There was a thread entitled “Whatever became of B.F. Skinner?” posted in 2003 (http://www.straightdope.com/columns/030815.html). In it the Cecil states, “His insistence that internal mental states and processes didn’t exist because they couldn’t be measured was simplistic.”
Actually B.F. Skinner was a radical behavior analyst and did believe in internal mental behaviors. As Wikipedia defines radical behaviorism, “Radical: Skinnerian behaviorism; is considered radical since it expands behavioral principles to processes within the organism; in contrast to methodological behaviorism; not mechanistic or reductionist; hypothetical (mentalistic) internal states are not considered causes of behavior, phenomena must be observable at least to the individual experiencing them”
The author fails to point out the differences between methodological behaviorism and radical behaviorism.
The author also states, “For all Skinner’s insistence on science, his philosophical musings were unsupported by data.” Check out these websites for current research in the field: seab.envmed.rochester.edu/jaba/ and
seab.envmed.rochester.edu/jeab/. These are just two of the more well known publications. Also check out this document listing therapies that are empirically validated: home.comcast.net/~dave.combs/valther.pdf Notice how many of them say behavior therapy in the title. Many of the treatments for phobias, depression, autism, are based in the field of behavior analysis (the field that has grown out of B.F. Skinner’s work).
The author also fails to answer the question, how is Skinner reguarded today? Check out www.abainternational.org if you are interested in the field.