> 00:00:05.860 into the mind or, well, maybe the anti -mind 00:00:05.860 --> 00:00:08.660 of a figure who really defined the trajectory 00:00:08.660 --> 00:00:11.660 of 20th century psychology. He really did. This 00:00:11.660 --> 00:00:15.480 is a man who was. Simultaneously, an American 00:00:15.480 --> 00:00:19.079 scientist, a utopian novelist, a radical philosopher, 00:00:19.320 --> 00:00:21.960 and an inventor who tried to use trained pigeons 00:00:21.960 --> 00:00:24.920 to guide U .S. Navy missiles. Which is just an 00:00:24.920 --> 00:00:26.940 incredible thing to have on your resume. Right. 00:00:27.079 --> 00:00:29.140 We are talking about Berhus Frederick Skinner, 00:00:29.179 --> 00:00:31.640 but of course, everyone knows him as B .F. Skinner. 00:00:31.719 --> 00:00:33.240 And when you say he designed the trajectory, 00:00:33.539 --> 00:00:35.659 that's not hyperbole at all. I mean, there was 00:00:35.659 --> 00:00:38.880 a major survey in 2002 that... ranked Skinner 00:00:38.880 --> 00:00:41.479 as the single most influential psychologist of 00:00:41.479 --> 00:00:44.619 the entire 20th century. Wow. Yeah. He was placed 00:00:44.619 --> 00:00:46.979 on the same level as the absolute pioneers like 00:00:46.979 --> 00:00:49.460 Ivan Pavlov and John B. Watson. His work was 00:00:49.460 --> 00:00:51.979 just so comprehensive. It spanned theory, practical 00:00:51.979 --> 00:00:54.460 application, philosophy, everything. Exactly. 00:00:54.700 --> 00:00:57.119 So our mission today is to do a real deep dive 00:00:57.119 --> 00:00:59.759 into the specifics of his work. We want to cut 00:00:59.759 --> 00:01:01.399 through some of the mythology. Oh, there's a 00:01:01.399 --> 00:01:03.770 lot of it. A lot of it, especially the myths 00:01:03.770 --> 00:01:06.049 around his most controversial inventions. And 00:01:06.049 --> 00:01:08.209 we want to understand the mechanics of his radical 00:01:08.209 --> 00:01:10.969 behaviorism, the principles of operant conditioning 00:01:10.969 --> 00:01:14.650 he developed, and of course, his hugely polarizing 00:01:14.650 --> 00:01:17.150 social blueprint for a controlled, happy society. 00:01:17.590 --> 00:01:19.989 I think the foundational takeaway you need right 00:01:19.989 --> 00:01:22.969 from the start is that Skinner developed behavior 00:01:22.969 --> 00:01:26.049 analysis and basically founded the entire field. 00:01:26.560 --> 00:01:29.140 of the experimental analysis of behavior he didn't 00:01:29.140 --> 00:01:31.560 just propose a theory not at all he built the 00:01:31.560 --> 00:01:34.340 infrastructure to test it he invented the foundational 00:01:34.340 --> 00:01:37.590 tools of the trade the operant conditioning chamber, 00:01:37.810 --> 00:01:39.510 which everyone immediately started calling the 00:01:39.510 --> 00:01:43.109 Skinner box, and the cumulative recorder, which 00:01:43.109 --> 00:01:45.430 was this ingenious mechanical device that actually 00:01:45.430 --> 00:01:49.590 allowed him to precisely measure and chart the 00:01:49.590 --> 00:01:51.450 whole process of learning. What's so fascinating 00:01:51.450 --> 00:01:54.069 about Skinner's intellectual path is that the 00:01:54.069 --> 00:01:56.530 man who would dedicate his entire life to analyzing 00:01:57.550 --> 00:02:00.170 empirical, observable behavior, he started out 00:02:00.170 --> 00:02:02.390 wanting to analyze the inner human experience. 00:02:02.689 --> 00:02:04.310 He wanted to be a novelist. He wanted to write 00:02:04.310 --> 00:02:06.950 great American novels. Yeah, he was born in 1904 00:02:06.950 --> 00:02:09.229 in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania. His father was 00:02:09.229 --> 00:02:12.250 a lawyer. And you can see these early signs of 00:02:12.250 --> 00:02:15.789 the radical thinker he'd become. Like what? Well, 00:02:15.909 --> 00:02:19.509 he became an atheist pretty early on. And it 00:02:19.509 --> 00:02:21.310 was mainly because he had this profound fear 00:02:21.310 --> 00:02:23.550 of hell that his grandmother had instilled in 00:02:23.550 --> 00:02:27.180 him. And a religious teacher then... Completely 00:02:27.180 --> 00:02:29.240 failed to calm that fear. So the traditional 00:02:29.240 --> 00:02:31.319 explanations didn't work for him. They didn't 00:02:31.319 --> 00:02:33.419 provide any rational comfort. And that seems 00:02:33.419 --> 00:02:36.139 to be what started his move away from these internal 00:02:36.139 --> 00:02:39.659 metaphysical explanations toward external verifiable 00:02:39.659 --> 00:02:41.699 ones. And even before he got into psychology, 00:02:42.020 --> 00:02:44.800 his interests were super mechanical and practical. 00:02:45.120 --> 00:02:47.120 It shows that, you know, that intrinsic connection 00:02:47.120 --> 00:02:49.860 he had between theory and actually building things. 00:02:50.060 --> 00:02:52.139 Oh, completely. His closest childhood friendship 00:02:52.139 --> 00:02:54.819 was with a boy named Raphael Dockmiller. And 00:02:54.819 --> 00:02:57.439 they bonded intensely. over gadgets and contraptions. 00:02:57.560 --> 00:02:59.699 They were constantly inventing. Constantly. I 00:02:59.699 --> 00:03:01.900 mean, you can see the precursor to the Skinner 00:03:01.900 --> 00:03:04.460 box mentality right there. They set up this confusing 00:03:04.460 --> 00:03:06.659 telegraph line between their houses. I love this 00:03:06.659 --> 00:03:10.259 story. It was so unreliable that, as the story 00:03:10.259 --> 00:03:12.599 goes, they often had to follow up with a phone 00:03:12.599 --> 00:03:14.960 call to explain what the message was supposed 00:03:14.960 --> 00:03:17.879 to be. But they tried. They were natural engineers. 00:03:18.219 --> 00:03:21.840 My favorite anecdote, which is just pure quintessential 00:03:21.840 --> 00:03:24.580 BF Skinner, involves their elderberry business. 00:03:24.860 --> 00:03:26.639 Oh, the elderberry machine. The elderberry machine. 00:03:26.960 --> 00:03:29.419 So they found that when they picked the ripe 00:03:29.419 --> 00:03:31.560 berries, a bunch of the unripe ones would come 00:03:31.560 --> 00:03:33.560 along too, which was inefficient. Right. So what 00:03:33.560 --> 00:03:36.060 do you do? You observe the problem, and then 00:03:36.060 --> 00:03:38.120 you build a machine to control the environment 00:03:38.120 --> 00:03:40.939 for a specific outcome. They bent a piece of 00:03:40.939 --> 00:03:43.580 metal into a trough and ran water down it. And 00:03:43.580 --> 00:03:46.240 the ripe berries, which were denser, would sink. 00:03:46.620 --> 00:03:49.120 and get carried into a bucket. While the unripe, 00:03:49.120 --> 00:03:52.159 more buoyant ones would just get pushed over 00:03:52.159 --> 00:03:54.060 the edge and discarded. And that's his whole 00:03:54.060 --> 00:03:57.099 life's thesis in microcosm right there. Observe 00:03:57.099 --> 00:03:59.539 a natural interaction and then create an environment 00:03:59.539 --> 00:04:01.819 to control the variables for the result you want. 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:04.560 But that mechanical side was there, but the ambition 00:04:04.560 --> 00:04:07.199 was literary at first. He went to Hamilton College 00:04:07.199 --> 00:04:09.879 aiming to be a writer. He got his B .A. in English 00:04:09.879 --> 00:04:13.080 literature in 1926. But he felt like a total 00:04:13.080 --> 00:04:16.170 outsider there. He was described as having a 00:04:16.170 --> 00:04:19.089 strong intellectual attitude, and he was openly 00:04:19.089 --> 00:04:22.149 critical of the college's traditional social 00:04:22.149 --> 00:04:25.170 norms and, you know, their mores, especially 00:04:25.170 --> 00:04:27.810 being an atheist in that environment. And that 00:04:27.810 --> 00:04:30.389 leads directly to what he later called his dark 00:04:30.389 --> 00:04:33.329 years. Yeah. After he graduated, he spent about 00:04:33.329 --> 00:04:35.230 two and a half years trying to write a novel, 00:04:35.370 --> 00:04:38.009 and it was, by his own admission, a complete 00:04:38.009 --> 00:04:40.740 failure. He felt he just didn't have the life 00:04:40.740 --> 00:04:42.620 experience. He didn't have the personal perspective 00:04:42.620 --> 00:04:45.720 you need for profound literature, even though 00:04:45.720 --> 00:04:47.779 he got an encouragement from the poet Robert 00:04:47.779 --> 00:04:50.120 Frost. So he was totally disillusioned with writing. 00:04:50.379 --> 00:04:52.740 But that failure was probably the greatest gift 00:04:52.740 --> 00:04:54.300 he could have given to the science of psychology. 