In this profound and profoundly controversial work, a landmark of
20th-century thought originally published in 1971, B. F. Skinner
makes his definitive statement about humankind and society.
Insisting that the problems of the world today can be solved only
by dealing much more effectively with human behavior, Skinner
argues that our traditional concepts of freedom and dignity must be
sharply revised. They have played an important historical role in
our struggle against many kinds of tyranny, he acknowledges, but
they are now responsible for the futile defense of a presumed free
and autonomous individual; they are perpetuating our use of
punishment and blocking the development of more effective cultural
practices. Basing his arguments on the massive results of the
experimental analysis of behavior he pioneered, Skinner rejects
traditional explanations of behavior in terms of states of mind,
feelings, and other mental attributes in favor of explanations to
be sought in the interaction between genetic endowment and personal
history. He argues that instead of promoting freedom and dignity as
personal attributes, we should direct our attention to the physical
and social environments in which people live. It is the environment
rather than humankind itself that must be changed if the
traditional goals of the struggle for freedom and dignity are to be
reached. Beyond Freedom and Dignity urges us to reexamine the
ideals we have taken for granted and to consider the possibility of
a radically behaviorist approach to human problems--one that has
appeared to some incompatible with those ideals, but which
envisions the building of a world in which humankind can attain its
greatest possible achievements.