

Milgram experiment participant who refused to administer shocks - soundsop
http://www.jewishcurrents.org/2004-jan-dimow.htm

======
wallflower
What separates this from being an experiment vs. harrowing life experience?

Another Milgram study involved asking NYC subway passengers to give up their
seat. The interesting part is when Dr. Milgram participated:

"Dismissing his students' fears, Dr. Milgram set out to try it himself. But
when he approached his first seated passenger, he found himself frozen.

"The words seemed lodged in my trachea and would simply not emerge," he said
in the interview.

Retreating, he berated himself: 'What kind of craven coward are you?"

A few unsuccessful tries later, he managed to choke out a request.

"Taking the man's seat, I was overwhelmed by the need to behave in a way that
would justify my request," he said. "My head sank between my knees, and I
could feel my face blanching. I was not role-playing. I actually felt as if I
were going to perish."

<http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/14/nyregion/14subway.html>

------
miked
"In retrospect, I believe that my upbringing in a socialist-oriented family
steeped in a class struggle view of society taught me that authorities would
often have a different view of right and wrong than mine."

Well, it didn't make my father-in-law independent. He was a leader in the
fight against the Japanese, was shot and left for dead, but recovered thanks
to a brilliant doctor. As a reward, after the war he was appointed photography
editor of the PLA's offical newspaper. During the Cultural Revoultion, they
threw him into a reeducation camp for supposedly making a joke about Mao. I
wonder if the people who fed him his one egg a week cooked in used motor oil
had any trouble obeying orders? After all, most of them were raised in
"socialist-oriented families". What about the secret policemen in Cuba? What
about Mussolini, whose father was a member of the Communist Internationale and
whose famous son was first elected to parliment as a member fo the Socialist
Party? Was that enough of a "socialist-oriented family"? Or the Hilter Youth
of the National Socialist German Workers Party? The hangmen of the Ayatollah
Khomeini's "Islamic Socialism", stringing up a fresh batch of gays? Mugabe's
goons murdering political opponents in Zimbabwe? What about Danny Ortega's
goons murdering Moskito Indians in Nicarauga -- any trouble following orders
there? Saddam Hussain's Arab Ba'ath Socialist Party? Soviet soldiers starving
20 million Kulaks to death by withholding their grain and movement privileges
(hello Wlater Duranty and the New York Times!)? The Cambodian language teacher
turned Khmer Rouge prison director who meticulously corrected the confession
of an inmate while the guards in the next room poured gasoline into her vagina
and ignited it? Obiedient socialists all.

Speaking of social experiments, you don't often get a chance to control for
nearly all variables when comparing outcomes among large groups of people.
Compare East Germany to West, North Korea to South, Taiwan and Hong Kong
versus China on the amount of "obiedience to authority". Same culture,
language, history, geography, weather, genetics.

"This is not to say that membership in the Communist Party made me or anyone
else totally independent."

Oh, he's quite wrong there. One last bit of history that you've never heard
cuz it's just too darned trivial. A bit of background: Human feces is valuable
to Chinese peasents, as they often use it as fertilizer. During the Great Leap
Forward, my wife's cousin was found by the side of the road, several leaves in
his hand wrapped around something. Puzzled, they opened it up to see what was
inside. It was all he had left in the world. He was quite independent from
that point on, as he and 77 million other Chinese never needed anything from
anyone ever again.

Stalin once said that one death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.
But then, he and all the people who obeyed him would know, wouldn't they?

------
andreyf
This is more depressing than it looks like at first. His refusal to continue
was foremost due to a badly designed experiment. I have a feeling if the
Milgram experiment were done in a military or corporate setting in which
subjects weren't aware of participating in an experiment, the results would be
very different. Hell, even if you took undergraduates and "hired" them to man
the shock experiments for a professor who was grading them, you'd get
different results.

Too bad experimenting on people without telling them is illegal. Unless you do
it on a TV show... hm...

------
tptacek
Cool story, would have been more interesting if he had refused to continue
even without figuring out the ruse.

~~~
bootload
_"... Cool story, would have been more interesting if he had refused to
continue even without figuring out the ruse ..."_

How?

Is it _"cool"_ because you figured out the original poster is smart enough to
realise the _"Milgram experiment"_ is a higher order of intelligence test that
divides those who will really question assumptions and acts on them? (a
desirable hacker quality) Or _"coool"_ because you just realised it's the same
psychology used by every Tin-pot dictator, boss, person in charge to make
others do their bidding?

~~~
tptacek
That was shrill. No, it would be "cool" because the experiment was famously
set up to model real instances of authoritarian abuses. There was no ruse for
the Nazis to figure out.

~~~
bootload
_"... That was shrill ... the experiment was famously set up to model real
instances of authoritarian abuses .."_

Yes but for a reason. One of the (nasty) findings of the Milgram experiment
was that you don't have to be a _"Nazis"_ in order to obey orders. For me
there is nothing "cool" about blind obedience to Authority ~
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment#Results>

