Walden Two

Synopsis

Walden Two is a utopian novel written by behavioral psychologist B. F. Skinner, first published in 1948. At that time, it was considered as science fiction since science-based methods for altering human behavior were not widespread. Such methods are now known as applied behavior analysis. In this book B. F. Skinner is essentially putting forward his ideas as applied to practical everyday and communal problems, for instance how to raise children, balance work and life, or help people have happy and meaningful lives. The book is controversial because its characters speak of a rejection of free will, including a rejection of the proposition that human behavior is controlled by a non-corporeal entity, such as a spirit or a soul. It embraces the proposition that the behavior of organisms, including humans, is determined by environmental variables, and that systematically altering environmental variables can generate a sociocultural system that very closely approximates utopia.

Text license: CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source

Details

Type

Book

Release date

January 1, 1948

Genres

utopian literature, science fiction

Created by

B.F. Skinner