Someone has written me that she is doing well with the Shangri-La Diet by doing only crazy-spicing — adding random spices to everything. She’s not doing anything else — no oil, no sugar water, etc. My reaction is: Take that, B. F. Skinner!
In 1950, Skinner published a paper called “ Are Theories of Learning Necessary?” which revealed that he did not understand the value of theories. In 1977, he wrote a similar paper called “ Why I am not a Cognitive Psychologist,” which showed he still did not understand their value. In the later paper he wrote:
I am equally concerned with practical consequences. The appeal to cognitive states and processes is a diversion which could well be responsible for much of our failure to solve our problems.
The value of crazy spicing would never have been discovered without a theory. Without a theory, you’d never try it. It would never be discovered by accident.