1. FRÅN NEW YORK TIMES
Man's Brain Child, April 18, 1965.
Among the famous secret documents of World War-II was a technical report known as the "Yellow Peril,"
because it came in a bright yellow cover — and included equations so abstruse only professional
mathematicians, and not all of them, could understand them. The author of the report was the late Norbert
Wiener of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who received his doctor's degree from Harvard at the
age of 18 and went on to become one of the most creative and widely read scientists of our times. Wiener
regarded his report with mixed emotions. As a leading mathematician, he was
proud of the fact that he had contributed to the design of computers. As a man with
a conscience, he voiced a deep concern about the social implications of what he
and his associates were doing. This double role accounts largely for the impact of
his first and in many ways most influential book, Cybernetics, which was originally
published in 1948 and has just been issued in a revised paperback editions.
Cybernetics is, among other things, an introduction to new scientific development. The title comes from
the Greek for "helmsman" (rorgängare, styrman) and refers not only to ship-steering devices and
other automatic machines, but also to living control devices built into the human
brain(kontrollkomponenter inbyggda i hjärnan) . In introducing this field he served as
unofficial spokesman for a highly original group of thinkers whose leaders included
fellow mathematicians John von Neumann of the Institute for Advanced Study in
Princeton and Claude Shannon of the Bell Telephone Laboratories; Johan Bigelow,
an engineer associated with von Neumann at the Institute; and Warren
McCulloch, a leading brain investigator at the University of Illinois Medical School.
Wiener coined the word nearly a generation ago to identify a new field that was just
beginning to take shape, the broad study of all control systems, artificial and
natural, manmade and begotten.
Revival of R. U. R., May 7, 1950.
Last Friday and yesterday the Dramashop of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology revived Karel
Capek's famous play R.U.R., which stands for Rossums' Universal Robots and which enriched every
language with the word "robot." There would be no reason for mentioning the revival here were it not for a
prologue written and spoken by Professor Norbert Wiener,
the mathematician who coined the word "cybernetics."… This is in essence exactly what Plato said, for it
means that humanity as a whole can be ruled by nothing less than men who span the whole of humanity…If
cybernetics is to be used for vain ostentation or to satisfy the lust of power, it can lead only to damnation. It
must be redound to some purpose which we recognize as righteous and which transcends all petty private
ambitions.
Mayo Scientists Use Electrodes on Brain, April 3, 1953

2. Patients' brains are "wired for sound" with hairlike electrodes sometimes left in place for several weeks in a
new technique reported at the Mayo Clinic today…The scientists said that through the depth recording and
electrical stimulation methods, new fields of investigation had been opened into: basic function of the human
brain, like memory thought, action, sight and smell.
At last week's meeting of the American Physiological Society in Chicago, Dr. José M.R. Delgado, a Yale
neurologist, rose to tell about his way of treating mental afflictions by implanting electrodes in the brain and
then turning on a feeble current. He has been developing this technique for the past five years. Dr. Delgado
implants from seven to forty electrodes in various sections of a monkey's brain. After recovery the monkey's
brain is stimulated through one electrode or a combination of electrodes. The effects are dramatic. A
ferocious monkey of
the macacus rhesus species become so tame that his face could be stroked. As soon as the current was turned
off he wanted to bite anyone near him.
Electric Technique for Mental Cases, April 11, 1953
At last week's meeting of the American Physiological Society in Chicago, Dr. José
M.R. Delgado, a
Yale neurologist, rose to tell about his way of treating mental afflictions by
implanting electrodes in the brain and then turning on a feeble current. He has been
developing this technique for the past five years.
Dr. Delgado implants from seven to forty electrodes in various sections of a monkey's brain. After recovery
the monkey's brain is stimulated through one electrode or a combination of electrodes. The effects are
dramatic. A ferocious monkey of the macacus rhesus species become so tame that his face could be stroked.
As soon as the current was turned off he wanted to bite anyone near him. This electrode technique
has been tried in a small way on human patients with encouraging results, but
many more months of clinical work must be done before neurologists will adopt it.
