walden2

4/26/2001

     After reading all of B.F. Skinner's Walden Two, and rereading significant portions of it, I have decided to choose the second issue possible for this assignment: I will discuss how the Utopian community that Skinner creates in this novel relates to his views on learning and schedules of reinforcement. In this text, "the textbook" will refer to Learning and Behavior by Paul Chance; "lecture" will refer to class sessions given by the excellent Professor Alan Silberberg for Behavior Principles PSYCH-200G during the spring semester of 2001. Also, references to the community created by T. E. Frazier in the story of Walden Two will be done under the term "Walden" with respect to the woman that Professor Burris spoke to on page 204 of Walden Two because, "Like many of the members, she omitted the 'Two'" (Skinner 204).
     The premise of Walden Two is that T.E. Frazier has created an egalitarian utopia by the same name as the novel. The utopian community is intended to be an experiment in scientific engineering, designed by Frazier, that will improve the way of life for its members. The community accepts members who are willing to adopt their way of life. One major requirement of their way of life is the observance of "the Code" which lays out the basis of their behavior and egalitarianism.
     The book is told from the point of view of Professor Burris. Burris becomes aware of the existence of Walden when one of his former students, Rogers (Rodge) came to visit him in his office with his friend Steve Jamnik. Rodge and Steve were soldiers returning from World War II and had read about Frazier's society in a magazine. As it turned out, Burris had gone to school with Frazier and had heard of his ideas for this society, but did not know they had been realized. The three of them get so excited by the possible implications of the society that they agree to go to meet Frazier at Walden during an upcoming break from school. On the trip, Burris brings a colleague, Professor Castle, who works in the Humanities, and Rodge and Steve each bring their girlfriends: Barbara and Mary respectively. Castle is a skeptic and constantly trying to find holes in Frazier's design and success, but in doing so he instead becomes Frazier dramatic foil by allowing Frazier to defend and develop the explanation of the quality and power of Walden. Steve and Mary are examples of how Walden grows as they are sold on Frazier's presentation of the society and become members before the others return to the world at large.
     Through the course of the book, Burris finds that the design of Walden is that of a within-subject experiment, also known as a single-case or single-subject experiment design, as discussed on page 50 of the textbook. In this experimental design, the population of Walden is the subject. It was observed before treatment as part of the world at large - members of the American society living their lives. New experimental plans and designs are then presented to them, observed and analyzed, and improved upon from there. This is Frazier's scientific method.
     The method is also powerfully based in positive and negative reinforcement. Positive reinforcement is when "a response is followed by the appearance of, or an increase in the intensity of, a stimulus" (Chance 137). In other words, a desired response is followed by a reinforcing stimulus. Negative reinforcement is when "a response is strengthened by the removal, or a decrease in the intensity of, a stimulus" (Chance 138). Frazier, however, seems to lump the two together when he says,

     Now...if it's in our power to create any of the situations which a person likes or to
     remove any of the situations he doesn't like, we can control his behavior. When he
     behaves as we want him to behave, we simply create a situation he likes, or remove one
     he doesn't like. As a result, the probability that he will behave that way again goes up,
     which is what we want. Technically, it's called 'positive reinforcement'" (Skinner 244).