00:04:55.079 --> 00:04:57.360 While he was struggling with literature, he came 00:04:57.360 --> 00:04:59.699 across the work of John B. Watson. The father 00:04:59.699 --> 00:05:02.879 of behaviorism. Exactly. And Watson's insistence 00:05:02.879 --> 00:05:06.410 on studying only observable behavior. Well, it 00:05:06.410 --> 00:05:09.029 gave Skinner a whole new intellectual framework, 00:05:09.290 --> 00:05:12.990 a tangible mission. And that led him straight 00:05:12.990 --> 00:05:15.670 to graduate study in psychology at Harvard, where 00:05:15.670 --> 00:05:18.730 he got his Ph .D. in 1931. And this is where 00:05:18.730 --> 00:05:21.449 the genius of the contraption builder finally 00:05:21.449 --> 00:05:24.350 merges with the scientist. Right. At Harvard, 00:05:24.529 --> 00:05:26.970 a fellow student named Fred Keller convinced 00:05:26.970 --> 00:05:29.649 Skinner that behavior could be a real experimental 00:05:29.649 --> 00:05:32.750 science with precise tools. And that was it. 00:05:32.889 --> 00:05:35.670 That was it. That conversation immediately led 00:05:35.670 --> 00:05:38.350 Skinner to invent the prototype for the operant 00:05:38.350 --> 00:05:40.569 conditioning chamber and collaborate on other 00:05:40.569 --> 00:05:43.610 instruments. It turned him from a failed novelist 00:05:43.610 --> 00:05:46.209 into this incredibly rigorous experimentalist. 00:05:46.250 --> 00:05:48.509 His career progression from there was, I mean, 00:05:48.550 --> 00:05:50.990 textbook brilliance. Absolutely. He stayed on 00:05:50.990 --> 00:05:53.149 as a researcher at Harvard for a few years, then 00:05:53.149 --> 00:05:55.209 moved into teaching roles, first at the University 00:05:55.209 --> 00:05:57.870 of Minnesota in 1936. Then he was department 00:05:57.870 --> 00:06:00.550 chair at Indiana University, starting in 45. 00:06:00.910 --> 00:06:02.949 But the big one was coming back to Harvard. The 00:06:02.949 --> 00:06:05.449 major homecoming. He returned to Harvard in 1948 00:06:05.449 --> 00:06:08.329 as a tenured professor, the Edgar Pierce Professor 00:06:08.329 --> 00:06:11.579 of Psychology. And he held that position until 00:06:11.579 --> 00:06:14.660 he retired in 1974. And unlike a lot of academics 00:06:14.660 --> 00:06:17.060 who just sort of fade after retirement, Skinner 00:06:17.060 --> 00:06:19.639 didn't slow down at all. Not even a little. He 00:06:19.639 --> 00:06:23.980 was a vibrant voice, writing, speaking, revising 00:06:23.980 --> 00:06:26.459 his theories right up until his death from leukemia 00:06:26.459 --> 00:06:29.720 in 1990. He was 86. And it's almost unbelievable 00:06:29.720 --> 00:06:32.079 that just 10 days before he passed away, he was 00:06:32.079 --> 00:06:34.060 awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by the 00:06:34.060 --> 00:06:36.550 American Psychological Association. giving one 00:06:36.550 --> 00:06:38.790 last address to the scientific world that he 00:06:38.790 --> 00:06:41.610 completely reshaped. It's incredible end to the 00:06:41.610 --> 00:06:44.009 story. So we move from the inventor to the philosopher. 00:06:44.250 --> 00:06:46.149 This is really where Skinner earns the label 00:06:46.149 --> 00:06:49.810 radical. His school of thought, radical behaviorism, 00:06:49.850 --> 00:06:53.410 was a profound intellectual reaction to the psychology 00:06:53.410 --> 00:06:56.170 of the time, especially depth psychology and 00:06:56.170 --> 00:06:58.769 any theory that relied on hypothetical internal 00:06:58.769 --> 00:07:02.269 states like mind or will. So help us dissect 00:07:02.269 --> 00:07:04.509 that a bit. What was the true danger he saw in 00:07:04.509 --> 00:07:08.120 talking about... The danger for Skinner was really 00:07:08.120 --> 00:07:10.620 twofold. First, the core assumption of radical 00:07:10.620 --> 00:07:13.100 behaviorism is actually pretty simple. Behavior 00:07:13.100 --> 00:07:15.899 is purely a consequence of environmental histories 00:07:15.899 --> 00:07:18.720 of reinforcement. Full stop. So if you want to 00:07:18.720 --> 00:07:21.339 know why you act the way you do, you look outside 00:07:21.339 --> 00:07:23.879 yourself. You look at the external variables 00:07:23.879 --> 00:07:27.240 that have shaped your responses, not some ethereal 00:07:27.240 --> 00:07:29.980 inner driver. But if you reject mentalism entirely, 00:07:30.420 --> 00:07:32.720 aren't you severely limiting what you can even 00:07:32.720 --> 00:07:36.300 study about human experience? I mean, where does 00:07:36.300 --> 00:07:38.839 that leave complex internal things like grief 00:07:38.839 --> 00:07:41.959 or creativity or even just thinking? Most people 00:07:41.959 --> 00:07:44.959 intuitively feel their thoughts. cause their 00:07:44.959 --> 00:07:47.199 actions. And that's the critical tension he's 00:07:47.199 --> 00:07:49.480 addressing. Skinner's position wasn't that internal 00:07:49.480 --> 00:07:52.000 experience didn't exist. He just rejected the 00:07:52.000 --> 00:07:54.319 idea that it was a nonphysical mind or consciousness 00:07:54.319 --> 00:07:57.860 acting as some kind of internal agent. So what 00:07:57.860 --> 00:08:01.019 are feelings then? To him, what is felt or introspectively 00:08:01.019 --> 00:08:03.620 observed, all those thoughts, feelings, sensations, 00:08:03.879 --> 00:08:06.629 they're simply the observer's own body. and the 00:08:06.629 --> 00:08:09.509 collateral products of their genetic and environmental 00:08:09.509 --> 00:08:12.110 histories. Their effects, not causes. Exactly. 00:08:12.170 --> 00:08:14.509 You feel anxious because of your environmental 00:08:14.509 --> 00:08:17.569 history, not because some little anxiety -causing 00:08:17.569 --> 00:08:19.689 entity lives inside your head. So he saw internal 00:08:19.689 --> 00:08:21.970 feelings and thoughts as part of the total behavioral 00:08:21.970 --> 00:08:24.790 picture, but not the explanation for it. So if 00:08:24.790 --> 00:08:27.209 I say, I'm running because I feel determined. 00:08:28.139 --> 00:08:30.180 Skinner would say that the feeling of determination 00:08:30.180 --> 00:08:32.559 is just another side effect of the environmental 00:08:32.559 --> 00:08:34.960 factors, like a history of successful exercise, 00:08:35.259 --> 00:08:37.259 that actually caused the running in the first 00:08:37.259 --> 00:08:40.620 place. You've got it. And this is why he disliked 00:08:40.620 --> 00:08:43.700 what he called mental fictions. He argued that 00:08:43.700 --> 00:08:45.980 attributing an action to an internal feeling 00:08:45.980 --> 00:08:49.220 brings investigation to an end. What does that 00:08:49.220 --> 00:08:51.940 mean? Well, if a parent asks why their child 00:08:51.940 --> 00:08:54.620 hit another child, and the answer is because 00:08:54.620 --> 00:08:57.580 he felt angry, the parent stops looking. They 00:08:57.580 --> 00:09:00.620 stop looking for the real, observable environmental 00:09:00.620 --> 00:09:03.139 conditions. The triggers, the consequences, the 00:09:03.139 --> 00:09:05.120 things that actually produce the aggressive behavior 00:09:05.120 --> 00:09:07.279 in the first place. So it perpetuates ignorance 00:09:07.279 --> 00:09:10.200 of the environment's actual powerful role. It 00:09:10.200 --> 00:09:12.059 kind of lets us off the hook from analyzing our 00:09:12.059 --> 00:09:14.820 complex external history of reinforcement. That's 00:09:14.820 --> 00:09:17.139 it. He made this really pointed observation that 00:09:17.139 --> 00:09:19.580 for like two and a half millennia, philosophers 00:09:19.580 --> 00:09:21.759 were preoccupied with these internal feelings 00:09:21.759 --> 00:09:24.419 and the structure of mental life. But it was 00:09:24.419 --> 00:09:26.679 only in the early 20th century that anyone got 00:09:26.679 --> 00:09:29.879 serious about a systematic analysis of the environment's 00:09:29.879 --> 00:09:32.360 role. So to him, behaviorism was just psychology 00:09:32.360 --> 00:09:35.179 finally catching up to where physics and chemistry 00:09:35.179 --> 00:09:37.740 had been for centuries? Focusing on the verifiable. 00:09:38.100 --> 00:09:40.580 And that focus is why his research centered so 00:09:40.580 --> 00:09:43.700 intensely on operant conditioning. He stressed 00:09:43.700 --> 00:09:45.419 that these carefully controlled environments, 00:09:45.500 --> 00:09:47.879 like the Skinner box, were the only reliable 00:09:47.879 --> 00:09:50.980 way to observe learning. By isolating variables, 00:09:51.259 --> 00:09:53.419 you can accurately establish the principles of 00:09:53.419 --> 00:09:55.360 learning. And then those principles, once you've 00:09:55.360 --> 00:09:57.519 established them, can be applied to vastly complex 00:09:57.519 --> 00:10:02.039 human contexts like therapy, education, and organizational 00:10:02.039 --> 00:10:04.759 management. His entire goal was to move psychology 00:10:04.759 --> 00:10:08.299 from philosophy to engineering. Okay, so moving 00:10:08.299 --> 00:10:11.240 from the philosophy to the science, Skinner had 00:10:11.240 --> 00:10:13.399 to create a structured framework for observation. 