One reason is that the complete after-effects of the treatment are unknown.One
patient treated in a hospital had suffered for years from
severe pains that could be relieved only through drugs, and then only temporalay.
An electrical current passed through implanted electrodes destroyed a small area
of the frontal lobes of his brain. Immediate
relief followed. After his discharge from the hospital the man went back to work.The
ideas of implanting electrodes in the brain was first introduced successfully in
Switzerland, more than twenty-five years ago. Other medical scientists have used
variations of the method ever since. In Dr. Delgado's development of the technique,
the electrodes remain in the skull for long periods, even permanently
Pavlov's Dogs and Communist Brainwashers, May 9, 1954.
Through a monstrous misuse of famous psychological techniques the totalitarians seek to enslave the human
mind… The world became more conscious of the danger of systematized mental
coercion when the trials against the subversive old Bolsheviks took place in
Moscow in 1936 and 1937. It seemed nearly impossible to believe that these

3. oldguard Communists had suddenly changed into traitors. When one after another, every
one of the accused confessed and beat his breast, we at first thought that it was a great show of deception,
intended for the international stage, until gradually it dawned upon us that a much worse tragedy was being
enacted. Human beings were being systematically changed into puppets...It was this method that
Moscow's Chinese Communist allies used in the Korean war to "brainwash" Col.
Frank H. Schwable and other P.O.W.'s….
The fact that it is technically possible to bring the human mind into a condition of
enslavement and submission has tremendous political implications in what is going on at
this moment in the world of the totalitarians, their propaganda, and the "cold war." We
should also recognize, of course, that intervention into free thinking and free
mental development does not occur only on the other side of the Iron Curtain...If
man is unaware of new mental pressures threatening him in this aftermath of war,
he will become an easy and willing victim, howling with the wolves in the woods.
Surgeons to Work via 'Push Button', FEBRUARY 14, 1954
A procedure developed largely by Swedish investigators — the "stereotaxic technique" — for, exploring and
treating the deep recesses of the brain — will be the basis of the Mount Zion method…A mathematical
device, into which are fed the proper measurements, enables a surgeon to insert instrument with great
precision. The procedure was so painless that it generally was used under only a local anesthetic... The new
"aiming" technique, called stereotaxis, was perfected so that a surgeon might hit a "target area" in the brain
without making a large incision and needlessly involving healthy tissue…Dr. Feinstein returned late last year
from the University of Lund, Sweden, where he spent almost two years with Dr. Lars Leksell, famous
neurosurgeon to whom is credited the development of the new form of "mathematical surgery."… In all
these procedures, the physicians said, It is important to emphasize that the patient remains conscious and
yet free from pain.
Device Suggested To Err Like Brain, March 24, 1955
Dr. McColloch is studying at M.I.T. the possibilities of direct electronic
communication with the human brain… The suggestion was made here yesterday afternoon at a
symposium of Design of Machines to Simulate the Behavior ofthe Human Brain. The
symposium, at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, was apart of the annual conference of the Institute of Radio
Engineers.The essential limitation of modern brain-simulating mechanisms is that they can give only
correct answers, Dr. Schmitt said.Observing that the human brain had no such limitation,
Dr. Schmittsaid it was necessary for a person to make "forced decisions" to havean
answer always and to be able to act quickly and certainly just as ifthe answer were
always correct…
Electrical Brain, April 7, 1955

4. "Push-button" living rats that run and stop under the control of an electric current are being used in brain
research at the University of Washington. A weak electric current, passed through an electrode imbedded in
a specific area of the brain causes a rat to start running in a methodical fashion. As soon as the current is
shut off, the animal stops automatically.
Device Appears to have Memory; Conditioned Like Pavlov's Dogs, September 5, 1955
An electromechanical apparatus that apparently "learns" by experience and also forgets has been shown to
visitors at this year's meetings of the British Association for the Advancement of Science here. It is one of
the many models of parts of the living brain built by Dr. W. Grey Walter, a British neurologist, who directs
experimenentation at the Burden Institute near Bristol…The educable machine is called Cora, or
Conditioned Reflex Analogue, because like the famous conditioned dogs of the
Russian physiologist, Pavlov, it responds to an association of ideas or stimuli by a
process of apparent anticipation…By other circuits, including feed-back or self-regulating control,
the reflex model exhibits many individual characteristics usually considered to be confined to the process of
thought.