Therefore, in the remainder of this text "positive reinforcement" will refer to Frazier's definition which is equal to a combination of Chance's positive and negative reinforcements.
     Skinner seems to renounce the idea of punishment as Frazier casts off all possibility of using punishment in Walden. Frazier does not believe in the idea that punishment can be at all effective in reducing the possibility of a behavior. "That simply doesn't hold. It has been established beyond question" (Skinner 244). The textbook indicates that Skinner proved as much himself in 1938, at least when a punisher's intensity is not strong enough. (Chance 194). When Castle injects that, as undesirable as it is, punishment is effective,( as Chance says briefly on page 202 of the textbook) Frazier responds, "It's temporarily effective" (Skinner 244). But, that, he says, is the worst of it because it could keep the punisher from realizing the futility of his method. When Castle insists that the offender would not repeat his offense if you punish him severely enough, Frazier explain that, "He'll still tend to repeat it. He'll still want to repeat it" (Skinner 245). Punishment will not have altered the potential behavior, but, says Frazier, "That's the tremendous power of positive reinforcement - there's no restraint and no revolt. By a careful design, we control not the final behavior, but the inclination to behave - the motives, the desires, the wishes" (Skinner 246-247). This is an exercise of the Law of Effect as defined in lecture on February 12: Behavior is governed by its consequences. If consequences are positive, you tend to repeat the behavior. If not, you don't.
      Frazier is able to use positive reinforcement in this way to create a cultural design that he deems beneficial to the society without treading on characteristics of a tyrant or despot because he "'can achieve a sort of control under which the controlled, though they are following a code much more scrupulously than was ever the case under the old system, nevertheless feel free. They are doing what they want to do, not what they are forced to do" (Skinner 246). It is clear that Frazier whole-heartedly believes this. At one point he says to Burris, in reference to the members of Walden, "I love them" and then, "What is love...except another name for the use of positive reinforcement?" (Skinner 282).
      Operant conditioning is a center-piece of Walden. According to the textbook, "This is what operant learning is all about: An organism acts on its surroundings, and changes them, and is changed in turn by these changes produced. Each shapes the other" (Chance 217). One example of this can be seen in the events surrounding the Walden tea service. The members had built the facility so that the place from which they drew their tea was a walking distance, and climb of stairs, from the place where they liked to drink their tea. In doing so, they had acted on their surroundings. In response to this, they changed the way the carried their tea. "'Cups and saucers were immediately discarded by our young domestic engineers'" Frazier explained to Burris and Castle. "'It's practically impossible to carry a full cup of tea without spilling, especially down the stairs of the Ladder'" (Skinner 26). So, as the surroundings acted on the organisms, they changed in ways that Burris observed when he "saw that the girls were carrying tall glasses, set in braided grass jackets, to which loops of string were attached so that the glasses could be carried like pails. They also carried squarish dishes containing bread and butter" (Skinner 25-26). Here we see that the organisms acted on their surroundings, the surroundings caused new conditions for the organisms, so that they organisms acted again, in a new way, in response to the surroundings. The textbook indicates that Skinner parallels in operant learning what Darwin said about evolution: "B.F. Skinner often suggested that in operant procedures the environment selects behavior in much the same way that the environment selects species characteristics" (Chance 217). Frazier refers to my example of this as "a nice little job of domestic engineering" (Skinner 25).
     There is another example of this evolutionary effect on behavior. Skinner, in 1983, said that human beings had become hostages to the surroundings they had evolved in.

      He notes that humans evolved in a world in which salt and sugar were not readily
      available. Those individuals who had a natural preference for these foods were more
      likely to get the sodium and calories needed for survival. We have, as a consequence,
      evolved into a species with strong preferences for both salty and sweet foods.
      (Chance 18)

But, our world has changed and foods full of salt and sugar are now easily obtained in industrial societies. In response, humans consume salt and sugar in such abundances that they often endanger or damage their health. Burris and Castle find this effect in Walden in a way that is quite difficult for them to believe. On one day of particularly nice weather at Walden, they observed that many of the indoor areas were occupied. When the inquired with Frazier as to why these people were not enjoying the outdoors, he responded that they have no reason to - due to their short work hours and lack of parental responsibilities, they could go outside leisurely whenever they wanted to. So, on a nice day such as this they were not starved for the opportunity to get outside. Not yet understanding the principle, Burris asked why the people had not at least congregated into crowds. Frazier responded that crowds were useless and harmful, and only existed in the world at large in response to loneliness. He used the example of a housewife:

      How does the average housewife spend most of her day? Alone! Whom does she see?
      Tradespeople, or her younger children, or two or three neighbors - not two or three
      friends, just two or three people who happen to be within reach. Is it surprising that
      she finds the noise and bustle of a large crowd like food to a starving man?...But, why
      should anyone who isn't starved for friendship or affection enjoy a crowd? (Skinner 35)

