o doubt you have heard of Stanley Milgram's experiment from 1963 that “was intended to measure the willingness of a participant to do someting may conflict with the participant's personal conscience.” He assigned roles of teachers and learners to unknowing participants. “The ”teacher“ is then told that the voltage is to be raised by 15 volts after each mistake.
[On the right a picture of his original shock machine.] In reality, there are no shocks being given to the actor – the actor is merely acting. At ”300 volts“ the actor bangs on the wall separating him from the subject. If, however, the subject indicates his desire to halt the experiment he is given a succession of verbal prods by the experimenter, such as: ”The experiment requires that you continue. Please go on.“ At 315 volts the actor bangs on the wall again and after that there is no further response from him and he stops giving answers to the memory questions [...]
Thomas Blass...has collected results from repeats of the experiment done at various times since, in the US and elsewhere, and found that the percentage of participants who are prepared to inflict fatal voltages remains remarkably constant, between 61% and 66%, regardless of time or location.” [Wikipedia]
As the long shadow of Abu Ghraib and “Gitmo” is cast across the land, this experiment is receiving renewed interest. British artist Rid Rickinson and others did a theatrical version of the experiments, and subsequently turned it into a [non-theatrical] film. They set the event--seeming more a performance piece than a traditional theatrical work--in a surprisingly, obsessively detailed reconstruction of the space.
Their site contains a host of fascinating documentation both about their piece and about Milgram's original work.
Comments