Radio Waves' Use In Surgery Noted, February 4, 1956
The use of radio waves to destroy selectively portions of the human brain in a manner that in some ways
may be superior to the use of the surgeon's knife was described here yesterday.
…This gently and selectively destroys brain tissue around the electrode while
leaving surrounding tissues unchanged…Some types of brain tumours can best be
removed by destroying them in place and then pumping them out. And recent
surgical relief for a degenerative condition that causes profound muscle tremor in
the aged (Parkinsonism) involves selective destruction of brain tissues.
Mr. Aronow said that the new radio frequency power technique was held by some surgeons to be
advantageous because it might offer precise control of the volume of brain tissue to be destroyed, and
precise control of the site in the brain where tissue was to be destroyed...And he emphasized that operations
to destroy brain tissues, while often simple to
do, were very radical operations. The new radio frequency techniques is experimental, he said.
Brain Research by Soviet Cited, 13.4.1958
Soviet advances in brain research and the possible advent of pharmachological warfare were cited last night
by an eminent psychologist in a plea for a greater American effort to penetrate the secrets of the mind. Dr.
Leonard Carmichael, secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, said those who love
freedom cannot view without concern the possibility that brain changes may be induced by new means….He
took issue with those who asserted that Soviet Union lagged behind the West in the
behavioral sciences…In many respects of brain research, the Soviet Union led the
world. Dr. Carmichael anticipated the possibility of a "dramatic breakthrough in brain study" and the
development of novel methods for altering human behavior. He expressed the fear that such techniques
might be used to make people submit to authoriatarian control...He declared that the possibility of
pharmachological warfare necessitating pharmachological counter-measures was

5. to be taken seriously...Dr. Carmichael warned that the free world could not afford to disregard the
long-range integrated program of brain research now being carried forward in the Soviet Union by a large,
competent and hard-working staff…He emphasized the use of modern conditioned-reflex techniques, new
electronic recording devices and the effect of pharmaceutical products on higher nervous activity.
Automatic Analysis of Brain's Signals Aids Mental Study, 20.9.1958
The automatic analysis of the electrical signals produced by the human brain is enhancing medical
understanding of psychiatric disorders, it was said here yesterday. And such analysis reportedly may aid
aneasthesis for surgery…He explained. Physicians at Mayo Clinic originally made use of the relation
between brain waves and depth of anesthesia to automatically regulate anesthesia, Mr. Slocombe said. He
demonstrated a modified version of the Mayo machine in which the depth of anesthesia of the patient - as
indicated by the brain waves - is continuously indicated. Mr. Slocombe expressed the view that a machine
could be devised to keep a patient anesthetized to the level where the brain's electrical signals were of the
desired form.
Current's to Brain Produce Changes in Social Behavior, Aug 12, 1959.
The social behavior of humans and animals can be drastically influenced by electrical stimulation of the
brain a researcher said yesterday...He said his tests would, at first seem to support the distasteful conclusion
that motion, emotion and behavior can be directed by electrical forces and that animals and humans can be
controlled like robots. This assumption must be qualified, he said.
Talking Machine Won't Be Tricked, December 29, 1959
Devices are also being developed that can teach themselves without human intervention. They will soon be
making decision at speeds and through steps of reasoning beyond the reach of human minds. These
developments, with their prospects for good and evil, were discussed at the annual meeting of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science being held
here. The situation was foreseen where the nation, under threat of war, could surrender
its destiny to a device whose decision would "win" the war but destory the country.