The group, though, was able to come up with some reasons why: to meet interesting people or to view a show or lecture. Frazier however insisted that large crowds were indeed hindrances to these purposes. By way of direct responses, he said that it was more effective to gather in small groups to meet specifically interesting people and that shows or lectures would be repeated the necessary number of times, due to the performers freedom of time, until all interested individuals had taken their fill by attending in small groups.
     Walden seems to be a combination of the types of mating ratios discussed in lecture on April 12. The actual mating is monoganistic - that is, there is one male and one female engaged in the process of conceiving babies. But, that lecture indicated that monogamy also involved mate assistance and mate guarding. In Walden, though, these activities were done with many different adult males and females, ideally not even including the parents. This challenges the ideas of sociobiology as discussed in lecture on April 9. In that lecture, it was said that the body is a structure supporting reproduction and behavior is aimed towards the spreading and preservation of genes. It was said that that preserving behavior would cause us to act more protectively towards those closely related to us, as musk oxen herds do, and less protectively towards those that are loosely related to us, as herds of wildebeests do. When Frazier was questioned about whether the group child care at Walden weakens the bonds between parents and children, he responded, "It does. By design. We have to attenuate the child-parent relation...Group care is better than parental care" (Skinner 131). This would go in direct opposition that idea, advanced in that lecture, that sociobiology could cause racism by causing a person to dislike people that, due to different skin color, are clearly not of their genetic heritage; Frazier is advancing the idea that having adults care for children with the definite knowledge that those children are not of their genetic heritage is indeed the optimal plan.
      That lecture on the 9th of April also proposed that the sociobiological structure of the body as an instrument whose ultimate purpose is to reproduce, causes women to be coy and, more importantly to this point, men to be philanderers. The following lecture, on April 12, said that this tendency was so prevalent as to necessitate the biological phenomenon of sperm competition. Walden, however, does not place normal social safeguards against promiscuity. When he is interrogated about the possibility of encouraging promiscuity, he responds, "On the contrary, we are perpetuating loyalty and affection" (Skinner 129). He goes on, "The simple fact is, there's no more promiscuity in Walden Two than in society at large. There's probably less" (Skinner 129). He claims that Walden had solved the promiscuity problem that lecture had attributed to sociobiology through the practice of "free affection," which he describes as a sort of sexless version of "free love." "That goes a long way towards satisfying the needs which lead to promiscuity elsewhere" (Skinner 129-130).
      Skinner's depiction of this egalitarian version of human society largely avoids many of the scientific techniques he had researched the effects of on animals. There is no significant mention of shaping as discussed on pages 147-148 of the textbook or chaining as discussed on pages 150-151 of the textbook. He also makes no use of his theories of superstition (page 241 of textbook), gambling due to variable ratio schedules of reinforcement (page 374 of textbook), or conditioned suppression that are also known as phobias (page 108 of textbook). Also, on pages 226-228 he advances six techniques of self-control. Though he tacitly accepts three, distraction, monitoring behavior and informing others of your goals, he strongly casts off the other three: physical restraint, distancing, and deprivation and satiation. These, I believe, Frazier would say, are all against the principles of Walden. In addition to all of this, Skinner also has a theory on verbal behavior which is quite different from the traditional view that words are symbols for communicating ideas; and that ideas are therefore encoded in the form of words by one person who sends them to another person through a medium, such as speech or writing, who then decodes the message to understand it. Skinner rejects all of this and, "Instead, he proposed that to understand the nature of the spoken and written word, we must first recognize that they are forms of behavior. Moreover, he proposed that verbal behavior is not essentially different from any other behavior" (Chance 229). This would mean that verbal behavior, such as speech and written communication, is governed by the Law of Effect as discussed earlier. But, he neglected to make use of this in Walden Two.
      What Skinner does use are applications and effects of within-subject experimentation, positive reinforcement, and operant conditioning to create a utopian society. And, after several days of immersion in these conditions, Burris finds himself thinking,

      Now, fresh from my experiences at Walden Two, I saw that this [less than ideal
      way of the world] could not go on. But I also saw that educators themselves could
      not save the situation. The causes were too deep, too remote. They involved the whole
      structure of society. What was needed was a new conception of man, compatible with
      our scientific knowledge, which would lead to aphilosophy of education bearing some
      relation to educational practices. But to achieve this, education would have to abandon
      the technical limitations it had imposed upon itself and step forth into a broader sphere
      of human engineering. Nothing short of a complete revision of culture would
      suffice. (Skinner 294)

Burris thought this to himself as he began a multi-day trek by foot back to Walden. He was going to join Frazier's effort, Skinner's dream. There he had found that imperatively needed complete revision of culture.

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