Through many events in our history as a race, tragedies have occurred due to the extreme form of nationalism called ultra-nationalism. Many examples of this include the Rwandan genocide, the Bosnia genocide and the second world war, where over 55 million had died and the near extinction of a race also occurred. Many of the war criminals claimed that they were “simply following orders”. This is shown in Scott Milgram’s book obedience to authority and Veronica Roth’s movie Divergent, they both use example to prove this argument; one example would be the Milgram experiment; which involved a subject who would get shocked every time they got the answer wrong and the voltage of the shock would increase as the experiment progressed, and the teacher …show more content…
where there would be a teacher and a subject on two opposing sides of a wall. Whenever the subject made an incorrect answer, they would receive a shock, this experiment was rigged so that the subject would actually be shocked be rather made extremely convincing screams of pain and the subject was told to give the wrong answer to the teacher. When the voltage reached passed 200 v, the teacher would become more reluctant to go further with the experiment due to the pain that the subject was going through, but the teacher didn’t know that the test was rigged. After it got past 475 V, about 65% of the teachers would hold the switch to shock the subject under the pressure from the men in the white coats recording the experiment and in most cases were reluctant to press on the button by themselves. This experiment no only proves that many people will do dangerous and immoral things under the pressure of authority, but also supports the idea that many people would not commit these acts underneath their own free will due to human …show more content…
During many events in the movie, the idea that human nature gets in the way of society’s progress, shown through Jeanine’s remarks on human nature, for instance” it's an important ideal, but sometimes difficult to fulfill. It goes against our fundamental human nature. But that's exactly the weakness we need to overcome.”, and “The system removes the threat of anyone exercising their independent will. Divergent threaten that system.”. In these cases, Jeanine believes that human nature and morals are a weakness to the progress of society and is eliminated through the faction system where people are obliged to do what they are told. The second quote explains how divergents are a threat to the faction system with their ability to have free will. The factions system was set up in the movie to make sure that the Another example would be the initiation of the Dauntless initiation during the movie. During many scenarios, the initiates were put in positions that required them to hurt someone that cannot fend for themselves and is even exemplified when Four tells Tris during one of the simulations that “As a Dauntless soldier you have to follow orders you don't always agree with... She's an innocent... and I have to kill her. But I can never do it... unless I look away.” This quote from Four explains how the dauntless
The Milgram experiment was conducted in 1963 by Stanley Milgram in order to focus on the conflict between obedience to authority and to personal conscience. The experiment consisted of 40 males, aged between 20 and 50, and who’s jobs ranged from unskilled to professional. The roles of this experiment included a learner, teacher, and researcher. The participant was deemed the teacher and was in the same room as the researcher. The learner, who was also a paid actor, was put into the next room and strapped into an electric chair. The teacher administered a test to the learner, and for each question that was incorrect, the learner was to receive an electric shock by the teacher, increasing the level of shock each time. The shock generator ranged from
He conducted 18 different variations of the original experiment. When changing different variables the obedience percentage dropped significantly. These variations showed that when the “authority” figure was wearing some sort of uniform the obedience levels would rise but when the participants question their authority they percentage decreased. In other variations the learner and the teacher were placed in the same room so the teacher can experience the pain the learner was going through. In this variation the obedience fell too. Throughout all of the variations the percentage of participants administering the maximum 450 volts decreased significantly when different variables were added to the
People can change in a position of power from being normal to crazed. In the milgram experiment uses students from yale university were used to show a relation between position of power and being evil, the experiment showed that there was a relation. Saul Mcleod conveys through the article "THE MILGRAM EXPERIMENT" that people put in positions of power, are more likely to be cruel to the people they are in power of. The other experiment the stanford experiment was to see how many people would kill another person when instructed to someone of a higher stature. The article by Saul Mcleod shows how people are suseptable of murdering someone when another person is to blame. Both articles show that positions of power can make people do insane
Stanley Milgram’s obedience study is known as the most famous study ever conducted. Milgram, a psychologist at Yale University, conducted an experiment that focused on the conflict between personal conscience and compliance to command. This experiment was conducted in 1961, a year following the court case of Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem. Milgram formulated the study to answer the question “Could it be that Eichmann and his million accomplices in the Holocaust were just following orders? Could we call them all accomplices?” (Milgram, 1974). The investigation was to see whether Germans were specially obedient, under the circumstances, to dominant figures. This was a frequently said explanation for the Nazi killings in World War II.
The subjects of the experiment believed that they were taking part in a study on the relationship of learning and punishment. The subject would sit in a room and ask questions to an actor in another room, who was supposed to be another subject. In front of the questioner was a box that had a series of buttons labeled from 15 volts to 450 volts. The subject was told to shock the person every time they answered incorrectly, increasing the voltage each time. As the shocks got worse, the actor would make noise, bang on the wall, yell for help, etc. but the researcher would tell the subject to keep going. Milgrim found, contrary to many psychologists predictions, that sixty-five percent of the subjects delivered the shocks all the way up to 450 volts (Slater).
