Human freedom and dignity, part one

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Within a single lifetime our physical environment has been changed almost beyond
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recognition. Yet there's been little corresponding change in how we as
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individuals relate to the world and experience reality.
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New tools and techniques of the human potentiality and presenting to
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us an exhilarating and dangerous frontier renewing in our minds the old
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question what are the limits of human ability the boundaries of the human
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experience. What does it mean to be a human being.
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Seminar Big Sur are a series of discussions focusing attention on the front tiers of
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human development presented by K x K x FM in San Francisco in
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cooperation with the Aslan Institute of Big Sur California a Center which studies those
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trends and religion philosophy and the behavioral sciences which emphasize the
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potentialities of human existence. This week we present highlights of a
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discussion from a seminar led by Dr. B.F. Skinner professor of psychology at Harvard
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University. The general theme of the seminar was programming nonverbal
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behavior. This week's discussion entitled human freedom and
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dignity and education. Here now is Dr. B.F. Skinner as he met in
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session with his seminar at the Aslan Institute as some of you
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now are.
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I have been close with associated for
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over the years with programs for the
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movement that have inspired
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and excellent article by George Larry. A lot of other not excellent
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has not been
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very bad programs and market craziness and
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so on and so on and the public have
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gotten to dismiss the whole thing as somehow or other relevant
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to putting across a simple
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but to be quite inadequate to broaden
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to include other NGs very well I've finally
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got around after the hour and a lot more
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numbers that are a ride or answer some of those witnesses.
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And you want to go. I gave the paper
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Harvard School of Education which is going to appear in a small
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book usually by the press doing papers by Caradhras Jerry
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Gruner peer in the night
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of the match.
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That and the teaching
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thinking through program instructor right.
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Yes thinking is not
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really good for the program. I'm less than a month ago a New Yorker gave
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birth and motivational aspect of the program structure in
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which I raised the question whether this is human whether it misses out
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strong personal element. So on. And
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to take the burden for
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what you really shouldn't need to do with respect
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to programming. And whether or not
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to educate. You know here
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that a lot of close contact with people
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I'm all for that. For the tutorial situation in this part of Owens our
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Bible replaced today with a need to read your mail and then
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do it today your doubts and so on. We certainly
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can't solve this problem with the ordinary face to face
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teaching and I want to read one
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danger one lives here with people that
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you know apply these techniques on a broad scale the individual I like to
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do that somehow because I want to raise
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the question as to whether a. Program
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instructing or how much broader operant conditioning.
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Can deal with the individuality of the story.
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Our zine deal with that. Numbers do
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this quite an it often rare connection where
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so-called creativity creativity is supposed to be something to assess
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for everyone. When the usual them are right you are standing people
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and the question is are there others reprogramming that Erica.
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My pleasure satisfied or predictive
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power I don't like to put it that way. The creative
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student I recognise isn't going to be dull and his creative that here
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students do the Haven creative work and we want to know why.
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But to explain it by saying it's because they possess creativity
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that that's a no. And we can move beyond that.
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We are sorry where students they hated individual
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original creative work and you have to find real cause
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rather than fancy dinner causes. If we want to
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make the kinds of substantial changes they won't produce the same cause we're
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here. Now you may say but this 100 percent here
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I have created here you mean behavior that doesn't have any cards. What do you
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mean you're going to find the objective because well that is
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true if you really know that there is behavior which has no
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empathy which is truly original. Then this
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formulation wrong hope that the question arises whether the attorneys are
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here and I think another way of putting the graph on
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this program except of our deterministic or scientists.
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There is nothing in the scientific view of man. The question on
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individuality everyone is an absolutely you
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me carbonate product combination of
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multiple sources of genetic and environmental. Every one of us
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here is genetic. The place for
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you is our fingerprints or find out that individuality. But
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every part of our body as unique as our pain your brain
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and we have this unique content.
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As America where great talent
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environmentally were all our different family
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backgrounds different backgrounds governmental economic There are.
