What do you make of Skinner's comment about free will?
- I am not surprised by a behaviorist's take on free will being illusion or fiction as he puts it. It makes sense given his studies/experiments on operant conditioning and external motivators especially since his experiments have more or less proven his theory/take on free will to be true. He states, on gambling, We don't say that the human subject gambles to punish himself, as the audience might say, or gambles because he feels excited to do so. Nothing of the sort. People gamble because of the schedule of reinforcement that follows. In part, he is not wrong that stimuli/reward affects human behavior, but this limits humans and takes away various nuances and other motivating factors.

What is the role of the teacher in the behaviorist scheme?
-In behaviorism, teachers can apply positive or negative reinforcement to yield intended outcomes for students. Positive reinforcement can entail rewards or incentives to strengthen desired behaviors. For example, a teacher can praise students for completing their homework, give them a sticker for raising their hands, or reward them with extra recess time for being cooperative. Negative reinforcement can actually be positive in the sense that teachers can remove negative stimuli such as removing additional homework for a student who performs well on a test, for example. Punishment would involve negative consequences to discourage unwanted behaviors. Teachers can take away privileges, such as recess, for talking out of turn.



Nature or nurture?
-The behaviorists fall squarely on the nurture side as the emphasis is on the environment in which the child was raised. The idea is just like animals, in their experiments, can be conditioned toward a desired behavior, so can humans. As we know now, it is not an either/or factor, but an and as both play an important factor in one's personality and traits. Genetics, as well as our environment, shape who we are and how we respond to the world at large.

What are the dangers and uses of intelligence tests?
-Well, there is a historical link with IQ tests and racial bias that cannot be ignored. One only needs to look at the Eugenics Society surveys and this idea of feeblemindedness which was feared to be hereditary (see: https://via.library.depaul.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1270&context=law-review). On a positive note, IQ tests do well to measure working memory. However, we have come a long way to measure intelligence and what IQ tests cannot measure are a myriad number of things such as: interpersonal skills, self-discipline, teamwork, problem-solving, creative thinking, etc. IQ tests really only focus on rote learning and rote memorization.