The Milgram Experiment is one of the most famous studies in psychology. It was carried out by Stanley Milgram, a psychologist from Yale University. The purpose of the experiment was to study how far people would go in obeying an instruction from an authority figure if it involved hurting another person. Milgram wanted to study whether Germans were more obedient to authority as this was what people believed was the main reason for Nazi killings in World War II. 40 males were chosen to participate in the study, and were paid $4.50 for attending. The experiment was carried out as follows:
Although no such experiment can be 100% conclusive, the Milgram experiments do shed considerable (and disturbing) light on the behavior of ordinary people in obedience of authority. They also explain, to a large extent, the seemingly perplexing behavior of many ordinary Germans during World War II and some American soldiers in Vietnam. (“Milgram,” Obedience to Authority..).
In 1984, after the trial of World War 2 criminal Adolph Eichmann, Stanley Milgram created an experiment where his starting hypothesis was to see if Germans had a character flaw which made them more obedient which correlated to the holocaust. He put an advertisement in the newspaper for volunteers for an educational experiment who would be paid on hour for $4.50. The experiment itself wasn’t real, but the participants didn’t know that it going in. The experiment was once they got into the “laboratory”, they picked from a hat and one would get “teacher” and the other “learner” but it is rigged so the participants will always get “teacher”. Jack William who is the experimenter takes the “learner” into a room to strap them into the shock machine while the “teacher” watches and at this time, the “teacher” is informed of the “learners” heart condition and Jack Williams pushes
A researcher, Stanley Milgram, wondered how far individuals would go in following commands. In 1974 he set up a series of experiments. Describe the research methods used, together with the findings.
Stanly’s experiment showed 65% of his participants administered a deadly voltage to another human being, with hesitation, but none the less still did it. Why? Because with all of their hesitation there was a man standing next to them telling them to and assuring them that it would not have any long term harm for the person on the receiving end. Blind obedience came from telling the subjects to continue, but trust was put onto Stanly when he assured the subject that no harm was being done.
At this point, the Teacher and Learner were separated into different rooms where they could communicate but not see each other. The Teacher was then given an electric shock from the electro-shock generator as a sample what the Learner would supposedly to receive during the experiment. After the Teacher was given a list of word pairs which he was to teach the Learner. The Teacher began by reading the list of word pairs to the learner. The teacher would then read the first word of each pair and read four possible answers. To respond the Learner would press a button to indicate their answer, if the answer was wrong the teacher would shock the Learner with the voltage increasing by 15-volts for each wrong answer, if correct the Teacher would read the next word pair. The subjects believed that for each wrong answer the Learner was receiving actual shocks. In reality, there were no shocks. After a series of wrong answers the Learner would start complaining about their heart, afterwards there would be no response from the Learner at all. Many people indicated their desire to stop the experiment and check on the learner at this point in the experiment. Some paused at 135 volts and began to question the purpose of the experiment, while most continued after being assured that they would not be held responsible. A few subjects even began to laugh nervously or exhibit other signs of extreme stress when they heard the screams of the
Stanley Milgram conducted one of the most controversial psychological experiments of all time: the Milgram Experiment. Milgram was born in a New York hospital to parents that immigrated from Germany. The Holocaust sparked his interest for most of his young life because as he stated, he should have been born into a “German-speaking Jewish community” and “died in a gas chamber.” Milgram soon realized that the only way the “inhumane policies” of the Holocaust could occur, was if a large amount of people “obeyed orders” (Romm, 2015). This influenced the hypothesis of the experiment. How much pain would someone be willing to inflict on another just because an authority figure urged them to do so? The experiment involved a teacher who would ask questions to a concealed learner and a shock system. If the learner answered incorrectly, he would receive a shock. Milgram conducted the experiment many times over the course of 2 years, but the most well-known trial included 65% of participants who were willing to continue until they reached the fatal shock of 450 volts (Romm, 2015). The results of his experiment were so shocking that many people called Milgram’s experiment “unethical.”
However, this experiment was all fake, the learner was also a person who knew what was going on just like how it was for the Asch Conformity, there were no real shocks they just gave fake screams to make it seem like it was real! The whole point was to test if the teacher would follow the directions and go all the way to 450 volts. Some people actually gave up because they couldn’t live with hurting an innocent person and some people went all the way to 450 volts. I remember watching this experiment in one of my high school classes I am still just as shocked as I was while watching the video.
Stanley Milgram, a famous social psychologist, and student of Solomon Asch, conducted a controversial experiment in 1961, investigating obedience to authority (1974). The experiment was held to see if a subject would do something an authority figure tells them, even if it conflicts with their personal beliefs and morals. He even once said, "The social psychology of this century reveals a major lesson: often it is not so much the kind of person a man is as the kind of situation in which he finds himself that determines how he will act (Cherry).” This essay will go over what Milgram’s intent was in this experiment and what it really did for society.
Discuss the Milgram Conformity Experiment, include ethical considerations, the strengths and weaknesses of the approach.