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No nothing about the march Terminus conception of
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the car we're the notion of individuality
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and the problem really is to see whether we can design a teaching
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technique that will further an individuality
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that's very different from nourishing something called creativity
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creativity or originality presupposes something from our start.
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Inside the organ that individuality
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recognizes that control or there's outside genetic and
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environmental recognizes. There are lots of them. There are unique
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combination of these both which reduces and the
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other one. Now what time do we want. We certainly
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don't want people simply to be different
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or unusual. A nightmare is just
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creative. As a painter we want more not
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the psychotic as a creative person. Sometimes we don't
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necessarily want more psychotic. How do we decide on the
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kind of individuality we want to foster I
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think we have to appeal here to the notion of cultural evolution
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and the model which seems more useful for many years actually
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biological The natural to.
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The evolution of species you have on the one great stability
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in that it material much reproduces and with a
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great There was a village but the baby would get
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nowhere if there were not element
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of individuality and these come from without their invitation rather
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brought about by external environment or factors of one kind or.
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Another I want to tell you our cultural practices. You have
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the same kind of thing. There are very the strong need
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for stability. We must speak the same language must change too fast
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so that we can communicate and must have certain rules of conduct
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certain governmental and whatnot and it's important that we
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maintain against at least two rapid tracks but
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the court would get nowhere or simply settled for stability. There
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must be a novelty introduced somewhere. And in
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this case we are ahead of the geneticist at all he's beginning to talk
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about deliberately producing certain kinds of mutations and
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changing the germ plasm. We can already do that in the Cultural Revolution. We can
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literally change practice. And those are the mutations which will then
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be selected as a culture was wrong or at least
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in terms of practice work or not. Well we have
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we don't this is not a very good value to go by but we have a valuable
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survival guide. We have culturally
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range in order to survive and attempt to reduce change which
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will make that more likely one of the things certain I would support and
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that people being in the middle as they can be in
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turning up what are essentially called the new play which will then contribute
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to the eventual strength of the
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parallel theme for me good enough for all our current revolutions remarking
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with biological level of many different workers. Now
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let's look at actual techniques.
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Control you never in the education elsewhere and see what can
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be done about Margaret Sanger
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that the individuality of the student most likely to emerge is most likely to
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do things which are different from a lot of people do. And
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yet again most likely contributed to the culture.
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When the press played where are controlled by other people there are reasons
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why religion's government forces control
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religion and government usually work through adversity and draw our rules and
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violate economics were true to
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persuasion paper doing this other thing. You
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operate your cell on the right power
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or controls and can be an arm as you it was me that
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education should accept one of its goals. Making
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people aware of the extent to which they are drawn by other people. And.
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Teaching them how to resist their role that education itself is involved.
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It's important to manage students in a governmental science and sport and there
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are other ways in which the educators want to play to have attempted control Now
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any person who is being controlled by others by institutions or
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by other person as an individual. Him not himself an
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individual so we have to look at this very closely. How can you
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limit the extent to which people are controlled by other people. So either they
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will be free to
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education in addition to using of residence and drop
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students around them. That's another problem you
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have to get the student in a particular way so that they
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need to be reinforced. This is a problem. For instance what I think you
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do something you got it for you doing
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you just can't sit around waiting for something build up
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special repertoire which enabled us to get the student to behave in a
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given sort of force Britain example or simply telling them what to do
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given instruction or given directions 24 hours or something
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happens and you then learn for example that. Struck you know how to
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operate a piece of equipment. You first of all operated by the power in the structure and
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the work and that teaches you how to operate and even forget the directions and
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operate in the equipment without that of the verbal control which was there in prison
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and we do that when we do not it when we tell them what to
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do. We even the words To reach of these feet given time and so
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on. Eventually we want that support to be drawn and
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that's to become not dependent on people as groups our
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health. Kind of think about this.
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People who are corrupted by other people but that nature made everyone good. We want
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to get students independent of people and have them
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think and you're doing that for example if you have a child that's been
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in the school in the morning and you every morning there's a hurry up now it's time.
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I will wait for you have now it's time for the women. Sure but you was
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making dependent on the clock rather than on your
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person and free to do their very difficult to withdraw are
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your verbal drawer and bring him under the control of either
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an internal.