00:10:13.659 --> 00:10:16.419 And in his 1938 book, The Behavior of Organisms, 00:10:16.440 --> 00:10:18.320 he lays out this critical distinction between 00:10:18.320 --> 00:10:21.279 two sorts of behavior. And this distinction is 00:10:21.279 --> 00:10:24.360 so crucial because it's what really differentiates 00:10:24.360 --> 00:10:27.039 his work from classical behaviorism. The first 00:10:27.039 --> 00:10:29.740 type, which he totally acknowledged Pavlov had 00:10:29.740 --> 00:10:32.799 studied exhaustively, is responded behavior. 00:10:33.159 --> 00:10:36.120 These are reflexes. Reflexes. They are behaviors 00:10:36.120 --> 00:10:39.639 elicited by specific stimuli. A puff of air makes 00:10:39.639 --> 00:10:41.779 you blink. The smell of food makes you salivate. 00:10:41.980 --> 00:10:44.620 They're induced by an antecedent stimulus, and 00:10:44.620 --> 00:10:46.379 you typically measure them by their latency, 00:10:46.659 --> 00:10:49.100 how quickly they happen, or their strength. And 00:10:49.100 --> 00:10:51.039 then the second type, the one that makes Skinner, 00:10:51.059 --> 00:10:54.259 Skinner, is operant behavior. Right. And the 00:10:54.259 --> 00:10:56.679 key difference here is that these behaviors are 00:10:56.679 --> 00:10:59.620 emitted. Which means they're not initially triggered 00:10:59.620 --> 00:11:02.679 by an obvious specific stimulus. They're voluntary, 00:11:02.879 --> 00:11:05.720 purposeful actions that an organism uses to operate 00:11:05.720 --> 00:11:07.679 on the environment. And these are the behaviors 00:11:07.679 --> 00:11:09.879 that are strengthened when they produce a desirable 00:11:09.879 --> 00:11:12.620 outcome. A reinforcer. Through operant conditioning. 00:11:12.980 --> 00:11:15.940 And you measure these not by latency, but by 00:11:15.940 --> 00:11:18.899 their rate. How frequently the organism performs 00:11:18.899 --> 00:11:21.720 the action over time. But that difference immediately 00:11:21.720 --> 00:11:25.289 raises a huge question. If an operant response 00:11:25.289 --> 00:11:28.590 isn't elicited by a stimulus, where does it even 00:11:28.590 --> 00:11:31.190 come from? Where do new behaviors originate? 00:11:31.289 --> 00:11:33.509 And Skinner's answer is beautiful because it 00:11:33.509 --> 00:11:36.649 connects his work directly to biology. He draws 00:11:36.649 --> 00:11:39.990 a direct analogy to Darwinian evolution. That's 00:11:39.990 --> 00:11:42.809 the concept of variation and selection. Exactly. 00:11:42.950 --> 00:11:45.509 Individual behaviors, just like genetic traits, 00:11:45.769 --> 00:11:48.870 vary constantly. A rat might press a lever slightly 00:11:48.870 --> 00:11:51.570 harder one time or a pigeon cocks its head a 00:11:51.570 --> 00:11:53.850 little differently. A variation that just happens 00:11:53.850 --> 00:11:56.330 to be followed by reinforcement is selected. 00:11:56.450 --> 00:11:58.629 And it's strengthened, becoming a more prominent 00:11:58.629 --> 00:12:01.029 part of that individual's behavioral repertoire. 00:12:01.490 --> 00:12:03.970 Its selection by consequence is operating on 00:12:03.970 --> 00:12:06.149 individual actions instead of over generations. 00:12:06.509 --> 00:12:09.009 It's evolution in miniature. And the specific 00:12:09.009 --> 00:12:11.850 term he coined for modifying this variation is 00:12:11.850 --> 00:12:15.049 shaping. Shaping. Which is the gradual modification 00:12:15.049 --> 00:12:18.250 of behavior by consistently reinforcing variations 00:12:18.250 --> 00:12:21.090 that get closer and closer to the desired outcome. 00:12:21.269 --> 00:12:23.409 It's like using a hot and cold game to guide 00:12:23.409 --> 00:12:26.389 a complex behavior. Perfect analogy. You start 00:12:26.389 --> 00:12:28.929 by reinforcing the pigeon for just facing the 00:12:28.929 --> 00:12:31.070 key, then for taking a step toward it, then for 00:12:31.070 --> 00:12:33.409 touching it, until you finally get the full peck 00:12:33.409 --> 00:12:35.210 established. So once the behavior is shaped, 00:12:35.269 --> 00:12:37.330 the next question is how you direct or control 00:12:37.330 --> 00:12:40.360 it. If the behavior is just emitted and doesn't 00:12:40.360 --> 00:12:42.399 have a constant trigger, how do we know when 00:12:42.399 --> 00:12:44.519 it's going to happen? And this is where the discriminative 00:12:44.519 --> 00:12:47.200 stimulus, or SD, comes in. The SD, say, a light 00:12:47.200 --> 00:12:49.919 or a specific sound. It doesn't force the behavior. 00:12:50.320 --> 00:12:52.500 It just sets the occasion for reinforcement. 00:12:53.539 --> 00:12:55.860 So a pigeon learns that picking the disc only 00:12:55.860 --> 00:12:58.700 yields food when the light is red. The red light 00:12:58.700 --> 00:13:01.620 is the discriminative stimulus. Precisely. And 00:13:01.620 --> 00:13:04.360 that whole structure... is the three -term contingency. 00:13:04.460 --> 00:13:06.960 It's the fundamental building block of his entire 00:13:06.960 --> 00:13:10.679 experimental analysis. Stimulus, response, reinforcer, 00:13:10.740 --> 00:13:13.860 or as it's often called, ABC, antecedent behavior 00:13:13.860 --> 00:13:16.500 consequence. And that framework provides a systematic 00:13:16.500 --> 00:13:19.200 way to analyze behavior that goes way beyond 00:13:19.200 --> 00:13:21.980 simple two -part stimulus -response associations. 00:13:22.480 --> 00:13:25.399 And that framework is what allows us to analyze 00:13:25.399 --> 00:13:28.539 complexity, because complex human behavior is 00:13:28.539 --> 00:13:31.809 rarely a single act. Skinner explained complexity 00:13:31.809 --> 00:13:34.289 through chaining. He viewed complex behavior 00:13:34.289 --> 00:13:37.049 as a sequence of simpler responses all linked 00:13:37.049 --> 00:13:39.629 together. Yes, and the genius of chaining is 00:13:39.629 --> 00:13:42.309 how it explains motivation across a really long 00:13:42.309 --> 00:13:45.250 sequence. The discriminative stimulus for the 00:13:45.250 --> 00:13:48.250 next step in the chain also acts as a conditioned 00:13:48.250 --> 00:13:51.000 reinforcer. for the step you just completed. 00:13:51.100 --> 00:13:53.740 So, like, if a child is being taught a long sequence 00:13:53.740 --> 00:13:56.519 of chores, the site of the clean kitchen sink 00:13:56.519 --> 00:13:59.220 is the SD for the next step, wiping the counter. 00:13:59.440 --> 00:14:01.679 But it also acts as a conditioned reinforcer 00:14:01.679 --> 00:14:04.059 for the preceding step, which was putting the 00:14:04.059 --> 00:14:06.779 dishes away. You build these long, complex behavioral 00:14:06.779 --> 00:14:10.200 sequences by linking these three -term contingencies 00:14:10.200 --> 00:14:12.379 together. Exactly. He described an animal sequence. 00:14:12.740 --> 00:14:15.440 Noise turnaround, light press lever food. The 00:14:15.440 --> 00:14:17.850 noise sets the occasion for the turnaround. The 00:14:17.850 --> 00:14:19.549 sight of the light reinforces the turnaround 00:14:19.549 --> 00:14:21.509 and sets the occasion for the press. It just 00:14:21.509 --> 00:14:24.049 chains together. But even chaining kind of struggles 00:14:24.049 --> 00:14:26.909 to explain truly novel human actions. Like when 00:14:26.909 --> 00:14:28.909 you get directions to a building you've never 00:14:28.909 --> 00:14:31.970 seen before. Right. For that, he introduced rule 00:14:31.970 --> 00:14:34.929 governed behavior. OK. Rule governed behavior 00:14:34.929 --> 00:14:37.269 accounts for complex human actions that just 00:14:37.269 --> 00:14:40.049 appear without any direct history of reinforcement 00:14:40.049 --> 00:14:43.240 for that specific action. This happens when simple 00:14:43.240 --> 00:14:46.279 behaviors, like following a command, come under 00:14:46.279 --> 00:14:49.700 the control of verbal stimuli. So once a person 00:14:49.700 --> 00:14:51.679 has an established history of being reinforced 00:14:51.679 --> 00:14:54.600 for following instructions, like, go left when 00:14:54.600 --> 00:14:57.240 I say left, then a sequence of verbal stimuli, 00:14:57.480 --> 00:15:00.639 a set of directions, can evoke an almost unlimited 00:15:00.639 --> 00:15:03.899 variety of complex, novel responses, even if 00:15:03.899 --> 00:15:05.679 the final behavior has never been reinforced 00:15:05.679 --> 00:15:08.860 before. The rule stands in for the direct environmental 00:15:08.860 --> 00:15:11.519 contingency. So if the three -term contingency 00:15:11.519 --> 00:15:14.320 is the structure and chaining builds complexity, 00:15:14.679 --> 00:15:17.259 then reinforcement is the fuel. It's the engine. 