Skip to main content

Beyond Freedom and Dignity - A Review

 

Beyond Freedom and Dignity

Author: B.F. Skinner

Reviewer

  Geoffrey W. Sutton

 

B.F. Skinner's Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971) challenges traditional ideas about human autonomy and self-determination. Skinner asserts that our behaviors are not driven by an inherent sense of freedom or dignity, but rather by environmental contingencies.

I observed a somewhat humorous example of Skinner’s influence on psychology in the 1970s when I was in graduate school. A colleague in school psychology relied heavily upon reinforcement theory as he helped teachers with classroom management and identified himself as a behavioral engineer.

 

In Beyond Freedom and Dignity, Skinner argues for a more orderly structuring of society, especially through the implementation of psychological research. As a proponent of radical behaviorism, he posits that humans are controlled by their environment and their DNA. He suggests that if society wishes to improve its collective habits, it must change its environment.

 


Skinner criticizes the idea of free will and morality, arguing that human behavior is influenced by the environment and not some internal force or thought. He believes that it is naive to assume that something which cannot be seen by the human eye has a big influence on our actions.

 

Skinner discusses operant conditioning, explaining how children are learn to act and behave when they are young and believes that the same process may be applied to adults. If human beings can learn (i.e., be conditioned) to behave in a certain way, society can be better.

 

Skinner contends that the results are rarely positive when individuals and societies make life decisions based on their passions or ego. He proposes the need for “a technology of behavior. With modern scientific research, society can be structured in a way to promote wise human behaviors.

 

Skinner calls the people shaping society to be benevolent engineers. He acknowledges that the power to shape society through behaviorism can be used for positive or nefarious purposes; however, he was criticized for not elaborating on how this power could be abused.

 

APA Reference:

Skinner, B. F. (1971). Beyond Freedom and Dignity. New York: Knopf.

Sutton, G. W. (2024, January 9). Beyond freedom and dignity-review. Retrieved from https://suttonreviews.suttong.com/2024/01/beyond-freedom-and-dignity-review.html

Note. I read a hardcover edition of the book. I used Bing Chat to assist me in preparing this summary.

AVAILABLE ON AMAZON



Geoffrey W. Sutton, PhD is Emeritus Professor of Psychology. He retired from a clinical practice and was credentialed in clinical neuropsychology and psychopharmacology. His website is  www.suttong.com

 

See Geoffrey Sutton’s books on   AMAZON       or  GOOGLE STORE

Follow on    FACEBOOK   Geoff W. Sutton    

   TWITTER  @Geoff.W.Sutton    

You can read many published articles at no charge:

  Academia   Geoff W Sutton     ResearchGate   Geoffrey W Sutton 



Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Changing Our Mind by D. Gushee - Review

Changing Our Mind   by David P. Gushee    Reviewed by Geoffrey W. Sutton Changing Our Mind by David P. Gushee is a transformative book that explores the author's evolving views on LGBTQ inclusion within Christianity. Gushee, a prominent Christian ethicist, shares his journey from holding traditional evangelical views to advocating for full acceptance of LGBTQ Christians in the church. He examines biblical texts and theological positions, encouraging readers to reconsider their beliefs in light of new understandings and the lived experiences of LGBTQ individuals. The book is a call for empathy, inclusivity, and a more loving faith community. ***** I read the Kindle version of the third edition of Changing Our Mind as part of my research into Christian worldviews focused on Christian moral perspectives toward people who identify as LGBTQ. I had previously addressed the topic from the perspective of moral psychology in A House Divided (2016) and in a few research studies co...
Post a Comment
Read more

Elizabeth and Hazel Two Women of Little Rock

  Trauma, Hate, and Barriers to Reconciliation   Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock by David Margolick Reviewed by    Geoffrey W. Sutton Elizabeth Ann Eckford is 15 in the classic photo of her silently walking toward Little Rock’s Central High School in 1957. But she’s not alone. A loud white mob screams hate. With an unforgettable open mouth, Hazel Massey appears over Elizabeth’s right shoulder and comes to represent the hot white objection to desegregating the all-white High School.   The story of Elizabeth and Hazel is painful to read. David Margolick makes the black and white images come alive as much as possible for those of us at a distance in time and place from the lived events. In addition to the stories recalled by each woman, we gain additional insights from school records and the way various reporters retold the stories over several decades.   Margolick offers insight into human emotion and personality traits as well as the toll on m...
Post a Comment
Read more

Denial of Death and the Meaningful Life- Book Review

  The Denial of Death   by Ernest Becker A Review by Geoffrey W. Sutton The prospect of death, Dr. Johnson said, wonderfully concentrates the mind. The main thesis of this book is that it does much more than that: the idea of death, the fear of it, haunts the human animal like nothing else; it is a mainspring of human activity—activity designed largely to avoid the fatality of death, to overcome it by denying in some way that it is the final destiny for man.  — Ernest Becker, xvii I completed a recent reading of this old classic yesterday (13 December, 2015) because I was interested in Becker’s contribution to Terror Management Theory, which I find so helpful in understanding the ways U.S. leaders are publicly responding to terrorist activities. Becker’s ideas are more than forty years old and many have not withstood the test of time. However, his basic premise that we deny the reality of death in many ways...
3 comments
Read more