I think that the Standford prison experiment is a perfect example of the flip side of Milgram. It's the self fulfilling prophecy of people in power to believe they are right, correct, and even better than those that they 'control'. "I'm in power so I must be right which is why I'm in power and I should have been in power earlier because I am right and I'm going to remind all those people below me that I was always right"
I think the stereotype is a whining sycophant (Peter Lorre characters come to mind) who get even a whiff of power and lord it over others with an iron fist is a perfect example. Maybe that's another reason to listen to people in authority. The vague hope to one day be the authority and control others. "If I listen and be good, I'll be the one with the clipboard" And before people jump in and say Bush in response to my mention of people in power going crazy, I can point to the total debacle that Obama is making of the Middle East in response. Every president (from every party) thinks that they know better than others and can command them, even commanding the ruler (or whatever) of another country. Carter isn't even president anymore and he's still on that power trip. But the politics of the power of politics is another thread totally. -- Michael Dinowitz On Mon, Mar 22, 2010 at 3:49 PM, Larry C. Lyons <[email protected]> wrote: > > Still your argument doesn't exactly explain the results of the > Stanford Prison Experiment. > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment > > But I have to disagree. it provides a very good explanation of the > willing participation in the Holocaust, Rwanda, various riots etc. > > On Mon, Mar 22, 2010 at 3:05 PM, Judah McAuley <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> The fatal flaw with a lot of these studies is determining whether the >> subject *really* believed that they were going to cause serious harm >> and/or death to the other person. Killing someone is illegal therefore >> it is reasonable to believe that a game show (which will be shown on >> television) would not really kill someone. As a participant, you may >> not know or understand how the system is working, but the standard >> appeal to authority is that someone must know what is going on and >> they wouldn't really let you kill that other person, just like >> everyone knows that pro wrestling is staged but don't necessarily know >> how. It *looks* like they might kill each other hitting them over the >> head with a folding chair but everyone knows it is pretend because if >> it were real, it wouldn't be allowed. >> >> Judah ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:313727 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