00:15:18.019 --> 00:15:20.019 Let's tackle reinforcement and punishment because 00:15:20.019 --> 00:15:22.139 these are probably the most frequently misused 00:15:22.139 --> 00:15:24.799 terms in common language. We need to define them 00:15:24.799 --> 00:15:26.879 clearly and then look at their power in practice. 00:15:27.220 --> 00:15:31.169 It is absolutely essential to reiterate. Reinforcement 00:15:31.169 --> 00:15:34.269 always strengthens behavior. The terms positive 00:15:34.269 --> 00:15:36.409 and negative are just mathematical operators. 00:15:36.710 --> 00:15:39.690 They're not moral judgments. Right. So positive 00:15:39.690 --> 00:15:41.929 reinforcement is strengthening behavior by the 00:15:41.929 --> 00:15:44.889 addition or occurrence of an event. Real world 00:15:44.889 --> 00:15:47.809 example. You offer a suggestion in a meeting. 00:15:47.889 --> 00:15:50.450 That's the behavior. And your boss immediately 00:15:50.450 --> 00:15:53.090 gives you praise or credit. The positive event. 00:15:53.230 --> 00:15:55.549 That makes you more likely to offer suggestions 00:15:55.549 --> 00:15:58.269 again. And negative reinforcement is strengthening 00:15:58.269 --> 00:16:01.330 behavior by the removal or avoidance of an aversive 00:16:01.330 --> 00:16:04.190 event. Crucially, the behavior is strengthened 00:16:04.190 --> 00:16:07.110 because something bad goes away. Like silencing 00:16:07.110 --> 00:16:09.730 an annoying alarm clock. Perfect. The behavior 00:16:09.730 --> 00:16:11.990 pressing the snooze button is reinforced because 00:16:11.990 --> 00:16:14.149 it successfully removes the irritating noise. 00:16:14.370 --> 00:16:17.169 Or if you have a headache, taking a pill is reinforced 00:16:17.169 --> 00:16:19.629 because the behavior removes the pain. So both 00:16:19.629 --> 00:16:21.450 of these actions make the behavior more likely 00:16:21.450 --> 00:16:23.490 to happen again. The key distinction is just 00:16:23.490 --> 00:16:26.879 application versus removal. OK, now let's pivot 00:16:26.879 --> 00:16:29.940 to the flip side, how we weaken or decrease behavior. 00:16:30.240 --> 00:16:32.139 This brings us to punishment and extinction. 00:16:32.399 --> 00:16:34.899 Right. And punishment aims to decrease behavior. 00:16:35.159 --> 00:16:37.799 But Skinner argued it was ineffective and created 00:16:37.799 --> 00:16:40.659 all these collateral problems. Punishment involves 00:16:40.659 --> 00:16:42.860 either the application of an aversive stimulus. 00:16:42.940 --> 00:16:45.779 That's positive punishment, like a reprimand 00:16:45.779 --> 00:16:48.960 or a fine. Or the removal of a desirable stimulus. 00:16:49.059 --> 00:16:52.120 Negative punishment, like a timeout or losing 00:16:52.120 --> 00:16:54.679 access to a video game. Let's use a consistent 00:16:54.679 --> 00:16:56.539 example to make the four terms really clear. 00:16:57.440 --> 00:17:00.159 Imagine a child who dries on the wall. Okay. 00:17:00.320 --> 00:17:02.639 Positive reinforcement. The child cleans their 00:17:02.639 --> 00:17:05.279 room and then receives an ice cream. The addition 00:17:05.279 --> 00:17:07.559 of the ice cream strengthens the cleaning behavior. 00:17:07.920 --> 00:17:10.519 Negative reinforcement. The child cleans their 00:17:10.519 --> 00:17:12.960 room and the nagging from their parents stops. 00:17:13.200 --> 00:17:15.880 The removal of the nagging strengthens the cleaning 00:17:15.880 --> 00:17:18.960 behavior. Positive punishment. The child draws 00:17:18.960 --> 00:17:21.569 on the wall and is immediately yelled at. The 00:17:21.569 --> 00:17:23.210 addition of the yelling is meant to decrease 00:17:23.210 --> 00:17:25.269 the drawing behavior. And negative punishment, 00:17:25.569 --> 00:17:27.670 the child draws on the wall and loses their TV 00:17:27.670 --> 00:17:30.349 privileges for the day. The removal of the TV 00:17:30.349 --> 00:17:32.950 is meant to decrease the drawing behavior. And 00:17:32.950 --> 00:17:35.430 Skinner's skepticism about punishment was just 00:17:35.430 --> 00:17:39.069 unwavering. He argued it causes temporary suppression 00:17:39.069 --> 00:17:42.109 at best, and it introduces all these unwanted 00:17:42.109 --> 00:17:44.490 consequences. Like teaching the person to just 00:17:44.490 --> 00:17:47.150 avoid the punisher? Exactly, or creating emotional 00:17:47.150 --> 00:17:50.309 responses like fear and anxiety that generalize 00:17:50.309 --> 00:17:53.700 to the whole environment. For behaviorists, the 00:17:53.700 --> 00:17:55.839 preferred way to weaken a behavior is extinction, 00:17:56.180 --> 00:17:58.559 which is simply withholding reinforcement when 00:17:58.559 --> 00:18:01.440 the behavior occurs. If the lever press no longer 00:18:01.440 --> 00:18:03.819 yields food, the lever pressing eventually just 00:18:03.819 --> 00:18:06.839 stops. It goes extinct. And this whole system, 00:18:06.960 --> 00:18:08.819 Skinner argued, wasn't just some psychological 00:18:08.819 --> 00:18:11.579 trick. He saw it as a fundamental law of nature. 00:18:11.819 --> 00:18:15.049 Oh, yeah. In his really powerful 1981 paper, 00:18:15.230 --> 00:18:17.890 Selection by Consequences, he connected the process 00:18:17.890 --> 00:18:20.329 of reinforcement directly to the broader biological 00:18:20.329 --> 00:18:23.009 context of Darwinian natural selection. What 00:18:23.009 --> 00:18:24.950 was the argument? He was arguing that there were 00:18:24.950 --> 00:18:27.490 three levels of selection by consequences. Natural 00:18:27.490 --> 00:18:30.049 selection, which selects genetic traits. Operant 00:18:30.049 --> 00:18:31.990 conditioning, which selects behaviors within 00:18:31.990 --> 00:18:35.009 a lifetime. And culture, which selects behavioral 00:18:35.009 --> 00:18:38.039 practices across generations. So he felt that 00:18:38.039 --> 00:18:40.519 while natural selection was universally accepted, 00:18:40.880 --> 00:18:43.400 the psychological selection process reinforcement 00:18:43.400 --> 00:18:46.880 was still viewed with skepticism. Largely because 00:18:46.880 --> 00:18:50.539 of that enduring belief in the autonomous interagent. 00:18:50.559 --> 00:18:54.559 It's an incredibly profound claim that a single 00:18:54.559 --> 00:18:57.119 mechanical principle governs adaptation across 00:18:57.119 --> 00:19:00.390 biology, behavior, and culture. The mechanism 00:19:00.390 --> 00:19:02.869 by which this selective pressure truly molds 00:19:02.869 --> 00:19:05.529 behavior in the lab and in life is through the 00:19:05.529 --> 00:19:07.750 schedules of reinforcement. Which he detailed 00:19:07.750 --> 00:19:10.390 with Charles Förster in their massive seminal 00:19:10.390 --> 00:19:14.069 1957 work, Schedules of Reinforcement. This book 00:19:14.069 --> 00:19:16.369 analyzed how the timing and frequency of reinforcement 00:19:16.369 --> 00:19:18.950 dramatically alter the rate and pattern of responses. 00:19:19.390 --> 00:19:21.089 Let's look at the five main schedules because 00:19:21.089 --> 00:19:23.509 they really do define so much of modern human 00:19:23.509 --> 00:19:26.170 life. Okay. The easiest way to teach a new behavior 00:19:26.170 --> 00:19:29.660 is... Continuous reinforcement, CRF, where every 00:19:29.660 --> 00:19:31.900 single response is reinforced. It establishes 00:19:31.900 --> 00:19:34.240 behavior quickly, but it's fragile. If you stop 00:19:34.240 --> 00:19:36.579 reinforcing, the behavior quickly goes extinct. 00:19:36.859 --> 00:19:39.259 Right. Most of our behavior is maintained by 00:19:39.259 --> 00:19:41.319 intermittent schedules, which are based either 00:19:41.319 --> 00:19:43.900 on time interval or the number of responses ratio. 00:19:44.200 --> 00:19:47.099 Let's start with fixed interval, Fi. Reinforcement 00:19:47.099 --> 00:19:49.079 is delivered after a fixed amount of time has 00:19:49.079 --> 00:19:51.789 passed, as long as a response is made. This creates 00:19:51.789 --> 00:19:54.849 a really unique and recognizable pattern because 00:19:54.849 --> 00:19:57.589 the subject knows when the next opportunity for 00:19:57.589 --> 00:19:59.930 reinforcement is coming, the response rate is 00:19:59.930 --> 00:20:02.589 super low right after they get the reward. And 00:20:02.589 --> 00:20:04.869 then it rapidly accelerates just before the interval 00:20:04.869 --> 00:20:07.529 expires. Exactly. If we chart this on a cumulative 00:20:07.529 --> 00:20:10.130 recorder, it creates the famous scallop pattern. 