Current's To Brain Produce Changes In Social Behavior, August 12, 1959
The social behavior of humans and animals can be drastically influenced by electrical stimulation of the
brain a researcher said yesterday...Dr. Jose M.R. Delgado, Associate Professor of Physiology at the Yale
University School of Medicine, said painless charges
to the human brain had evoked such feelings as fear, friendliness and recall of long-forgotten
events. The patients were mentally ill or epileptic. In the tests on monkeys and cats, there
were definite changes in eating and sleeping, fighting and playing and sexual
responses, he said.Dr. Delgado spoke at a meeting of the International Congress of
Physiological Sciences in Buenos Aires. He said his tests would, at first seem to
support the distasteful conclusion that motion, emotion and behavior can be directed by

6. electrical forces and that animals and humans can be controlled like robots. This
assumption must be qualified, he said.
Proton New Tool in Brain Surgery, 17.10 1961
TUMOUR MADE TO SHRINK - Parkinson's Disease Is Also Treated With a Beam of Nuclear Particles
An international gathering of neurosurgeons heard today how radiation was being
used to perform bloodless operations on the brain and to map the functions of the
human brain...Medical researchers from Cambridge, Mass., and Stockholm, Sweden, described the
successful use of proton beams on brains to treat persons suffering with tumors, Parkinson's disease and
schizophrenia. Dr. Raymond Kjellberg a neurosurgeon at the Massachusetts General Hospital reported
today the first application of this proton-beam technique for treating a deep-seated brain tumour...Dr. Lars
Leksell of Serafimerlasarettet, a hospital in Stockholm described how the proton-beam technique had been
used for successful treatment of a small group of patients suffering with psychic disorders and Parkinson's
disease. As an example, he told of a 44 year old women who had been progressively incapacitated by a right-
side tremor from Parkinson's disease. The woman was subjected in the proton beam
treatment, with the protons aimed at the thalamus, a deep-scated collection of
nerve cells inside the brain, which controls body movements. After thirteen days,
Dr. Leksell reported, the tremor disappeared with complete recovery of function and
without side effects.
Technological Decisions Ignore Human Factors, Admiral Rickover Says, November 20, 1964
Vice Adm. Hyman G. Rickover said tonight that both governmental and private organizations
were disregarding human considerations in making technological decisions.Too often, he declared,
technological decisions are being made on the basis of shortrange, private interests
with no regard for the
interests of others or the possibilities of harmful, long-range side effects. The methods of
science, he said, require the rigorous exclusion of the human factor. But technology
cannot claim the authority of science,
and what is done with technology must be subject in the traditional concepts of
ethics and morals, he said.
Admiral Rickover spoke before a symposium on Cybernetics and Society being held in
connection with the 175th anniversary celebration of Georgetown University. The
two-day symposium is considering the
social and psychological implications of the new science of cybernetics, which
deals with computer control of human or machine activities. He said there must be
a recognition that technology is a product of human effort, a product serving no other
purpose than to benefit man — man in general, not merely some man. Neither public
opinion nor the low, he said, has caught up with the new destructive potential of technology
which is why perpetrators of technological damage often as not escape with impunity.
Technology, Admiral Rickover said, is not an irrepressible force of nature to which we
must meckly submit. It is, he said, nothing but the artifacts fashioned by modern man to
increase his powers

7. of mind and body....Marvelous as they are, we must not let ourselves be ever awed by these
artifacts, he said, They certainly do not dictate how we should use them nor by their mere
existence do they authorize actions that were not anteriorly lawful.
Sociologist Warns on'Big-Brotherism', April 14, 1966
In a benevolent, scientific disguise, the age of big-brotherism is fast approaching
with possibly disastrous consequences only dimly regcognized by researchers and
the public, a mental health meeting here was told today. Apparently in the interests
of social welfare and scientific knowledge, an ugly alliance may be developing between
legal electronic surveillance, scientific research and Government dossiers, according to Dr.
Orville G. Brim Jr., a prominent sociologist who is president of the Russell Sage
Foundation of New York. Dr. Brim participated in one of several sessions on surveillance, testing and
the right of privacy …At the various sessions, behavioral scientists from different fields agreed
independently to the growth of psychological tests, electronic surveillance and social research presented
dangers.