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Or sometimes only because of our time on this floor or the clock on the
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wall. But it has to be done eventually or remains dependent on another
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person. Our dependence on things can be quite rig
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rigid unit doesn't mean it's going to be an individual as soon as you watch the clock. But
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things where things change right. People do not. People can
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perpetuate their own kind on the except if you can make
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students dependent on things rather than on other people you are maximizing the
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chance that they will be influenced by changes in the physical environment which
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will be indeed now the student producing all primed for now.
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One of the things the preachers do is to build up an imitator repertoire. We teach not only to
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imitate us to speak the words we seek to do it that way by we way
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via bias or on and then we do we continue this dancing
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teacher that fills up all the doors and the repertoire steps and you can show you a new
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dance by doing it and you do the same thing before you go if you know the steps and so
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on that can become very powerful. So we go around imitating
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people in the little time I've been embarrassed by this myself. Terrible
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imitative to see someone come in and sit down and try to talk to me and the
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four other reporters are in them forward and
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then you're all there. And before I know I
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talked to a professor from Cambridge University only five
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being a very efficient price
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for originality.
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Being like other people I was very important to have that in the
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repertoire in the beginning. People that take you a
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long time just
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reinforcement but the whole art of
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vanishing gravel another support program and you're right
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hard work very clever technique
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for withdrawing the support we put in the first place
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so that they are then the. Thing
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for people and people that teach further
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education and help me understand the art of getting that here
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you're there in the first place and then withdrawing our
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instructional support leaving the student dependent on the world at large is already
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facing up to this problem and it and I'm sure that we
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have techniques available now for our
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repertoire of behavior of another without having
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any reason you will drop from teacher to interfere
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with the possibility that the student will now respond novel features
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of the environment. But there are a few things.
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What about this what about the knowledge we impart whatever the skills we
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are as you know we sign books to
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be read to be listened to get examined and when they can they've been
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read and listened to and so on. And the dollar.
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Live your own education. It is that the students would understand
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perfectly what he's taught or more or a little book.
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The rule book on how to read a book incest the birth during the
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reader is to understand exactly what the authors.
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Get together in a group and back to work.
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Man let's get going much too far
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and I don't think there's any reason to understand things perfectly.
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And you'll be a lot more original if you don't you know
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educational as it is constructed now are we set. Perfect
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understanding is the goal for that we say right because we don't teach
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people don't really understand.
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And yes there have been times in history and education is extremely powerful and
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limited to a pure notebook retard writer and the
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result was very far from create for all of you.
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The behavior you had imparted to a stick and isn't now just what somebody else
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has said in the past or done in the first in the case of CEOs and it was so well
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that there was no chance for it to transfer in this situation and I would be united hard
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to make this case that I would be in for deliberate
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design instructional techniques that don't quite work.
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Don't put things across too clearly or to well I think that
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you can get across what is useful in the past. You can transmit
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body of culture without transmitting it in a rather rigid form which is
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represented by a book. And have the pursuers
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large numbers of students who would be most likely. Now with this in their
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possession to deal with new situations as they arise. Because if you
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never get to behavior. Defiant
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to specifically under the control of certain scenes it won't generalize on France for
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other situations. So rather than these two points and I
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might summarize as far as I do occasion must teach. In
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such a way that its own influence disappears as fast as possible and what
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it teaches should not be true
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rigidly tied down to specific patterns. This isn't
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going to make progress much originality. Even so. There aren't
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more deliberate ways of producing
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unusual crimes for hate. You can teach
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the techniques of discovery for example really wanting
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said Jane education discovery map and I know that elsewhere I
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think in general it's not correct. Think of
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discovery being taught properly and I don't think you need
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to imply to the steward and he doesn't need to learn what other people know
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that he can discover the whole sum and substance of human knowledge himself but
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it is really important to teach exploration curiosity and so
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on and curiosity again is not a trait not something like creativity.