00:20:10.529 --> 00:20:14.569 Think of studying for an exam. Intense studying 00:20:14.569 --> 00:20:16.690 responding right before the test reinforcement 00:20:16.690 --> 00:20:19.390 and then a huge drop -off right after the exam 00:20:19.390 --> 00:20:22.750 is over. Next is variable interval 6, where reinforcement 00:20:22.750 --> 00:20:25.269 is available after unpredictable amounts of time, 00:20:25.329 --> 00:20:27.609 since you never know exactly when the opportunity 00:20:27.609 --> 00:20:30.170 will arrive. This schedule yields the most steady 00:20:30.170 --> 00:20:32.950 and stable rate of responding. 6 is the engine 00:20:32.950 --> 00:20:35.450 of so many of our digital behaviors. Checking 00:20:35.450 --> 00:20:37.470 your email, checking social media. You don't 00:20:37.470 --> 00:20:40.029 know when a new, rewarding message will arrive, 00:20:40.049 --> 00:20:42.569 so you just maintain a constant, steady rate 00:20:42.569 --> 00:20:44.789 of checking. So you don't miss it. It's highly 00:20:44.789 --> 00:20:47.069 effective at maintaining long -term, low -rate 00:20:47.069 --> 00:20:50.269 behaviors. okay moving to ratio schedules which 00:20:50.269 --> 00:20:54.160 are based on output fixed ratio fr Reinforcement 00:20:54.160 --> 00:20:57.880 after a specific fixed number of responses. A 00:20:57.880 --> 00:20:59.920 factory worker gets paid after assembling 10 00:20:59.920 --> 00:21:03.420 items or a child gets a sticker after completing 00:21:03.420 --> 00:21:06.259 five homework problems. This produces a high 00:21:06.259 --> 00:21:08.200 rate of responding, but usually with a brief 00:21:08.200 --> 00:21:10.920 pause right after the reinforcement is received. 00:21:11.160 --> 00:21:13.619 The post -reinforcement break. They get the reward, 00:21:13.859 --> 00:21:16.500 they pause, take a breath, and then start the 00:21:16.500 --> 00:21:18.799 next set of required responses. Sales commissions 00:21:18.799 --> 00:21:21.420 often work this way. And the final. And maybe 00:21:21.420 --> 00:21:23.759 the most powerful schedule is variable ratio, 00:21:24.019 --> 00:21:27.180 VR. Yes. Reinforcement occurs after a randomized, 00:21:27.480 --> 00:21:29.640 unpredictable number of responses. And this is 00:21:29.640 --> 00:21:32.200 famous because it generates the highest and steadiest 00:21:32.200 --> 00:21:34.299 rate of responding. Sometimes called breakpoint 00:21:34.299 --> 00:21:36.079 behavior because the subject will often just 00:21:36.079 --> 00:21:37.640 continue until they're physically exhausted. 00:21:38.220 --> 00:21:40.579 The classic example, of course, is the slot machine. 00:21:40.900 --> 00:21:43.480 Where a win might come after one pull or 100 00:21:43.480 --> 00:21:47.019 pulls or 500, totally randomly. And because the 00:21:47.019 --> 00:21:50.079 next pull might be the winner. The behavior is 00:21:50.079 --> 00:21:53.039 incredibly resistant to extinction and is just 00:21:53.039 --> 00:21:55.819 intensely maintained. It's the engine of addictive 00:21:55.819 --> 00:21:58.640 behavior, whether it's gambling or grinding for 00:21:58.640 --> 00:22:00.859 loot drops in a video game. And the ultimate 00:22:00.859 --> 00:22:02.960 application of all these schedules in a structured 00:22:02.960 --> 00:22:06.160 setting is the token economy. Right. These systems, 00:22:06.180 --> 00:22:08.140 which are used in psychiatric hospitals, schools, 00:22:08.519 --> 00:22:11.200 therapeutic environments, they use token secondary 00:22:11.200 --> 00:22:15.140 reinforcers. to shape behavior. Desirable actions 00:22:15.140 --> 00:22:17.819 earn tokens. And those tokens can later be exchanged 00:22:17.819 --> 00:22:21.680 for primary reinforcers. Food, privileges, leisure 00:22:21.680 --> 00:22:24.680 time. It's a complete controlled society built 00:22:24.680 --> 00:22:27.279 purely on operant principles. Let's pivot back 00:22:27.279 --> 00:22:29.400 to the inventor because Skinner's legacy isn't 00:22:29.400 --> 00:22:32.140 just conceptual, it's physical. He was one of 00:22:32.140 --> 00:22:33.779 the few psychologists who could actually build 00:22:33.779 --> 00:22:36.240 the tools necessary to test his theories. And 00:22:36.240 --> 00:22:38.140 his scientific career is completely dependent 00:22:38.140 --> 00:22:40.380 on the operant conditioning chamber, the Skinner 00:22:40.380 --> 00:22:42.759 box, which he first built as a prototype at Harvard. 00:22:42.940 --> 00:22:45.799 And its design was just radical in its simplicity 00:22:45.799 --> 00:22:48.279 and effectiveness. The classic design had the 00:22:48.279 --> 00:22:51.579 manipulandum, a lever for a rat or a disc for 00:22:51.579 --> 00:22:54.819 a pigeon, and a mechanism to deliver a reinforcer, 00:22:54.880 --> 00:22:58.039 usually food pellets. Or, alternatively, electric 00:22:58.039 --> 00:23:00.859 shocks as a punishment. Yeah. But the real genius 00:23:00.859 --> 00:23:04.210 was the environmental control. By isolating the 00:23:04.210 --> 00:23:06.009 animal and controlling all the variables, the 00:23:06.009 --> 00:23:09.029 lights, the tones, the consequences, the timing, 00:23:09.190 --> 00:23:12.009 you could analyze behavior with this unprecedented 00:23:12.009 --> 00:23:14.970 precision. The chamber enabled huge progress, 00:23:15.170 --> 00:23:17.329 especially in measuring response rate, probability, 00:23:17.650 --> 00:23:20.210 and force, the things that were quantifiable. 00:23:20.549 --> 00:23:23.170 But it also had an unintended consequence. By 00:23:23.170 --> 00:23:25.470 steering research toward these measurable variables, 00:23:25.789 --> 00:23:28.029 it kind of discouraged the study of processes 00:23:28.029 --> 00:23:30.529 that weren't easily conceptualized that way, 00:23:30.609 --> 00:23:32.839 like spatial learning or... instinctual drift, 00:23:33.079 --> 00:23:35.279 which are now core areas of behavioral science. 00:23:35.519 --> 00:23:37.240 And to measure that response rate accurately, 00:23:37.519 --> 00:23:40.440 he invented the cumulative recorder. Before computers, 00:23:40.740 --> 00:23:43.200 this was the central piece of technology, a purely 00:23:43.200 --> 00:23:46.140 mechanical device. A pen was mounted on an arm 00:23:46.140 --> 00:23:48.180 and a sheet of paper unrolled beneath it at a 00:23:48.180 --> 00:23:50.660 constant speed. Every time the subject responded, 00:23:50.799 --> 00:23:53.299 then stepped up or just a little bit. This was 00:23:53.299 --> 00:23:56.339 so brilliant because the steepness of the incline 00:23:56.339 --> 00:23:58.819 instantly and visually showed you the response 00:23:58.819 --> 00:24:01.759 rate. A vertical line meant rapid, continuous 00:24:01.759 --> 00:24:04.559 responding like a VR schedule, while a flat line 00:24:04.559 --> 00:24:07.559 meant no responding at all. This allowed Furster 00:24:07.559 --> 00:24:10.099 and Skinner to visually identify and categorize 00:24:10.099 --> 00:24:13.059 all the distinct patterns produced by their schedules 00:24:13.059 --> 00:24:15.240 of reinforcement. Now we get to the truly strange 00:24:15.240 --> 00:24:17.700 inventions, starting with Project Pigeon. You 00:24:17.700 --> 00:24:19.799 have to set the stage for this. It's World War 00:24:19.799 --> 00:24:23.380 II, and the U .S. Navy desperately needs an effective, 00:24:23.440 --> 00:24:26.440 small guidance system for missiles. And the irony 00:24:26.440 --> 00:24:29.339 is rich. The problem was that the existing technology 00:24:29.339 --> 00:24:33.319 was too bulky. So Skinner, the behaviorist, proposes 00:24:33.319 --> 00:24:35.960 a biological solution. The project, codenamed 00:24:35.960 --> 00:24:39.220 Project Pigeon, and later Project Orcon for organic 00:24:39.220 --> 00:24:41.880 control, was centered on training pigeons to 00:24:41.880 --> 00:24:44.240 guide the missiles. The concept was kind of simple. 00:24:44.400 --> 00:24:46.519 A missile's nose cone would have three compartments, 00:24:46.539 --> 00:24:49.599 each with a trained pigeon inside. Lenses projected 00:24:49.599 --> 00:24:52.119 an image of the enemy ship onto a hinged screen 00:24:52.119 --> 00:24:54.880 in front of the birds, like a camera obscura. 