'Matador' With A Radio Stops Wired Bull, May 17, 1965 - Modified Behavior in Animals
Subject of Brain Study - By John. A. Osmundsen
Afternoon sunlight poured over the high wooden barriers into the ring as the brave bull bore down on the
unarmed "matador" - a scientist who had never faced a fighting bull...But the charging animal's horns never
reached the man behind the heavy red cape. Moments before that could happen, Dr. Jose M.R.Delgado the
scientist, pressed a button on a small radio transmitter in his hand and
the bull braked to a halt…The experiment conducted last year in Cordova, Spain, by Dr.
Delgado of Yale Universitys School of Medicine, was probably the most spectacular
demonstration ever performed of
the deliberate modification of animal behavior through external control of the brain.
Dr. Delgado was trying to find out what makes brave bulls brave - just as other of
his experiments have aimed at finding the biological basis for emotions, personality
and behavior in man and other animals through electrical stimulation of their brains.
He has been working in this field for more than 15 years…I do believe, he said in a
recent lecture, that an understanding of the biological bases of social and antisocial
behavior and of mental activities, which for the first time in history can now be explored in
a conscious brain, may be of decisive importance in the search for intelligent solutions to
some of our present anxieties, frustrations and conflicts. Dr. Delgado said in an interview
recently that he was particularly concerned with what he called the gap between our
understanding of the atom and our understanding of the mind. .. We are in a precarious
race, he said, between the acquisition of many megatons of destructive power and the
development of intelligent human beings who will make intelligent use of the formidable
forces at our disposal… Dr. Delgado's contention that brain research has reached a
stage of refinement where it can contribute to the solution of some of these

8. problems is basic he said, on many of his own experiments. These have shown, he
explained, that functions traditionally related to the psyche, such as friendliness, pleasure
or verbal expression, can be induced, modified and inhibited by direct electrical stimulation
of the brain.
Monkeys Rejects Its Young On Radio's Order Test Explores Ways to Aid Mentally Ill
By ROBERT REINHOLD - MARCH 22, 1967
Female monkeys, normally among the most protective of mothers, can be ordered by radio to reject their
young. Dr. José M.R. Delgado of Yale's School of Medicine told a convention of electronic engineers here
yesterday. The Spanish-born neuro-physiologist said he had conducted experiments in
which a rhesus
monkey coddling her infant son had responded to a 10-second radio signal by
thrusting off her son, adopting an offensive attitude and biting herself as she
wheeled angrily around her cage...The mother lost all interest in the infant monkey
for more than 15 minutes before the effect of the radiosignal wore off and she took
the little monkey back in her arms...The scientist described how fine wires were implanted in the
mother's brain to
carry the electrical signal...The wires were inserted in the mesencephalon of mid-brain, which controls the
maternal instinct. Dr. Delgado's objective is not to manipulate, but to explore the physical and chemical
basis of emotion and thought and also to develop new ways to treat the mentally ill. Such techniques have
already been applied to humans - in calming violent mental patients and in treating epilepties.
OBSERVER: PASS YOUR MIND,PLEASE
By RUSSELL BAKER - Sept. 2, 1967
Dr. David Krech, a University of California psychologist, suggests in possibility that
knowledge and memory may some day be transferred from brain to brain by
injection. The doctor is depressed by the prospect. He
apparently forces it as the final insult to individual integrity. And yet, if applied
sanely, with restraint, what a boon it could be. The same thing is said, of course,
about nuclear fission, which may explain why the news of each scientific advance,
including the possibility of memory transfer, terrifies us. Why has science become
Dr. Frankenstein? Because application of its boons is rarely planned until possibility becomes actuality, and
then it is too late to save it from commercial or military exploitation. If there is a possibility of memory-
knowledge transfer, now is the time to set regulations specifying how it may and may not be used.
PUSH-BUTTON PEOPLE? – Politisk ledare den 10 april 1967:
There are disquieting implications in the experiments on control of human beings
and animals that Professor José M.R. Delgado of Yale Medical School has
successfully conducted. His latest feat has been to demonstrate that by implanting
electrodes in a female monkey's brain he can make it reject its own child on radio
command. Two years, ago he revealed that he had been able to stop a charging
bull in mid-course and make it amble obediently away in response to the same type
of electronic stimulation. It is the possibility of similar control over human beings that causes
concern. Several years ago Dr. Delgado told a scientific meeting that

9. experiments with patients suffering from epilepsy or emotional illness seems to support the distasteful
conclusion that motion, emotion, and behavior can be directed by electrical forces and that
humans
can be controlled like robots by push buttons. It is indeed a "distasteful conclusion" despite Dr.
