We do not choose survival as a value, it chooses us.
B. F. SkinnerRead
The real question is not whether machines think but whether men do. The mystery which surrounds a thinking machine already surrounds a thinking man.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote questions human thought in contrast to machine intelligence, highlighting our own understanding of consciousness.
B.F. Skinner's quote challenges the reader to consider the nature of thought and intelligence, not just in machines but within ourselves as humans. It suggests that while we may ponder the capabilities of machines, we often overlook the complexity of our own minds and the mystery that lies in understanding our own consciousness as thinking beings.
Themes
MachinesThinkingHumanConsciousnessPhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
During a lecture on artificial intelligence, this quote may be used to provoke thought among students about what it means to think.
More from B. F. Skinner
All quotes βEach of us has interests which conflict the interests of everybody else... 'everybody else' we call 'society'. It's a powerful opponent and it always wins. Oh, here and there an individual prevails for a while and gets what he wants. Sometimes he storms the culture of a society and changes it to his own advantage. But society wins in the long run, for it has the advantage of numbers and of age.
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No theory changes what it is a theory about; man remains what he has always been.
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I am opposed to the military use of animals. I am also opposed to the military use of men.
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The ideal of behaviorism is to eliminate coercion: to apply controls by changing the environment in such a way as to reinforce the kind of behavior that benefits everyone.
B. F. SkinnerRead
Unable to understand how or why the person we see behaves as he does, we attribute his behavior to a person we cannot see, whose behavior we cannot explain either but about whom we are not inclined to ask questions.
B. F. SkinnerRead
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