Doing the right thing- What do we think we will do? And What will we really do? The Milgram experiment on obedience to authority studied the willingness of common people to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts conflicting with their personal conscience. The experiments began in July 1961, three months after the start of the trial of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem. Milgram devised this study to answer the popular question at that time: Could it be that Eichmann and his million accomplices in the Holocaust were just following orders given to them by Hitler? or Could we call them all accomplices? The Experiment - Advertisement will be given asking people to volunteer for an experiment. An experimenter will ask the volunteer to ask a set of questions to a learner who is on the other side of the wall, whenever the learner gives a wrong answer the experimenter will order the volunteer to give painful electric shocks to the learner, the shock voltage will be increased by 15-volt for each wrong answer with a maximum limit of 450 Volt which was marked as a lethal. Half way through the experiment the learner will start to bang on the wall saying It is extremely painful and do not want to continue anymore. After several times banging on the wall and complaining about his heart condition, all responses by the learner would cease. But even when there is no response from the learner which means he has probably fainted on the other side of the wall, the volunteer will be asked to carry on asking questions and carry on increasing electric shock voltage until they reach the maximum voltage. The motive of this experiment is to check whether the participant will say no. Will the volunteer stop as soon as he comes to know that the learner is in distress because of the electric shock administered by him? Or Will the volunteer go the whole length irrespective of the pain he is causing? Result is, most volunteers did not stop. Even though most paused in between and conveyed their displeasure about what is happening, they did not say No I will not do this Their excuse was, they are just following orders. The same experiment have been repeated many times in the following years with consistent results. Many modern day work environments pose similar scenario, many people inflict and being inflicted with misery just because this is what CEO wants. When push comes to shove will we do what is right? or Will we fold using your commitments and family as an excuse? If your parents, partner, boss, guru or your scriptures ask you to do something that is against your conscience, Will you say No? Can you say No? And If you do not say No, can you get away with it?
Posted on: Tue, 23 Sep 2014 00:43:48 +0000