What if you were being told this? You're participating in an experiment on learning. The "student" is in one room, an electrode attached to his arm. You were chosen at random to be the "teacher." Your job is to sit in an adjoining room, read off words, and have the student repeat them back. Each time the student misses a word, you administer an electric shock.
The shocks start at 15 volts and goes all the way up to 450 volts. There are a total of 30 settings, each in 15-volt increments, and each switches are labeled, from "slight shock" to "severe shock." The last two switches are labeled "XXX." For each word the student gets wrong, you must increase the voltage given. As you increase the voltage, the student's reaction to the shock becomes more and more disturbing- they complain, then beg, then scream for the experiment to stop.
The experimenter is sitting in the room with you. Although you are nervous, they urge you to continue. "Please continue." "The experiment require you to go on."
What would you do?
This was a real experiment. In response to the Holocaust, a scientist named Stanley Milgram decided to perform an experiment on obedience to authority. The "students" were really actors- only the "teachers" were being experimented on. So, what were the results?
No subject stopped the experiment before shocking the student with 300 volts. A total of 65% of the teachers went all the way to the 450-volt switch labeled "XXX." At this point, the student went silent, feigning death.
Obedience to authority is shockingly strong. It's a frightening concept. It's not even like the subjects continued gleefully- they shook, sweated, and acted anxious. They knew something was wrong, and they felt fearful. But they kept on going, just because someone told them to. We have to trust our own impulses on this to guide our actions. This experiment is a warning to everyone.
For more information on this experiment, please follow these links:
Report by Milgram: The Perils of Obedience
Ylerecnis,
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3 comments:
Sorry, Arrogantblogger. I accidentally deleted your comment (a mis-click). For your benefit, I'll quote you in the next comment I place. If you re-send it, I'll gladly publish it.
P.S. Full of $%#! or not, shouldn't we be careful about how we obey authority? I know it sounds cheesy to "hold onto our own beliefs," but what else is there to do? Should we just do what we're told?
Arrogantblogger said, "Isn't it so wonderful your full of..."
I did my best to quote this word-for-word. The spelling of "your" has been preserved, for instance.
I wish i had wrote that, i would not have wrote a cuss word on a school blog, so that would be where you are flawed. I believe that the last thing i posted talked about how people dont read your blogs because how long they are, but if thats how you saw it. Ok, i guess how you see it is the truth.
Lets try not to lie.
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