LETTERS

...But I also quoted Skinner as having said (3) that "all control is exerted by the environment," and that (4) of the programmer, as distinct from the programmed, "He will select goods or values which are important to him and arrange the kind of contingencies to which he can adapt" (my italics...

...The Senate hearings appear to have neither the desire nor the intention of ferreting out the truth...

...If the genetic factors have played only a token role in Skinner's analysis, "because they are very poorly understood," how can Skinner make any claim for them at all...

...Actually, apart from bare mention, the genetic factors play not a token role but no role at all in Beyond Freedom and Dignity...

...But credit and blame are given in one form or another, and that is part of the interchange between organism and environment that Skinner's thesis is all about...

...Spitz, from beginning to end, misreads Skinner's thesis...

...In the first place, the generalization is stated incorrectly for several reasons (and the conclusion is preposterous), but a most important point is that Skinner would never restrict the proposition to the "bulk" of mankind...

...For now, let it be said that Skinner has never dispensed with the notion of behavioral responsibility, which is, after all Mr...

...Widick ignores, that should be the real focal point of critical examination...

...At the very least, there is perhaps no better way for us to determine the "limits of social policy...

...As I read the transcripts of the press conferences from the Executive Council meeting in February, Meany never said he opposes better relations between the TUC and Common Market unions...

...Especially delightful is Joseph Bensman's characterization of the corporate management group...

...Spitz's labors, apparently his final conclusion...

...Spitz is devoted to providing a very traditional exposition of what philosophers and others have decided on that question...

...The point is made that, according to Skinner's belief that behavior is determined, we can give neither credit nor blame to either Skinner or Spitz for whatever they have done, for, "As Skinner would be the first to insist, both writer and reader are behaving only as they must...

...Each of the authors, avoiding the logophilia of the professional journalist, penetrates exactly to the heart of the matter...

...Mr...

...CURTIS S. LAUGHLIN 0 LETTERS...

...Both Epstein and Decter advance arguments which make a crucial omission—that of how intellectuals can relate to working-class Americans...

...What is the point...

...There is a world of difference between Spitz's statement and what Skinner is actually saying (as big a difference as if Darwin had suggested that the "bulk" of humanity had evolved through natural selection, but that some people were exempt from the process), and many of Spitz's following remarks should be considered accordingly...

...and so, it is not surprising that he falls far short in evaluating the conclusions to which Skinner comes...

...I explicitly noted (2) that Skinner applies this to all persons...

...A good part of the article by Mr...

...In any case, we are "held responsible" for our behavior by both the nonsocial as well as the social environment, and to the extent that certain kinds of contingencies for behavior prevail, we learn to behave responsibly...

...F. STEPHEN MCARTHUR B. J. WIDICK replies: Mr...

...The aim is simply to locate a scapegoat, preferably, if possible, President Nixon...

...As a social studies teacher in a vocational high school, I work every day with the young people who will eventually fill America's secretarial, trades, and factory positions...

...I doubt that Freiligrath would have applied his slogan to World War II, but I have little hesitation to assert that he would have invoked it for the war in Indochina, as it was invoked by the Internationalists during World War I when German militarists endeavored—not without success—to get working-class support for the war against Russian czarism...

...Spitz asks, "If, then, none of us is responsible for what we do and say, what is the point of writing, reading, reflecting upon or talking about this book" (Beyond Freedom and Dignity...

...One of the great poets of the period, Ferdinand Freiligrath, deeply moved by the impending doom of his Hungarian friends, warned, however, in a beautiful poem whose culminating lines were: "To beat Jellacic, beat your own Jellacic...

...and by the environmental circumstances...

...If intellectuals were sharing their ideas on a practical day-to-day level maybe we could take positivesteps forward in achieving the self and collective emancipation required of genuine socialism...

...To me, these intellectuals often constitute an isolated caste whose intellectual impact upon the masses of people is negligible...

...If the word "free" is no longer an essential component of some interunion relationships, and if, in deleting the word, certain European trade union movements help give legitimacy to what in fact are not trade unions but totalitarian instruments of forced labor, than it is a trend which deserves very strong denunciation by the free trade unions around the world...

...Widick's article I wonder if he would condemn or justify opposition to "new relationships" between what we know as free trade unions and the Spanish syndicates...

...It is the most concise and accurate description of my late uncle Sandy that I have ever read...

...How can they not choose yet be like him...

...After 27 pages of Mr...

...However, I wouldn't rule out a coalition of unions, irrespective of ideology, in a strike situation against a multinational corporation...

...Intellectuals can benefit from Eugene Debs's comment that he was reluctant to be a working-class "leader" because he was afraid if people had to be led to socialism, they could just as easily be led away from it...

...It is this "new trend," which Mr...

...0 Precedents Editor: Michael Harrington's fascinating report on his divergence of views on Vietnam with Max Shachtman (Spring 1973 issue) brings to my mind similar conflicts in the European Left more than a century ago...

...he is in absolutely no position to evaluate the evidence upon which Skinner's thesis is based (although, as if he were, he makes many derisive remarks about the scientific analysis of behavior...

...Quite so...

...After reading Mr...

...and the conclusions which are said to emerge from the proposal...

...In fact, there are few conclusions Mr...

...We behave as we must...

...Of those paragraphs throughout his article which refer to what Skinner is saying, there are very few which would not require substantial revision to bring them in line with Skinner's meaning...

