Stanley Milgram

Obedience to people in authority is a deep-rooted trait that we all possess by virtue of our upbringing, and as Milgram put it, “it is only the person dwelling in isolation who is not forced to respond, with defiance or submission, to the commands of others” (Milgram 1974). This trait is exhibited every day in family circles, workplace and school. People are most likely to obey instructions from people they perceive their authority to be legal or moral. We see people obeying their pastors, leaders in various societies and other people they see as higher to them; and they obey anything they are being told even if it involves killing another human being. They justify their actions, however wrong, on obedience to authority.

2. A. The research was conducted by first paying his participants $4.50 ($30 today) to come in and take part in the experiment. The group of participants he selected was composed of 40 males between 20 and 50 who were told that the experiment was to test the effect of “punishment on learning“. There was 15 skilled-unskilled workers, 16 white-collar employees, and 9 professionals. Apart from them, there were 2 key participants, a confederate, who was actually a 47 year-old accountant and an actor who dressed as the experimenter. He decided to test the power of obedience in a laboratory which was clever on Milgram’s part. He designed a realistic looking fake scenario, complete with a shock chair and men dressed in lab coats. The most realistic component was the fake shock generator that actually quite scary-looking. It had levels of shock that went up from 30 to 450 volts and the levels were labeled to describe the intensity of the shock. The participants

In each study the participant was give the role of ‘teacher’ and placed in a room with a ‘scientist’. The teacher was instructed to ask the learner (who was sitting in an adjacent room, and who along with the scientist where confederates in the experiment) a series of word associations, the teacher had to read the first word and the learner had to answer a matching word form a choice of four given by the teacher. They answered by pressing a corresponding switch on a unit in the room. The teacher was sat in front of a ‘shock generator’ a device which had 30 switches along the front which went up in 15 volt increments from 15volts to 450 volts. The labels above the switches described the shocks as ranging from ‘slight shock’ to ‘danger severe shock’ above 375 volts and the post powerful shock had XXX above it. In Milgram’s study the teacher was given a 45 volt shock to experience the sensation of being shocked and to show how the leaner would receive the shocks. In Burgers replication the teacher only received a 15 volt shock. In both cases the learner made the teacher and the experimenter aware that he had a minor heart

In this article, “Just Do What the pilot Tells You” Theodore Dalrymple and “The Genocidal Killer in the Mirror” by Crispin Sartwell express two different viewpoints expressed towards obedience. While both authors are addressing the issue of disobedience, Dalrymple approaches the issue, stating, “Some people think a determined opposition to authority is principled and romantic” (Dalrymple 3) while on the other hand, Sartwell emphasizes that authority, especially hierarchies are the most “evil” thing in our society. Despite the well-executed argument of the two author's, Dalrymple takes a self-centered approach, forcing the reader to agree with his opinion.

     Following authority is most noticed when it comes to military. Soldiers will do almost anything that their commander tells them. In a good way this is useful but when what they are doing is morally wrong there should be boundaries. But there are none and if they don’t do what they are told then they have to face the punishment. But

Individuals often yield to conformity when they are forced to discard their individual freedom in order to benefit the larger group. Despite the fact that it is important to obey the authority, obeying the authority can sometimes be hazardous especially when morals and autonomous thought are suppressed to an extent that the other person is harmed. Obedience usually involves doing what a rule or a person tells you to but negative consequences can result from displaying obedience to authority for example; the people who obeyed the orders of Adolph Hitler ended up killing innocent people during the Holocaust. In the same way, Stanley Milgram noted in his article ‘Perils of Obedience’ of how individuals obeyed authority and

With each wrong answer came an electric shock that the teacher, a random male participant, had to physically cause. The teacher could hear the learner after a while begging to stop. At this point the teachers causing the pain are obviously uncomfortable. Some start by laughing nervously and other just immediately beg to stop the experiment. At this point the experimenter gives a series of orders to push the teacher to continue. As a result, two-thirds of participants carried on shocking the learner to the highest level of four hundred and fifty volts. All the participants involved continued up to three hundred

·  What conclusions did the study reach? Are the conclusions appropriate? Why or why not?

In Stanley Milgram’s article “The Perils of Obedience,” several people volunteer to participate in Milgram’s experiment. It consists of a learner and a teacher. When the learner fails to memorize a word pair, the teacher applies a shock to the learner. The shocks increase in severity with each wrong answer, attaining a maximum voltage of 450 volts. Milgram states many psychiatrists he interviewed before the experiment predicted most subjects would not go past 150 volts, or the point at which the learner starts to ask to leave (Milgram 80). In his first experiment, twenty-five out of forty subjects continued the experiment until the end (Milgram 80). After several more experiments at different locations, Milgram obtained the same results. Milgram

On arriving for the experiment they were told that they would play he role of the teacher. They were to read a series of words pairs to an individual on the opposite side of a partition. They were to test the individuals' memory by giving him a word and asking him to select the correct matching word from four alternatives. Each time the learner made an error, they were to give him/her an electric shock at the touch of a lever. The individual was strapped into an electric chair while they watched. The teachers had levers in front of them labelled from 15 to 450 volts and switches labelled from slight shock to danger: severe shock to the final ‘XXX'. They were instructed to move one lever higher on the shock generator each time the learner made an error. There were not of course any shocks.

According to Tom Jacobs, in his article “Rethinking the Classic ‘Obedience’ Sudies,” he mentions how some people believe that people are predisposed to follow authority figures without having any doubt, and also will quickly become somehow abusive when positioned in power. In this world most of the people are going have some experience with this topic, especially because in today’s century many people do whatever they want just because of the power they could have compared to others. Jacobs also mentions that in journal named “PLoS Biology,” “they argue that people will indeed comply with the questionable demands of authority figures—but only if they strongly identify with that person, and buy into the rightness of those beliefs;” in other

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

The study was conducted by Stanley Milgram and aimed to examine how people “reacted to instructions from authorized individuals when the actions conflicted with their personal safety and conscience” (De Vos, 2009, p.226). The participants were instructed to work in pairs and play different roles. In each pair, one of the participants played a role of a “learner,” and was presented with different questions from the “teacher,” the second person in the pair. Experimenters observed the questioning process and asked “teachers” to apply an electric shock to “learners” when they gave wrong answers to questions. The main problem in the research was ethical, as the more than a half of “teachers” were instructed to apply electric shocks up to the level of 450 volts, which could be very harmful. However, the “learners” were asked to provide mainly wrong questions, and the “teachers” were not aware of this intention (Milgram, 2010). At the end of the study, the experimenters revealed the deception. The research concluded that “teachers” were likely to obey instructions from authorized individuals, even when the health of “learners” supposedly was in serious

I also for the most part agree that when under authority, people will follow direction no matter if they know it morally or ethically wrong. People have become too afraid to stand up to authority because they don’t want to miss out any opportunities that may enhance their living. I believe that individuals that portray too much authority can brainwash people to do evil things over periods of time for their own gratifications, and so they won’t have to endure any consequences. Another study was performed at Yale it was concluded that “ordinary men would inflict severe pain on others (link is external) simply because they were asked to do so by an authority figure in an experiment” (Grant,

To authenticate the potential electrical intensity to the learner the teacher is sampled with a 45-volt shock to the wrist. The teacher is then instructed to administer an incrementally increasing punishing electrical shock for each incorrect answer. This follows several methods to inform the teacher of the potential impact of the electrical shock that they will administer. These included, warnings listing the voltage range of 15 to 450-volts labeled Slight Shock, Moderate Shock, Strong Shock, Extreme Intensity Shock, Danger Severe Shock, and XXX, bright red