Delgado's assurance that electrical stimulation cannot change the basic characteristics of the
experimental subject...Dr. Delgado and his colleagues are pursuing these researches
to learn more about the brain, how it functions, and how its disorders can be
alleviated or cured. But it is quite conceivable that in some countries
investigations may be under way into the possibility of using these techniques to control human beings.
Presumably there is still a long way to go before Dr. Delgado's accomplishments with monkeys can
be successfully transferred to humans. But the mere existence of such a possibility is disturbing, and
certainly merits wider public discussion and greater attention than it has received up to now.
SCIENTIST SAYS CONTROL OF INTELLIGENCE IS POSSIBLE - Psychologist Says Level of the
Brain Can Be Raised By HAROLD M. SCHMECK Jr., April 3, 1968
Within 5 to 10 years, science will be able to exercise a "significant degree of control" over human
intellectual capacity, a psychologist predicted today...He said society should start thinking about this
possibility before it is too late. I foresee the time when we shall have the means and therefore,
inevitably, the temptation to manipulate the behavior and the intellectual functioning of all
people through environmental and biochemical manipulation of the brain, said Dr. David
Krech, professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley...Testifying
at a Senate sub-committee hearing, the scientist said this kind of control had
already been demonstrated in animal experiments...He said a class of chemicals
had been identified that can improve the memory and the problem-solving ability of
laboratory animals. Some of these drugs, he said, can raise a hereditarily stupid
animal up to the performance level of brighter animals of
the same species...Another class of drugs can prevent the permanent storing of
memories. The best known of these is puronycin, an anti-biotic that is not used
medically. In other words, these drugs, when injected in the animal permit it to put in an
efficent day's work, although the animal is prevented from building up a permanent body of
experiences, memories, expectations and abilities, Dr. Krech said...For if later
research should show that our animal data were applicable to man, and if in the meantime
we had failed to prepare ourselves for that eventuality, then we might find it too late to
institute effective, carefully thought through and humane controls. He testified before the
Government Research Subcommitee of the Senate Government Operations
Committee. The subcommittee, under the chairmanship of Senator Fred R. Harris,
Democrat of Oklahoma, is considering legislation to set up national commission on
health science and society...To me, in any event, it is clear that some of the possible
outcomes of our present brain research can raise problems surpassingly strange in their
novelty, bafflingly complex and of serious social importance, Dr. Krech said.
BRAIN WAVE – Politisk ledare den 19.9. 1970
If the late George Orwell were writing a sequel to "1984" today, he would probably

10. reject as archaic the propaganda techniques for controlling people's minds described
in his famous anti-utopian classic. Today, for example, he might envisage a society in
which a newborn baby's first experience would be neurosurgery, an operation in which
the child's brain was fitted with miniaturized radio devices connected to every major
center controlling reason and emotion.
Children in such a society might be raised as flesh and blood electrical toys, whose
ideas and behavior were directed by computer signals. An aberrant or heretical ideas
would be transmitted to the computer, which would be programed to take appropriate
action to restore control...If this is still fantasy, it is not so fantastic as it was before Dr.
Jose
M.R. Delgado of Yale reported his latest work. By fitting radio requirement into a
chimpanzee's
brain, he has developed a technique which permits a computer to make a specific
change in the
test animal's brain waves...That represents at least a first step down the road
toward the
nightmare vision of a brain-controlled population. Over the past decade Dr. Delgado
has
reported using electrical stimulation to stop a charging bull, to make a female
monkey reject
her children and to perform other similar feats. Dr. Delgado himself some years ago
said that
experimental evidence seems to support the distasteful conclusion that motion, emotion
and behavior can be directed by electrical forces and that humans can be controlled
like robots by push-buttons. Dr. Delgado's work is aimed at finding new techniques to
help those stricken with mental illness, epilepsy and such afflictions, not to create
some future super-totalitarian state. Fortunately,
human ignorance about the brain remains so vast that there is no imminent
prospect that the
techniques being worked on at Yale could have Orwellian significance. Nevertheless, the
horrifying prospect rises that in the 21st century the lexicographers may have to drop
the verb "to brainwash" and replace it with "to brainwave".