00:24:55.230 --> 00:24:58.130 And the pigeons were reinforced for pecking the 00:24:58.130 --> 00:25:00.630 screen, which, if they were aiming correctly, 00:25:00.970 --> 00:25:03.309 would show the ship right in the center. And 00:25:03.309 --> 00:25:06.329 the key mechanism was control. When the pigeons 00:25:06.329 --> 00:25:08.390 pecked the screen to keep the image centered, 00:25:08.650 --> 00:25:11.190 their pecking -controlled pneumatic tubes attached 00:25:11.190 --> 00:25:13.789 to the missile's guidance system, which in turn 00:25:13.789 --> 00:25:16.289 adjusted the bomb's thrusters. And he actually 00:25:16.289 --> 00:25:18.509 trained them to do this in the lab. Oh yeah, 00:25:18.609 --> 00:25:20.410 he successfully demonstrated that the system 00:25:20.410 --> 00:25:22.839 was technically viable. It sounds like a terrible 00:25:22.839 --> 00:25:25.700 joke, pigeons guiding missiles, but the seriousness 00:25:25.700 --> 00:25:28.160 of it all reminds you how desperately scientists 00:25:28.160 --> 00:25:30.680 were trying to innovate during the war. And it 00:25:30.680 --> 00:25:33.500 says he had absolute faith in the power of control 00:25:33.500 --> 00:25:37.880 behavior, even for military application. Ultimately, 00:25:37.920 --> 00:25:40.660 though, the Navy draw of the project. He often 00:25:40.660 --> 00:25:43.059 complained, no one would take us seriously. Right. 00:25:43.140 --> 00:25:45.279 And while the tech was briefly picked up again 00:25:45.279 --> 00:25:48.319 by the Naval Research Laboratory, it was discontinued. 00:25:48.700 --> 00:25:51.460 Too many uncontrollable factors like, you know, 00:25:51.460 --> 00:25:53.720 having pigeons in your supply chain for warfare. 00:25:54.000 --> 00:25:57.660 In a fitting, if slightly absurd, tribute, the 00:25:57.660 --> 00:25:59.660 project was awarded the Ig Nobel Peace Prize 00:25:59.660 --> 00:26:02.779 in 2024. Which is perfect. So from the military 00:26:02.779 --> 00:26:05.940 to the nursery, his next invention, the air crib, 00:26:06.119 --> 00:26:08.500 became his most notorious domestic controversy. 00:26:08.599 --> 00:26:12.259 This was an easily cleaned, enclosed bed. designed 00:26:12.259 --> 00:26:15.119 for infants. And the purpose was entirely practical. 00:26:15.259 --> 00:26:17.819 It was rooted in his desire to simplify child 00:26:17.819 --> 00:26:20.220 rearing for his wife and improve the baby's environment, 00:26:20.500 --> 00:26:23.240 especially in cold Minnesota. It was temperature 00:26:23.240 --> 00:26:25.819 and humidity controlled, so it eliminated the 00:26:25.819 --> 00:26:28.119 need for heavy blankets or constricting clothes. 00:26:28.420 --> 00:26:31.339 It was meant to reduce laundry, minimize diaper 00:26:31.339 --> 00:26:34.759 rash, prevent cradle cap, just regulate the environment. 00:26:35.130 --> 00:26:38.269 But the public perception, fueled by this sensationalized 00:26:38.269 --> 00:26:40.549 ladies' home journal article he wrote called 00:26:40.549 --> 00:26:44.089 Baby in a Box, it was a disaster. It was immediately 00:26:44.089 --> 00:26:47.289 and cruelly characterized as a cruel pen. It 00:26:47.289 --> 00:26:49.509 was often directly compared to the lab's Skinner 00:26:49.509 --> 00:26:51.970 box, suggesting he was experimenting on his own 00:26:51.970 --> 00:26:54.490 children. This association just destroyed its 00:26:54.490 --> 00:26:56.329 provincial success, even though reports from 00:26:56.329 --> 00:26:58.410 parents who actually used the air crib were largely 00:26:58.410 --> 00:27:01.349 positive. And the controversy followed his family 00:27:01.349 --> 00:27:05.079 for decades. His daughter, Deborah Skinner -Buzan, 00:27:05.359 --> 00:27:08.500 has had to publicly and repeatedly refute the 00:27:08.500 --> 00:27:10.619 persistent claim that she was raised in the air 00:27:10.619 --> 00:27:14.420 crib and used as a lab subject. She stated very 00:27:14.420 --> 00:27:16.640 clearly that it was just a comfortable, climate 00:27:16.640 --> 00:27:19.799 -controlled bed. Finally, let's discuss his key 00:27:19.799 --> 00:27:21.779 educational invention, the teaching machine. 00:27:22.059 --> 00:27:25.119 This was his solution to the inefficiencies and 00:27:25.119 --> 00:27:28.339 the psychological harms of the standard classroom. 00:27:28.700 --> 00:27:30.900 The machine was designed for programmed learning. 00:27:31.130 --> 00:27:34.390 And it embodied all his core principles. It presented 00:27:34.390 --> 00:27:37.230 questions one at a time, demanded an active response 00:27:37.230 --> 00:27:39.390 from the learner, and then immediately provided 00:27:39.390 --> 00:27:41.990 feedback. It rewarded a correct answer instantly. 00:27:42.250 --> 00:27:45.069 Automatic, immediate, and regular positive reinforcement. 00:27:45.470 --> 00:27:48.509 Completely bypassed aversive control or the punishment 00:27:48.509 --> 00:27:50.769 of getting something wrong. The pedagogical rationale 00:27:50.769 --> 00:27:54.089 was revolutionary for the time. The machine individualized 00:27:54.089 --> 00:27:56.349 the pace of learning. It promoted learning by 00:27:56.349 --> 00:27:59.509 doing instead of rote memorization. And crucially. 00:27:59.930 --> 00:28:03.309 The system aimed for a very low error rate. If 00:28:03.309 --> 00:28:06.109 a student consistently failed, the machine or 00:28:06.109 --> 00:28:08.509 the program could be adjusted to provide less 00:28:08.509 --> 00:28:11.950 advanced prompts. It guaranteed success and therefore 00:28:11.950 --> 00:28:14.789 maximized reinforcement. Skinner argued this 00:28:14.789 --> 00:28:17.009 positive approach was a sharp contrast to the 00:28:17.009 --> 00:28:19.410 traditional classroom, where instruction often 00:28:19.410 --> 00:28:22.009 relied on aversive control, fear of failure, 00:28:22.109 --> 00:28:24.490 or where entertainment was used before the required 00:28:24.490 --> 00:28:26.990 behavior, thus reinforcing nothing productive 00:28:26.990 --> 00:28:29.430 at all. The teaching machine was really a blueprint 00:28:29.430 --> 00:28:33.049 for effective, humane instruction. Skinner wasn't 00:28:33.049 --> 00:28:34.730 just interested in pigeons and pupils, though. 00:28:34.849 --> 00:28:38.049 He had grand plans for humanity itself. He really 00:28:38.049 --> 00:28:40.509 did. His social philosophy was driven by this 00:28:40.509 --> 00:28:42.609 hope that an effective science of behavioral 00:28:42.609 --> 00:28:45.630 control, what he called a technology of human 00:28:45.630 --> 00:28:48.430 behavior, could solve the problems that technology 00:28:48.430 --> 00:28:50.450 had created. Like the threat of nuclear war. 00:28:50.869 --> 00:28:52.650 He thought it could prevent us from destroying 00:28:52.650 --> 00:28:55.109 ourselves. This ambition was first explored in 00:28:55.109 --> 00:28:59.150 his 1948 utopian novel, Walden II. Right. The 00:28:59.150 --> 00:29:01.470 book described this experimental, self -sufficient 00:29:01.470 --> 00:29:04.690 community in the 1940s U .S., where scientific 00:29:04.690 --> 00:29:07.230 social planning and operant conditioning are 00:29:07.230 --> 00:29:09.609 used to engineer high productivity, happiness, 00:29:09.769 --> 00:29:12.130 and social stability. The community's philosophy 00:29:12.130 --> 00:29:14.789 centered on minimal consumption, rich social 00:29:14.789 --> 00:29:17.700 relationships, creative work, and lots of leisure 00:29:17.700 --> 00:29:20.480 time, all achieved by steering behavior away 00:29:20.480 --> 00:29:23.480 from greed and conflict. And the book was incredibly 00:29:23.480 --> 00:29:26.519 influential. It served as a blueprint for real 00:29:26.519 --> 00:29:29.380 -world efforts. The Twin Oaks community, founded 00:29:29.380 --> 00:29:32.720 in Virginia in 1967, openly used Walden, too, 00:29:32.859 --> 00:29:35.089 as a guide for their communal structure. But 00:29:35.089 --> 00:29:37.410 the work that truly thrust him into the cultural 00:29:37.410 --> 00:29:39.690 spotlight, the one that landed him on the cover 00:29:39.690 --> 00:29:42.829 of Time magazine, was his monumental and highly 00:29:42.829 --> 00:29:46.470 controversial 1971 work Beyond Freedom and Dignity. 00:29:46.589 --> 00:29:48.829 Wait, the idea that a technology of human behavior 00:29:48.829 --> 00:29:52.269 can fix society? That sounds dangerously close 00:29:52.269 --> 00:29:54.670 to authoritarian control, especially when you 00:29:54.670 --> 00:29:57.450 consider his premise. His core argument was that 00:29:57.450 --> 00:29:59.609 society must accept that the autonomous agent 00:30:00.089 --> 00:30:02.329 That internal concept of a free inner person 00:30:02.329 --> 00:30:04.890 is a fiction. It is not the driving force of 00:30:04.890 --> 00:30:07.670 our actions. So how did Skinner address the obvious 00:30:07.670 --> 00:30:10.549 ethical recoil to that concept? I mean, that's 00:30:10.549 --> 00:30:13.170 a tough one. He argued that control is inevitable. 