In the early 1960s, Yale psychology professor Stanley Milgram conducted a series of experiments that, in many people's minds, confirmed the worst fears about the relationship between fascism and modern democracy. As the name of his project suggested, Milgram was interested in "Obedience and Individual Responsibility." His goal was to determine just how pliable the average citizen might be in the face of a regime of power and authority. He set up a fairly simple experiment: Two people came to his lab, ostensibly to take part in a study on memory and learning. One of them was designated the "learner", the other the "teacher". The learner was put in a room and strapped into a chair, where an electrode was attached to his wrist. Meanwhile, the teacher was seated before a large machine called Shock Generator, Type ZLB. On the front of the machine was a series of switches designated, from left to right, "Slight Shock", "Moderate Shock", "Strong Shock", all the way to "Danger: Severe Shock,", and two final switches, simply but ominously labeled "XXX". The learned was then told that he would be asked to memorize lists of word pairs and that every time he made a mistake, the teacher would deliver a short, sharp shock of increasing intensity.
The experimental design was in fact an elaborate setup. The true subject was the "teacher," and the point of the experiment was not to test the effect of punishment on memory, but rather to see how far the average person would go in a situation in which he or she was asked to inflict pain on an innocent and protesting victim. The learner was a plant, and the shocks were faked.
The results were rather extraordinary. Despite the fact that the learner often gave clear evidence that he was in pain (screams of agony, complaints about his heart), the teacher continued to ask questions and administer shocks, often in the face of complete unresponsiveness on the part of the learner (who was actually an actor). Even Milgram himself was astonished: more than half of the residents of New Haven, Connecticut, appeared willing to electroshock a fellow citizen into unconsciousness, even to death, simply because a man in a white lab coat instructed them to do so.
-- Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter
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-- Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter
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