VILKEN SORTS MÄNNISKOR VILL VI SKAPA? av Maggie Scarf -15.11.1970
Vi skall tala om kärlek, krig och hat, inleder professor José M.R. Delgado vid Yale universitets
medicinska fakultet. Men vi skall granska dessa yttringar från ett nytt perspektiv: från insidan av den
tänkande hjärnan. Vad pågår där, vad sker i nervcellerna under tiden vi talar, när vi agerar och då vi
upplever? Vi har ett nytt sätt att studera beteendet, en helt ny metod som vi utvecklat, fortsätter han med en
låg röst som är full av löften som från en förkunnare… Det handlar om elektrisk stimulering av
hjärnan. Delgado är en av de ledande pionjärerna av den utvecklingen. Han är
också den passionerade profeten av ett nytt ”psykociviliserat” samhälle vars
medborgare influerar och förändrar sina egna mentala funktioner för att skapa en

11. lyckligare, mindre destruktiv och bättre balanserad människa… Den mänskliga rasen, säger han,
står vid en evolutionär vändpunkt. Vi är mycket nära den makt som ger oss möjlighet att
konstruera våra egna mentala funktioner, genom kunskapen om generna och de cerebrala
mekanismer som skapar våra beteenden. Frågan är vilken sorts människa som skulle vara
den ideala skapelsen?...Människan utnyttjade en gång i tiden sin intelligens för att uppnå
ekologisk frihet, för att inte behöva bli våt när det regnade, kall när solen försvann, eller
dödas när rovdjuren var hungriga. Men människan kan uppnå mental frihet likaså. Genom
att förstå hjärnan kan den själv forma sina egna strukturer och funktioner på ett intelligent
sätt. Det utgör den mest betydelsefulla kunskapen för mänsklighetens framtid… Jag tror vi
nu står vid tröskeln till att förstå dem. Vi måste göra det – och snart – ifall den brännande
kapplöpningen mellan atomkaos och intelligenta hjärnor skall kunna vinnas… Situationen för
mänskligheten är inte annorlunda än den för dinosaurierna, som levde här på jorden för 30
miljoner år sedan. De hade mycket lite av intelligens men 40 ton av kött och ben. När
miljön började förändras hade de inte tillräckligt med klokhet för att förstå sin situation och
anpassa sig. Deras öde – utplåning. Vi har också utvecklat onormala muskler och ben:
raketer, vapen och biologisk krigföring. Våra hjärnor är inte ordentligt utvecklade, men de
måste bli det om inte vårt öde skall bli detsamma.
In Behaviorist's Ideal State,Control Replaces Liberty – 3 September, 1971
Traditional concepts of individual freedom and dignity have made an immeasurable contribution, but
they've served their purpose, the rangy, cheerful, 67-year-old Harvard University professor asserted during
a conversation… Dr. Skinner argues that contrary to prevailing wisdom, individual men and women are
incapable of controlling their own behavior through free will, that their behavior is an inevitable product of
external influences. Having thereby disposed of "autonomous man," Dr. Skinner goes on to say that the
only way to control behavior is to manipulate the environmental influences that regulate it...So he proposes
widespread application of a developing "technology of behavior," in which the actions of individuals
would be controlled… Dr. Skinner, on the other hand, believes it will be possible to
engineer a behavioral control system in such a way that the leaders of society
would be brought under the same controls as the people.
N EW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW –3.9.1971
"There is just no gainsaying
the profoundimportance of
B.F. SKINNER'S new book,
BEYOND FREEDOM AND DIGNITY.

12. If you plan to read only one book this year,
this is probably the one you should
choose."
