Pretty Disturbing Experiment

[Bra]

http://home.swbell.net/revscat/perilsOfObedience.html

Part of a class assignment. I think it's fascinating. Shared it with Spence already. We discussed whether or not we would throw the switch. We both said 'no', but then, we both conceded that it was pretty easy to say that when not in the situation. It's a good read if you have the time for it -- not terribly long.

[Spencinator]

http://home.swbell.net/revscat/perilsOfObedience.html

Part of a class assignment. I think it's fascinating. Shared it with Spence already. We discussed whether or not we would throw the switch. We both said 'no', but then, we both conceded that it was pretty easy to say that when not in the situation. It's a good read if you have the time for it -- not terribly long.

Not terribly, no.

[Dehan]

I've read something similar to this in high school. Pretty cruel but eh.

[Celipa]

I've already read about this experiment.

Nuts stuff. I can say with certainty that I don't bend blindly to authority.

I can't say with certainty what I'd do, only that I wouldn't laugh at administering pain. I'm very empathetic. Seeing someone else crying is one of the only ways to make me cry. If the mood around me is solemn, I'm solemn. If the mood around me is excited, I'm excited.

This is a particularly interesting experiment, though.

[Bardock]

This can be used to refute the phrase "a person is smart, people are dumb" argument. Although admittedly intelligence and morality are two different things, it's the "sheep mentality" stigma.

[Celipa]

The human body is naturally inclined to follow. Even small things like nerve reactions of other people, your body will mimic.

This might be more obvious to people who play in a band. The instrumental type, not the rock type. I play trombone, and if someone beside me makes a mistake, even though I know what they just did was wrong, my first reaction is to follow what they just did. Same with other people around you. If you're on a rest and bring up your instrument, many people around you will as well.

Your brain processes the actions of others and is prone to mimicking small impulses.

[Bojack]

Is this about the Milgram experiment, or something else? That's really fucking long, I'm not reading that...

[Bardock]

Two people are used for an experiment: the teacher and the learner. The learner is in on the experiment, and actually an actor. The learned is hooked up to an electric chair-like device. The teacher is told this exercise is a different experiment than what it actually is. It's explained to both of them that all of it is entirely voluntary. The person conducting the experiment instructs the teacher to read off word pairs to the learner, to which the learner must be able to match the pairs correctly from memory. When the learner gets it wrong, the teacher is told to push a button that sends volts of electricity into the chair. The voltage goes up for each continued wrong answer, up to a certain capacity. After a point, the learner begins to pretend like they're in pain, that they have a heart condition, and starts complaining to be let go (unbeknownst to the teacher, no electric shock is actually being used). The whole experiment is to determine if the teacher continues to push the button when told to do so, or if they refuse.

The theory was that people would stop after the learner starts complaining, but the majority would keep going, despite voicing reservations. It's a test of ingrained personal belief system against the power of obedience, with the belief obviously being that it's wrong to intentionally hurt another human being.

[Bojack]

Yeah, I learned about this over the summer. Pretty cool stuff, and I could say that I may have finished the whole series of voltage.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6GxIuljT3w