00:30:13.390 --> 00:30:15.829 All behavior is controlled. It's either controlled 00:30:15.829 --> 00:30:18.009 by aversive means like punishment and threats 00:30:18.009 --> 00:30:21.839 or by positive means like reinforcement. So since 00:30:21.839 --> 00:30:24.359 control is inescapable, we should abandon the 00:30:24.359 --> 00:30:26.740 fiction of autonomous freedom. And choose to 00:30:26.740 --> 00:30:29.299 be controlled by the most humane and effective 00:30:29.299 --> 00:30:33.369 means. Positive reinforcement. He viewed our 00:30:33.369 --> 00:30:35.670 adherence to freedom as a defense mechanism that 00:30:35.670 --> 00:30:37.769 was preventing us from creating a truly effective, 00:30:38.049 --> 00:30:40.549 better society. And that is the context for his 00:30:40.549 --> 00:30:42.750 famous provocative quote where he compares the 00:30:42.750 --> 00:30:45.170 old -fashioned liberal who insists on absolute 00:30:45.170 --> 00:30:48.750 freedom to Milton's Satan in Paradise Lost. Yeah, 00:30:48.769 --> 00:30:50.890 Satan falls to hell. And to reassure himself, 00:30:51.049 --> 00:30:53.190 he declares, here at least we shall be free. 00:30:53.289 --> 00:30:55.970 The implication is just chilling. If you insist 00:30:55.970 --> 00:30:58.789 on unconditioned freedom, you might be left in 00:30:58.789 --> 00:31:01.250 a behavioral hell of inefficiency and conflict. 00:31:01.720 --> 00:31:04.579 The ethical pushback was immense, yet his vision 00:31:04.579 --> 00:31:06.779 wasn't just confined to these grand social schemes. 00:31:06.940 --> 00:31:10.220 It permeated his ideas on teaching, which he 00:31:10.220 --> 00:31:13.079 detailed in The Technology of Teaching. He outlined 00:31:13.079 --> 00:31:17.319 two major purposes of education. First, to teach 00:31:17.319 --> 00:31:20.079 specific repertoires of verbal and nonverbal 00:31:20.079 --> 00:31:23.650 behavior. the curriculum, and second, to genuinely 00:31:23.650 --> 00:31:25.869 interest students in learning. And his focus 00:31:25.869 --> 00:31:27.670 remained on positive control in the classroom. 00:31:27.990 --> 00:31:30.529 He argued that traditional education relies way 00:31:30.529 --> 00:31:33.390 too heavily on punishment, fear of failing, fear 00:31:33.390 --> 00:31:35.490 of the teacher. Which is ineffective because 00:31:35.490 --> 00:31:38.609 punishment primarily teaches avoidance. He used 00:31:38.609 --> 00:31:40.849 the visceral example of a child being forced 00:31:40.849 --> 00:31:43.839 to practice a musical instrument. The coercion 00:31:43.839 --> 00:31:46.160 makes the child associate practice with dread 00:31:46.160 --> 00:31:48.940 and aversion, creating a lifelong dislike of 00:31:48.940 --> 00:31:51.819 music rather than genuine skill. He believed 00:31:51.819 --> 00:31:53.819 teachers often failed, not because they weren't 00:31:53.819 --> 00:31:55.880 dedicated, but because they lacked an in -depth 00:31:55.880 --> 00:31:58.759 understanding of the science of learning. They 00:31:58.759 --> 00:32:01.619 relied on poor procedures, using aversive control, 00:32:02.079 --> 00:32:04.619 relying on just telling and explaining, which 00:32:04.619 --> 00:32:07.119 he noted fails to provide any corrective reinforcement, 00:32:07.559 --> 00:32:10.099 failing to adapt tasks to the student's success 00:32:10.099 --> 00:32:12.339 level, and failing to provide frequent immediate 00:32:12.339 --> 00:32:15.180 positive reinforcement. So he blueprinted a specific, 00:32:15.339 --> 00:32:17.319 positive, and systematic five -step teaching 00:32:17.319 --> 00:32:20.940 method to maximize success. Step one. Clearly 00:32:20.940 --> 00:32:23.359 specify the performance you expect from the student. 00:32:23.480 --> 00:32:25.660 You can't reinforce what you haven't defined. 00:32:25.940 --> 00:32:29.059 Step two. Break the task down into incredibly 00:32:29.059 --> 00:32:32.740 small, achievable steps. Step three. Let the 00:32:32.740 --> 00:32:35.400 student perform each step and provide immediate 00:32:35.400 --> 00:32:38.259 positive reinforcement for correct actions in 00:32:38.259 --> 00:32:41.579 every single step. Step four. Constantly adjust 00:32:41.579 --> 00:32:44.220 the difficulty and pacing to ensure constant 00:32:44.220 --> 00:32:47.200 success. You're aiming for a near zero error 00:32:47.200 --> 00:32:50.740 rate. And finally, step five. Once the behavior 00:32:50.740 --> 00:32:53.039 is mastered, you shift the student to intermittent 00:32:53.039 --> 00:32:55.039 reinforcement to ensure the performance is maintained 00:32:55.039 --> 00:32:57.869 over the long term. just like a VR schedule keeps 00:32:57.869 --> 00:33:00.150 a behavior going strong. While his contributions 00:33:00.150 --> 00:33:02.410 to structured learning were immense, Skinner's 00:33:02.410 --> 00:33:04.349 theories were rarely accepted without a fight. 00:33:04.549 --> 00:33:06.809 Almost never. Let's start with one of his most 00:33:06.809 --> 00:33:09.670 famous yet heavily disputed experiments, the 00:33:09.670 --> 00:33:13.869 1948 study Superstition in the Pigeon. This experiment 00:33:13.869 --> 00:33:16.849 was just so elegant in its design. Skinner placed 00:33:16.849 --> 00:33:18.910 hungry pigeons in a cage with a mechanism that 00:33:18.910 --> 00:33:21.089 delivered food at regular fixed intervals, say, 00:33:21.210 --> 00:33:23.750 every 15 seconds, regardless of what the bird 00:33:23.750 --> 00:33:26.069 was doing. So the reinforcement was accidental 00:33:26.069 --> 00:33:28.789 or adventitious. It wasn't contingent on any 00:33:28.789 --> 00:33:31.130 specific behavior. And the result was spectacular. 00:33:31.609 --> 00:33:34.369 Because the food arrived randomly, the pigeons 00:33:34.369 --> 00:33:37.309 began associating the food delivery with whatever 00:33:37.309 --> 00:33:39.210 chance action they happened to be performing 00:33:39.210 --> 00:33:42.150 right when the food dropped. One pigeon started 00:33:42.150 --> 00:33:45.470 turning counterclockwise. Another thrust its 00:33:45.470 --> 00:33:47.970 head violently into a corner. A third started 00:33:47.970 --> 00:33:51.750 this consistent pendulum -like head motion. They 00:33:51.750 --> 00:33:54.349 were behaving as if their random rituals were 00:33:54.349 --> 00:33:56.910 influencing the delivery of food. And Skinner 00:33:56.910 --> 00:34:00.269 argued this was a perfect analogy for human superstition. 00:34:00.410 --> 00:34:03.210 The athlete with the lucky socks, the gambler 00:34:03.210 --> 00:34:05.990 with a ritual before rolling the dice, the bowler 00:34:05.990 --> 00:34:07.890 twisting their arm after the ball has already 00:34:07.890 --> 00:34:10.010 left their hand as if they still control it. 00:34:10.269 --> 00:34:12.889 That occasional accidental association between 00:34:12.889 --> 00:34:15.550 the ritual and a good outcome is enough, under 00:34:15.550 --> 00:34:18.269 an intermittent schedule, to maintain the superstitious 00:34:18.269 --> 00:34:20.449 behavior forever. But this simple explanation 00:34:20.449 --> 00:34:23.690 has been robustly challenged. Subsequent research, 00:34:23.909 --> 00:34:27.590 particularly Stadden and Simmelhag in 1971, while 00:34:27.590 --> 00:34:29.929 they observed similar behaviors, they provided 00:34:29.929 --> 00:34:32.750 a key distinction. They argued that the terminal 00:34:32.750 --> 00:34:35.449 responses, the actions performed right before 00:34:35.449 --> 00:34:38.090 the food arrived, were better explained by classical 00:34:38.090 --> 00:34:40.809 conditioning. a process called auto -shaping, 00:34:40.829 --> 00:34:43.530 where the food presentation paired with the light 00:34:43.530 --> 00:34:46.210 cue automatically induces a conditioned response. 00:34:47.030 --> 00:34:49.550 So the cause of the bizarre behaviors in between 00:34:49.550 --> 00:34:52.070 food deliveries is still up for debate. It is. 00:34:52.170 --> 00:34:54.610 It proves that even the simplest Skinner box 00:34:54.610 --> 00:34:57.010 results can sometimes require a more nuanced 00:34:57.010 --> 00:34:59.789 explanation than pure adventitious reinforcement. 00:35:00.329 --> 00:35:02.150 Okay, let's move to the most famous intellectual 00:35:02.150 --> 00:35:05.170 battle of his career. Yeah. The Great Chomsky 00:35:05.170 --> 00:35:07.920 Feud. Well, yeah. This conflict, which came from 00:35:07.920 --> 00:35:11.099 Noam Chomsky's 1959 critique of Skinner's book 00:35:11.099 --> 00:35:13.980 Verbal Behavior, is widely considered the launch 00:35:13.980 --> 00:35:16.079 point of the cognitive revolution in psychology. 