The Psychology of Suicide Bombers

[John Dailey]

~ Re the fictionalized made-for-tv version, The 10th Level, I had caught it back then, and must say that Shatner WAS at his non-ham best playing a 'Milgram' type. Travolta I never noticed (but, wasn't a Welcome Back Kotter fan, anyway), and contrary to Wiki's implication, Stephen Macht played the main protagonist/rat-in-a-maze.

~ The horrible thing is that, 30yrs after this experiment too much is unchanged amongst the global populace (including the US), if followers of noted in-the-public-eye activist groups or rabble-rousing 'leaders' are any indication.

LLAP

J:D

Edited April 16, 2007 by John Dailey

[Brant Gaede]

When I was a young man I was susceptible to authority. The Milgram experiment always fascinated me because at the time I was most susceptible to authority it simply wouldn't have worked on me. You see, it had to do with the use of electricity. In the army we had POW training where we trainees were POWs. A select few from hundreds of trainees were selected to be 'tortured.' They were hooked up to an electro-shock machine and interrogated in front of all the other trainees. They could not tell that they were actually on a stage being observed by an audience of hundreds. There were three tortured--they were actually being shocked. I don't remember how the first two out of three did, but the third, a husky fellow, tore himself up out of his restraints and chair and ripped up the electrical wires attached to him. The "torturers" swarmed over him trying to protect the equipment. When he was released and allowed to go into the audience we gave him cheers and a standing ovation. We had been somewhat abused over the previous day or so and it was quite cathartic.

I simply wouldn't have continued giving shocks to anybody for that reason, but another experiment demonstrating "obedience to authority," would have caught me up just as short at that time of my life to authority.

I have continued to grow up to the point that there isn't a brain surgeon in the world--my most admired human being if he's good--who can bullshit me about what's right or wrong about brain surgery. I've talked down doctors and nurses who thought, somehow, that they could bullshit me about what they were doing to my Father because they were the experts. (It helps that I know a lot about medicine.)

Most people stop growing up and remain in obedience to authority. Obedience to authority is reflective of childhood and adolescence, not adulthood. This is part and parcel of what Ayn Rand meant when she stated that she was condemned to live in a world of children.

--Brant

Edited April 16, 2007 by Brant Gaede

[John Dailey]

Brant:

~ It ALWAYS 'helps' to know a lot about a subject that 'authorities' are...directing...you about (especially lawyers, much less brain surgeons.)

~ Life's main present-day probs (in 'civilized' countries) are: having to be a Renaissance-Man to merely deal with the authorities (and, nowadays, there's no avoiding them) re any new 'random' serious prob which pops up in one's life regarding another.

LLAP

J:D

Edited April 17, 2007 by John Dailey

[psychoanaleesis]

Well done! Too bad the experimental subject had just a fairly defined set of standards. However, the scientists may have overlooked exceptions such as a man with stringent set of principles. A rational man, an objective man for that matter would have asked for a ruler or at least tried to overlap the lines. I'm not sure how I would fare since I'm myopic and I could choose wrongly but certainly not on the account of the crowd.

That is why, I attempt to question every premise that is presented even if it came from someone who supposedly knows better.

Moral of the experiment: Better off alone and right than belong and wrong.