From the New York Times review by Christopher Lehmann-Haupt
The new book by the great behaviorist, author also of Walden Two, who
is the most
influential (and controversial) living psychologist, is just published. It
has already, through
the shock and force of its ideas, stirred nationwide debate.
Dr. Skinner questions the ideals western man holds most sacred. He
proposes to
substitute — as the only possible solution to the deepening crisis in our
civilization — a
"technology of behavior" making full use of scientific capabilitis to alter the
environment
and man himself.
The Time cover story (Skinner's Utopia: Panacea or Path to Hell?) the
extensive
editorials and articles in the New York Times (Is Freedom Obsolete?), the
Washington
Star (He calls for an end to autonomous man), the Washington Post, The
Atlantic, the
Christian Science Monitor, as well as the cover story and condensation
in Psychology
Today, all bear witness to an event of the first importance. His book is
one of the most

13. important happenings in 20th century psychology (Science News) as it
challenges, equally,
the liberal, conservative, and radical concepts of man's nature and
man's future.
Already in its 4th printing $ 6.95
BEYOND FREEDOM AND DIGNITY, NYT Book Review, 24.10.1971
The Skinner who appears in this book is different from the evengetistic author of
Walden Two. Where once he fantasized about a world controlled by social science,
now he attacks the unscientific fantasies of others; the fantasy that people possess
the right to freedom from society, or that mankind has an innate dignity which
transcends the way society makes man behave… This dissonance in Skinner's
thinking becomes amplified when he tries to explain the ethical purpose of behavior
conditioning. He tells us that the "technology of behavior" is of itself morally neutral;
a saint or a devil could employ it equally well. Speaking, as it were, ex machina, he
indicates a few purposes to which he personally would like to see the techniques
put… Science — modern, up-to-date, hard science — stands ready to support him. In
the process Skinner, who has some harsh words for "pre-scientific" writers, mis-
represents the character of modern scientific work. The unforgivable failing of this
book is that it is incurious about the nature of society and has little to say about
social life, though it proclaims a world of entirely socializable human beings..Indeed
a concepton of human dignity as simple-minded as Skinner's will never provide the
insights that might stimulate a society to encourage more dignified behavior in its
citizens.
ARTIFICIAL BRAIN, 10.2.1972
Electrodes planted deep withing the brain stem area, where commands from
the cortex are normally integrated, could evoke movements of the head, foreleg,
hindquarters and muscles of the face...Higher levels of behavior, including attack,
withdrawal, sitting, standing, preening and eating food, could also be elicited.
Curbs on Biomedical Tests on Humans Proposed by Panels at Minority Parley – 9 jan 1976
Draft recommendations including the barring of all biomedical research in prisons and on children
and the mentally infirm, were made today by panels of the first National Minority Conference on
Human Experimentation… Among these was a feeling of urgent need for safe guards of the rights and
medical well-being of research subjects. Another theme was the view that minority groups were consistently
exploited in research. The minority groups cited in this regard were not only ethnic but also such
groups as the poor and the mentally infirm. A third theme was an expression the need for a permanent
national body to see that justice is done to research subjects in all institutions were there is human
experimentation…We don't want to kill science, said M. Carl Holman, President of the National
Urban Coalition, but we don't want science to kill, mangle and abuse us.

14. Behavior Tests for C.I.A. Disclosed by Denver University, Sept. 7, 1977
The chancellor of the University of Denver said today that the school participated in
mind control experiments sponsored by the Central Intelligence Agency 20 years
ago… Maurice Mitchell said he received a letter from the agency on Aug. 12,
informing him that from 1954 to 1957 Alden B. Sears,
then a graduate student at the university, conducted the experiments under a grant
from the Geschikter Foundation for Medical Research, a C.I.A. front… He said that
under the grant's provisions, Mr.
Sears, who may not have known that the experiments were connected to the
C.I.A., was to perform three types of hypnosis and mind control studies. One
experiment, involved testing whether a person could be brainwashed and
"programmed" to do something at a later date.
The New York Times, August 20, 1998.
A terrorist whispering into his phone doesn't realize that his words get transmitted
to a ground station, become
amplified and disappear into space where they are captured by the antennas on
N.S.A. satellites...