I9I4.] BEHAVIORIST VIEWS IT." 3 



studies are to be approached from the point of view of adjustment 

 to environment; its categories are stimulus and response, heredity 

 and habit.^ Differentiation, however, is not to be understood as 

 separation; there is now no barrier between psychology and the 

 other " natural " sciences ; in the long run behavior will appear as a 

 matter of physical and chemical causation,*' while nevertheless, as 

 behavior, it is the subject-matter of the special science of psychology, 

 to be interpreted and arranged under the rubrics just mentioned. 

 The erection of this special science is both justified and made pos- 

 sible by the practical goal of behaviorism, which is the working out 

 of general and special methods for the control of behavior, the regu- 

 lation and control of evolution as a whole/ 



On the negative side, again, psychology is enjoined by the be- 

 haviorist to ignore, even if it does not deny, those modes of human 

 experience with which ordinary psychology is concerned, and in 

 particular to reject the psychological method of introspection. 

 " Consciousness in a psychological sense " may be dispensed with f 

 consciousness, in the sense of a tool or instrument with which all 

 men of science work, may be utilized by the new psychology without 

 scruple and without examination.^ Imagery, the " inner stronghold 

 of a psychology based on introspection," is denied outright; one of 

 Watson's "principal contentions" is "that there are no centrally 

 initiated processes. "^° And if consciousness may be dispensed with, 

 self-observation and the introspective reports that result from it are 

 to be treated in even more summary fashion ; they are to be " elimi- 

 nated."^^ There will be no real loss; for most of the essential prob- 

 lems with which psychology as an introspective science now con- 

 cerns itself are open to behaviorist treatment, and the residue may 

 " in all probability be phrased in such a way that refined methods in 

 behavior (which certainly must come) will lead to their solution."" 



^ A, 167, 177. 

 6^,173,177. 

 ''A, 158, 162, 168, 177. 

 8 A . 161, 163, 175, 176 f . 

 9.^,175,1/6. 



105,423. The statement is qualified in a footnote; I return to the point 

 later. 



" B, 428 ; A, 158, 163, 166, 170, 175. 

 12^,177; 5,428. 