[23:15 - 23:20]
That explains why people are curious. If you want people to curious you must
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reinforce him for looking things. Recently I had a friend who
[23:25 - 23:31]
got a new car. She was teaching the dog to fetch and she'd
[23:31 - 23:35]
throw something out and feel your job or run if you found anything that you didn't find them
[23:35 - 23:40]
right back and she wouldn't go out and get it. Never gave that
[23:40 - 23:45]
are a chance to discover that perhaps just turning their heads would turn out the size
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of the stick that she was for hours.
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As is true of children and less valid.
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If you explore without helping you never give them the
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chance to acquire the behaviors of looking you're looking for and
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and so on and really therefore making sure
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out of course we tend to punish curiosity. Than not.
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And reinforce for people working and so on and then we turn around
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and sisters that is not an appropriate face this
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part frowned and that your scientific research would be of this nature in you.
[24:32 - 24:37]
You can teach see things not feeling that tonight as I have done with it in this ride on
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teaching. Thank you but your family properly designing
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instructional materials build up a high level of curiosity and
[24:47 - 24:51]
dedicated search which will bring the
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individual maximally under the control of not all aspects
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of the environment which no one's ever responsible for and this is one of the great sources of the
[25:01 - 25:06]
forest. I'm individual of the novel the creativity
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in addition to that there are no special techniques that
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help people you use to produce you know I think there
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are some of them acquired. Simple if you're a short story writer and want a
[25:23 - 25:28]
new plot you can get a thing called plot on your screen some wheels has turned up a
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character national hero in an instant.
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You got a couple of these characters in this film and so on you've got a hell of a story and you're
[25:38 - 25:43]
going to break this and this is where are you going really. Plus you don't need. We also
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always get down on you and take standard I mean
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first the sex of the prince for characters or something like that you bet your life. The
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logicians in that magicians are always doing that as the first time somebody is I'd
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question one of your friends actually underbody Russia and all the other ones like
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no particular reading your question see what happens if you're Chinese
[26:07 - 26:12]
physicist who discovered in on paragraph four years each shake the genius of
[26:12 - 26:17]
divination system and you're like a bundle of sticks and for all and then the
[26:17 - 26:22]
pattern leads you to an encyclopedia and you look under that pattern and you're alive
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and that you were sentences. And some of them will be relevant somehow or
[26:27 - 26:32]
other that what you get. It works best of all you don't take it seriously.
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Which I'm sure to face to prison but there are ways of cooking
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are entirely original thing or just a random get as
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accidental as the atomic radiation will be introducing all of the
[26:46 - 26:51]
monsters financial that mutation is an
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accident. The drop of a bundle of sticks is an accident that it
[26:56 - 27:01]
produces in the first place an original species perhaps satin and original.
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There's something that I wanted to read you know these are only two
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little techniques exploration. Now all environments
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and the generation of now I dear reader only too
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many I can go under and I wonder as a question. What
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happens when. You know order to encourage a person to be
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an individual who would deliberately wait for original
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back paper and then reinforce.
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How we do it. Your glib relay or by active button
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that writes I want to raise with you is what the significance of a thing is scientifically
[27:45 - 27:50]
if I it just specifies some particular behavior on the part of the nervous
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system. I can make that up or wait for it to occur. The force of the never
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got the behavior that the old technique in animal trials. Karen what.
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But supposing now instead of specifying in advance.
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Behavior I'm going to reinforce I simply say it must be new that
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what happened. Well it turned up a
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little bit smaller and not very conclusive but interesting
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as has been done with the porpoises at sea life park
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and on the lower side of the loop and I was out there a couple weeks ago and
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cried my hard work was just to make sure I take that here.
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But let me tell you what I did this experiment to give you at
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Best Buy Pam. The redox.
[28:43 - 28:50]
This Friday part of our basic research
[28:50 - 28:54]
they don't want any more inland people come and say
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this is for a purpose there are mentally I was of
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our first and then we will back
[29:06 - 29:10]
flips and so on the moment and
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so on and coming through and
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it was an operant technique for the public
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to see that actually true. So every day
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hours and on top of the doing of
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the pigeon and I am
[29:34 - 29:40]
fine.