Copacabana

Cynicism or fatalism -- and is one worse than the other?

So, here's something -- In my research methods class last night we were discussing the Milgram Experiments. You know, the ones conducted after WWII to try to determine how ordinary people could have taken part in something as horrifying as the Holocaust -- and not just ordinary people but, dare I say, good people. People who worked with children and invalids and the disabled and animals, etc., etc. ...

These experiments are the ones where a volunteer is duped into believing they are administering electric shocks to a "grandpa with a heart condition" in the other room when he fails to respond correctly to questions being asked. These volunteers don't realize, of course, that no shocks are being administered and the wailing and banging on the walls coming from the other room is coming from a confederate. They are told what a lethal shock is and are encouraged by the researcher sitting behind them in a white lab coat to complete the experiment despite the "pain" they are inflicting. It was all to study people's obedience to authority.

But here's the thing I find really interesting -- learned academics estimated the results before the experiment and decided 1 out of every 1000 participants might administer fatal schock levels. They were shocked (groan) -- as was Milgram himself -- when 2/3 of the participants went there, as it were. And they went there all over the world as these experiements were replicated. So, this is a human condition, not a German human condition (although the number willing to adminster the fatal shocks was higher there than anywhere else. ahem.)

So my immediate question is -- what's the denial about our brutal human nature all about? I don't believe I would have estimated low (although there's a chance this is simply the benefit of hindsight). It does not surprise me that people are sheep and justify their behavior because "so and so told me to do it!"

But then, I'm a cynic. This might strike some as a bad thing to be. But I guarantee I would never have administered the fatal shock just because some joker in a white lab coat, conducting an experiment that I volunteered for, tells me I have to.

I'll take cynicism every time.


On a lighter note, Ennui and I are taking a train out Gainesville tonight and heading to D.C.
Ennui wants to get a feel for train travel as she'll likely be visiting home (New York) via train from D.C., and she also kinda likes the "never traveled by train before" adventure thing. I just hate to fly.

posted by Lola @ 11:41 AM