There are... for us no instinctsโwe no longer need the term in psychology. Everything we have been in the habit of calling an 'instinct' today is a result largely of trainingโbelonging to man's learned behavior.
John B. WatsonThe behaviorist advances the view that what the psychologists have hitherto called thought is in short nothing but talking to ourselves.
John B. WatsonNo one knows just how the idea of a soul or the supernatural started... It probably had its origin in the general laziness of mankind.
John B. WatsonThe first aim of a good college is not to teach books, but the meaning and purpose of life. Hard study and the learning of books are only a means to this end. We develop power and courage and determination and we go out to achieve Truth, Wisdom and Justice. If we do not come to this, the cost of schooling is wasted.
John B. WatsonMen are built, not born.... Give me the baby, and I'll make it climb and use its hands in constructing buildings of stone or wood.... I'll make it a thief, a gunman or a dope fiend. The possibilities of shaping in any direction are almost endless.
John B. WatsonPsychology, as the behaviorist views it, is a purely objective, experimental branch of natural science which needs introspection as little as do the sciences of chemistry and physics.... The position is taken here that the behavior of man and the behavior of animals must be considered in the same plane.
John B. Watson