00:35:16.400 --> 00:35:19.500 Right. So in Verbal Behavior from 1957, Skinner 00:35:19.500 --> 00:35:22.239 tried to explain human language acquisition using 00:35:22.239 --> 00:35:25.110 his operant framework. He defined verbal units 00:35:25.110 --> 00:35:27.550 as specific behaviors reinforced by a listener. 00:35:27.750 --> 00:35:30.369 A mand, which is a request reinforced by getting 00:35:30.369 --> 00:35:32.789 what you asked for, like water. A tact, which 00:35:32.789 --> 00:35:35.050 is a naming reinforced by social agreement, like 00:35:35.050 --> 00:35:38.630 that's a dog. And introverbals, which are word 00:35:38.630 --> 00:35:41.210 associations and conversational flow. He believed 00:35:41.210 --> 00:35:43.230 all language could be reduced to these controlled 00:35:43.230 --> 00:35:45.750 responses. Then Chonsky, who was a relatively 00:35:45.750 --> 00:35:48.309 unknown linguist at the time, unleashed this 00:35:48.309 --> 00:35:51.440 massive devastating review in the journal language. 00:35:51.739 --> 00:35:54.880 And his core argument was that Skinner's behavioral 00:35:54.880 --> 00:35:58.039 framework was fundamentally incapable of explaining 00:35:58.039 --> 00:36:00.219 the most important aspect of human language, 00:36:00.460 --> 00:36:03.739 generativity. Generativity. Generativity. It's 00:36:03.739 --> 00:36:06.039 a child's ability to generate an infinite variety 00:36:06.039 --> 00:36:08.320 of novel sentences, sentences they've never heard 00:36:08.320 --> 00:36:10.000 before, that have never been reinforced before, 00:36:10.159 --> 00:36:13.059 and yet are grammatically correct. And Chomsky 00:36:13.059 --> 00:36:15.780 argued that a theory based purely on conditioned 00:36:15.780 --> 00:36:18.539 responses could never account for this structural 00:36:18.539 --> 00:36:21.260 creativity. He basically dismissed Skinner's 00:36:21.260 --> 00:36:23.639 framework as little more than word games. He 00:36:23.639 --> 00:36:26.360 accused him of overextending lab work to phenomena 00:36:26.360 --> 00:36:29.510 it just couldn't touch. That critique. struck 00:36:29.510 --> 00:36:32.630 right at the heart of behaviorism. If the radical 00:36:32.630 --> 00:36:35.190 behaviorist framework couldn't explain language, 00:36:35.409 --> 00:36:38.849 the most complex human behavior, then maybe it 00:36:38.849 --> 00:36:40.510 couldn't explain anything truly complicated. 00:36:40.929 --> 00:36:43.469 It's hard to overstate the seismic impact of 00:36:43.469 --> 00:36:45.909 that review. It convinced an entire generation 00:36:45.909 --> 00:36:48.510 of academics to seek explanations inside the 00:36:48.510 --> 00:36:51.710 organism, in innate linguistic structures, cognitive 00:36:51.710 --> 00:36:54.269 rules, and that launched the cognitive movement. 00:36:54.510 --> 00:36:56.949 What's so incredible and probably detrimental 00:36:56.949 --> 00:36:59.949 to Skinner's legacy is... his silence. He never 00:36:59.949 --> 00:37:02.739 formally replied to Chomsky. He claimed he found 00:37:02.739 --> 00:37:05.000 the tone distasteful and only read a few pages. 00:37:05.219 --> 00:37:07.159 He said Chomsky had misunderstood the difference 00:37:07.159 --> 00:37:09.599 between his radical behaviorism and earlier, 00:37:09.699 --> 00:37:12.760 simpler stimulus response models. But his failure 00:37:12.760 --> 00:37:15.219 to engage allowed Chomsky's argument to stand 00:37:15.219 --> 00:37:17.320 essentially unopposed in the mainstream academic 00:37:17.320 --> 00:37:20.340 mind for decades. It accelerated the shift away 00:37:20.340 --> 00:37:22.559 from external analysis. And while Skinner's later 00:37:22.559 --> 00:37:24.519 supporters argued that Chomsky attacked a straw 00:37:24.519 --> 00:37:27.179 man, a caricature of behaviorism, the damage 00:37:27.179 --> 00:37:29.840 was done. The focus of psychology moved decisively 00:37:29.840 --> 00:37:32.460 inward. Beyond the language battle, Skinner also 00:37:32.460 --> 00:37:34.780 received criticism from the psychodynamic world. 00:37:34.940 --> 00:37:37.340 Although he was often portrayed as being aggressively 00:37:37.340 --> 00:37:40.320 anti -Freud, some analysts have pointed out that 00:37:40.320 --> 00:37:42.719 Skinner actually shared the psychoanalytic view 00:37:42.719 --> 00:37:46.260 that behavior often requires deep analysis because 00:37:46.260 --> 00:37:48.460 it's rarely what it appears to be on the surface. 00:37:49.039 --> 00:37:51.539 And to study things like projection or subconscious 00:37:51.539 --> 00:37:54.800 thought, Skinner even designed the verbal summator. 00:37:55.000 --> 00:37:57.300 Which was a unique projective test. It was an 00:37:57.300 --> 00:37:59.900 auditory version of the Rorschach test, intended 00:37:59.900 --> 00:38:02.619 to reveal subconscious thoughts that were projected 00:38:02.619 --> 00:38:06.099 onto incomprehensible auditory garbage. Finally, 00:38:06.099 --> 00:38:08.380 we have to include the serious claims made by 00:38:08.380 --> 00:38:11.539 animal behaviorist Temple Grandin. Right. In 00:38:11.539 --> 00:38:14.920 her 2005 book and later interviews, Grandin described 00:38:14.920 --> 00:38:18.119 meeting Skinner when she was 18. She claimed 00:38:18.119 --> 00:38:19.760 that during this encounter, Skinner attempted 00:38:19.760 --> 00:38:21.900 to touch her legs without her consent, and she 00:38:21.900 --> 00:38:24.639 verbally rebuffed him. Grandin also asserted 00:38:24.639 --> 00:38:27.000 that Skinner, throughout his life, was dismissive 00:38:27.000 --> 00:38:29.019 of the importance of brain function in understanding 00:38:29.019 --> 00:38:32.079 behavior. She claimed he refused to engage with 00:38:32.079 --> 00:38:34.280 the neurological basis of her work with animals 00:38:34.280 --> 00:38:36.900 and only began to recognize the importance of 00:38:36.900 --> 00:38:39.039 the physical brain structure after he suffered 00:38:39.039 --> 00:38:41.800 a stroke later in life. We present these claims 00:38:41.800 --> 00:38:43.860 as they stand within the historical record of 00:38:43.860 --> 00:38:46.239 critique directed at his personal and professional 00:38:46.239 --> 00:38:49.659 conduct. So B .F. Skinner's story is this profound 00:38:49.659 --> 00:38:51.980 demonstration of intellectual commitment moving 00:38:51.980 --> 00:38:55.400 from a frustrated novelist to the radical philosopher 00:38:55.400 --> 00:38:58.639 and experimental scientist who provided the framework 00:38:58.639 --> 00:39:01.380 for understanding consequences. His career spanned 00:39:01.380 --> 00:39:03.239 decades at the Intellectual Center of American 00:39:03.239 --> 00:39:06.099 Science. He earned the National Medal of Science 00:39:06.099 --> 00:39:10.460 in 1968 and that final deserved lifetime. Award 00:39:10.460 --> 00:39:13.900 in 1990. And his legacy isn't just historical. 00:39:14.119 --> 00:39:17.099 His principles of operant conditioning are still 00:39:17.099 --> 00:39:19.760 absolutely central to interpreting how consequences 00:39:19.760 --> 00:39:22.980 impact actions in every modern domain. Whether 00:39:22.980 --> 00:39:25.420 you are designing training for a corporate environment, 00:39:25.619 --> 00:39:28.280 developing therapy protocols, or even designing 00:39:28.280 --> 00:39:30.360 the addictive features of a social media platform. 00:39:30.619 --> 00:39:33.099 You're using the core principles of the three 00:39:33.099 --> 00:39:35.300 -term contingency and schedules of reinforcement. 00:39:35.760 --> 00:39:38.579 The mechanism is just unavoidable in human life. 00:39:38.800 --> 00:39:41.260 So, what does this all mean for you, the listener? 00:39:52.900 --> 00:39:57.000 He saw both as selection by consequences. And 00:39:57.000 --> 00:39:59.059 that leads to the final provocative thought. 00:39:59.360 --> 00:40:02.519 If we accept Skinner's premise that all behavior, 00:40:02.639 --> 00:40:05.460 from a pigeon's random ritual to your most complex 00:40:05.460 --> 00:40:08.219 moral decision, is fundamentally shaped by this 00:40:08.219 --> 00:40:10.420 relentless process of environmental selection, 00:40:11.130 --> 00:40:13.170 Where do we genuinely locate the boundaries of 00:40:13.170 --> 00:40:16.070 free will? If your choices are simply the reliable 00:40:16.070 --> 00:40:18.809 effects of a lifetime of environmental contingencies, 00:40:19.070 --> 00:40:22.230 what is left for the autonomous inner agent to 00:40:22.230 --> 00:40:25.090 actually choose? Is free will merely the name 00:40:25.090 --> 00:40:27.489 we give to the actions whose environmental causes 00:40:27.489 --> 00:40:30.630 we have yet to fully analyze? That is the deep, 00:40:30.630 --> 00:40:32.849 unsettling question Skinner forces us to mull 00:40:32.849 --> 00:40:33.050 over.