Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select?doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant chief, and yes, even beggar-man thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.
John B. Watson. His view of the power of behaviorism to shape people. Scary thing is, he's probably close to right.
why is that scary? he is saying that nature is less important than nuture... it would be scary if the opposite was true and we were deemed from the vary start to have a very specific and hence limited skill set...
why is that scary? he is saying that nature is less important than nuture... it would be scary if the opposite was true and we were deemed from the vary start to have a very specific and hence limited skill set...
It's scary that learning processes are so powerful that they can seemingly override our sense of being human (things like compassion can be de-programmed. racism can be learned, etc.) I'd like to think that there are some things we can't get "learned" out of us.
It's scary that learning processes are so powerful that they can seemingly override our sense of being human (things like compassion can be de-programmed. racism can be learned, etc.) I'd like to think that there are some things we can't get "learned" out of us.
I would prefer to think that we don't have any set complex behavioral instincts. To each his own i guess. I also would prefer if i had the opportunity to set things, just for the record, that racism be a learned trait rather than an inheritable one...
I would prefer to think that we don't have any set complex behavioral instincts. To each his own i guess. I also would prefer if i had the opportunity to set things, just for the record, that racism be a learned trait rather than an inheritable one...
I suppose that's one way of looking at it. I'll refrain from answering any further to avoid derailing this thread any more....
I suppose that's one way of looking at it. I'll refrain from answering any further to avoid derailing this thread any more....
Behaviorism is misguided as is much contemporary psychology . . . . I have some third hand stories about Skinner and what he really tried to do with his daughter . . . but you'd have to start another thread.
back to quotes:
? . . . a fluid succession of presents, the development of an entity of which our present is a phase only . . . a portrait is not an identificative paper but rather the curve of an emotion.?
\t\t\t\t\t--- Joyce
My daughter is named Anna Livia . . . for those of you who know what I mean.
This next quote I love and need to remember . . . and to get back into the spirit of with my own art:
"In the magical mirror image produced by the play world, a single object chosen at random...becomes a symbol. It has representative character. Even if it has long been forgotten, human play is the symbolic act of representing the meaning of the world and of life
\t\t\t\t\t---Eugen Fink, ?The Oasis of Happiness: Toward an Ontology of Play?, Yale French Studies, No 41
and then just because everybody else is doing it:
?A man?s maturity-consists in having found again the seriouseness one had as a child at play?
\t\t\t\t\t---Nietszche, Beyond Good & Evil
I think this next one is absolutely my favorite . . . I stumbled on it and realized that Leibniz is an ironic genius . . . (besides teh Monadology is pretty great too):
"Those who maintain a vacuum, are more influenced by imagination than reason."
Comments
Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select?doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant chief, and yes, even beggar-man thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.
John B. Watson. His view of the power of behaviorism to shape people. Scary thing is, he's probably close to right.
Originally posted by billybobsky
why is that scary? he is saying that nature is less important than nuture... it would be scary if the opposite was true and we were deemed from the vary start to have a very specific and hence limited skill set...
It's scary that learning processes are so powerful that they can seemingly override our sense of being human (things like compassion can be de-programmed. racism can be learned, etc.) I'd like to think that there are some things we can't get "learned" out of us.
Originally posted by torifile
It's scary that learning processes are so powerful that they can seemingly override our sense of being human (things like compassion can be de-programmed. racism can be learned, etc.) I'd like to think that there are some things we can't get "learned" out of us.
I would prefer to think that we don't have any set complex behavioral instincts. To each his own i guess. I also would prefer if i had the opportunity to set things, just for the record, that racism be a learned trait rather than an inheritable one...
Originally posted by billybobsky
I would prefer to think that we don't have any set complex behavioral instincts. To each his own i guess. I also would prefer if i had the opportunity to set things, just for the record, that racism be a learned trait rather than an inheritable one...
I suppose that's one way of looking at it. I'll refrain from answering any further to avoid derailing this thread any more....
Originally posted by torifile
I suppose that's one way of looking at it. I'll refrain from answering any further to avoid derailing this thread any more....
Behaviorism is misguided as is much contemporary psychology . . . . I have some third hand stories about Skinner and what he really tried to do with his daughter . . . but you'd have to start another thread.
back to quotes:
? . . . a fluid succession of presents, the development of an entity of which our present is a phase only . . . a portrait is not an identificative paper but rather the curve of an emotion.?
\t\t\t\t\t--- Joyce
My daughter is named Anna Livia . . . for those of you who know what I mean.
This next quote I love and need to remember . . . and to get back into the spirit of with my own art:
"In the magical mirror image produced by the play world, a single object chosen at random...becomes a symbol. It has representative character. Even if it has long been forgotten, human play is the symbolic act of representing the meaning of the world and of life
\t\t\t\t\t---Eugen Fink, ?The Oasis of Happiness: Toward an Ontology of Play?, Yale French Studies, No 41
and then just because everybody else is doing it:
?A man?s maturity-consists in having found again the seriouseness one had as a child at play?
\t\t\t\t\t---Nietszche, Beyond Good & Evil
I think this next one is absolutely my favorite . . . I stumbled on it and realized that Leibniz is an ironic genius . . . (besides teh Monadology is pretty great too):
"Those who maintain a vacuum, are more influenced by imagination than reason."
\t--Leibniz: The Leibniz-Clarke Correspondence