Fwd: setting the droid bit revisited

[Chuck Murcko]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Chuck Murcko <chuck@topsail.org>
> Date: Mon Jul 02, 2001  12:44:09 AM US/Eastern
> To: Eirikur Hallgrimsson <eirikur1@mediaone.net>
> Subject: Re: setting the droid bit revisited
>
> Agreed. One thing that surprised me is that these behavioral 
> experiments would not be allowed today by the American Sociological 
> Association ethics guidelines. The most interesting point was the 
> possible connection between Milgram's work and aircraft accidents.
>
> This raises a couple of questions:
>
> 1) Did the ASA succumb to the very same agentic behavior revealed by 
> Milgram's work in the course of disallowing future experiments of this 
> type?
>
> 2) How in the world would sociologists explain the Poi Pot regime in 
> Cambodia, the My Lai massacre, Serbia, Rwanda, or Jonestown had  they 
> excluded this type of experiment 40 years earlier? Kinder, gentler, 
> more correct experiments simply could not get into this emotional 
> regime to get useful data.
>
> I've known a number of people who truly believe they are incapable of 
> agentic behavior. That was what I was alluding to with the question, 
> Eirikur. I wasn't pretending to argue against the experimental results. 
> MHO is that there are folks today who truly believe we are evolved 
> enough that the horrors of last century worldwide could never be 
> repeated.
>
> Disobediance training. It's been around for some time. Tactically, the 
> IMF and other demonstrations today are light years advanced from the 
> student protests of the late 1960s. Strikes (labor protests) are 
> another example.
>
> I remember the Japanese looking into this idea differently in the 1980s 
> as a means of encouraging more individual initiative in their society. 
> They felt at the time there was a sort of "breakthrough slump" at many 
> of their research labs, and that encouraging antiagentic behavior would 
> help.
>
> Chuck
>
> On Sunday, July 1, 2001, at 11:44 PM, Eirikur Hallgrimsson wrote:
>
>>> Interesting reading. Are we actually better than those who commit
>>> atrocities, or are we just pretending to be?
>>
>> To argue that "we" are better is arguing against the data.  No one has 
>> to my
>> knowledge revealed any sampling errors or other methodology problems
>> with Milgram's work.   Most of the heat comes from conflicting
>> interpretations.    Even if I were to accept some evidence that we are 
>> better,
>> I'd have serious questions about whether it would pass down to the next
>> generations.   We have a good chunk of data about one generation, with 
>> no
>> particular reason to think that it was atypical.
>>
>> Now, I wonder if it is possible in society, given that society is a 
>> set of
>> somewhat coercive social norms, to put in place a mechanism of some 
>> kind,
>> that would have the effect of countering this 'obediance' factor.   
>> i.e.,
>> actually reducing the strength of one of the social 'glue' factors.
>> Regardless of whether it's in principle possible, would this be a good 
>> idea?
>> Might not the cure be worse than the disease?  This needs to be 
>> gamed-through.
>>
>> I can just see the controversy now over "disobediance training" for 
>> young
>> people.  I certainly got a lot of that at the Summerhill school I was 
>> at in
>> '68.
>>
>> Eirikur
>>
>>
>> http://xent.com/mailman/listinfo/fork
>>
>
Chuck Murcko
Topsail Group
http://www.topsail.org/
>