...I shall continue in the future, as I have for 35 years, to argue for the concept and practice of free trade unionism, in all countries at all times, as the best form of organization for human dignity and freedom...

...What does it mean to "behave responsibly...

...Skinner's thesis is that the behavior of all people is determined by genetic factors (which have only played a token role in his analysis, because they are very poorly understood) and the environmental conditions under which behavior occurs...

...Spitz begins by asking a question which, in contrast to what we actually know about ourselves, has long been an intriguing one for Skinner: "What manner of men do we take ourselves and others to be...

...Who is responsible to whom, for what...

...What Meany did say, however, is that they [TUC] are engaged now in what I would callthe Moscow-London Labor Axis and we just don'tbuy it...

...Now, by wha ever system of logic Professor Cobb may wish to invoke, I ask him how (1) is compatible with (3), and (2) with (4...

...Thus an adequate answer to Mr...

...What he meant to say—and what I would have said to Shachtman, had I known of his prowar views on Vietnam—was simply this: Your job is at home...

...That's not free enough forme...

...One can criticize what a person is proposing as a thesis (or what one thinks is being proposed...

...They are forming a new federation inEurope, and they have, by majority vote...

...If they count, we need to know how they count, and in what way...

...In any case, historically, Skinner's thesis has never been taken seriously (so it is not "age-old"), and it is really only "currently fashionable" among some of those who engage in the scientific analysis of behavior...

...What is the "point" of anything...

...I admit the victory against GE strengthened the UE (once expelled from the CIO as a pro-Communist union) but I didn't then nor do now see this as "giving legitimacy to what in fact was not a trade union but a totalitarian instrument of forced labor...

...How can he both choose and be determined...

...unions) by insulting them in public, which he did in the presence of Vic Feathers, TUC leader, without giving them a chance to reply...

...If the programmer can select (choose) what he wants, in what sense is he like the programmed (the bulk of mankind), who must conform...

...deleted the word "free" from their federation be cause the Russians feel that there is a connotation to the word "free" that is offensive to them...

...Spitz gives us Skinner's position at the outset—one which he characterizes as an "age-old" and "currently fashionable" answer: "that the bulk [sic] of mankind is unable or unfit to be free," from which it follows that men should be divided "into superior and inferior orders...

...From this viewpoint, incidentally, have I objected for over a decade to George Meany's policy of viewing the AFL-CIO as an "arm of the United States government...

...Spitz's confusion, we come to his last paragraph...

...When Croat soldiers under the command of General Jellacic defeated the Hungarian rebellion against Hapsburg absolutism in 1849, democrats and other "left-wingers" of the time were eager to come to the assistance of the Hungarian revolutionaries...

...So this contention is disingenuous and self-defeating...

...Spitz states which are (or would be) Skinner's conclusions...

...I explicitly quoted Skinner as having said (1) that "a person's behavior is determined by a genetic endowment...

...I am struck by how little the dialogue of intellectuals effects and filters down to their lives...

...ADOLF STURMTHAL 0 Watergate Editor: Like many others I have long been bored and weary of the volumes of journalistic trivia concerning Watergate...

...q Reaching Workers Editor: As a regular reader of DISSENT, I have been following the debate over the "new conservatives" with a certain degree of scorn...

...My major thrust in DISSENT (Summer 1973) was that George Meany couldn't have any serious influence in debating the British Trade Union Congress about policy (they are as free as U.S...

...LETTERS On Skinner Editor: David Spitz has clearly researched B. F. Skinner, if making reference to some of his writings is a reflection of that, but it is equally clear that he has simply missed Skinner's point all along the way...

...I like the precedent set in the U.S.A...

...If intellectuals who want to see significant change come about, really want to see their ideas discussed and debated, they are going to have to leave their sanctuaries at least part of the time and enter the arena of the workaday world in the factories, mines, businesses, and schools where most of us spend the bulk of our lives...

...McArthur can calm down...

...The discussion could become quite lengthy...

...Spitz would have to be exceedingly lengthy, but, perhaps not so arbitrarily, I may sample the beginning and end of his article "The Higher Reaches of the Lower Orders" (DISSENT, Spring 1973...

...To say so is inconsistent with the record...

...EDWARD S. COBB DAVID SPITZ replies: Like his master, Professor Cobb dismisses criticism on the alleged ground that it misunderstands Skinner's teaching, then repeats the very errors that criticism exposed...

...by George Meany, among others, when AFL unions—the UAW and the UE—joined in coalition-bargaining against GE in the big strike a couple of years ago...

...Den Jellacic zu schlagen, schlag Deinen Jellacic...

...RICHARD G. TAYLOR q LETTERS "Free" Unions Editor: B. J. Widick, in his article "New Trends in the Unions," criticizes George Meany for denouncing "the British trade union movement for seeking to establish better relations with the unions of the Common Market countries, in an effort to make the voice of British unionism more powerful as England enters the EEC...

...Well, I guess that's a question for philosophers to toss around...

...Finally, what is the "nonsocial environment" that holds us "responsible," and how does it, how can it, do so...

...the factual evidence upon which the proposal is based...

...Accordingly I wish to express my appreciation of the three articles in the summer issue of DissENT...

...That is where you have to fight your battles, especially when the struggle against foreign oppressors threatens to bring you into an unholy alliance with your own or other governments in an unjust war...