RHETOR 115 Chapter Notes - Chapter 4: Stanley Milgram
Document Summary
Annihilation of jews not the result of one person, but done through the power that comes from many individuals and organizations. Obedience binds these units - links person to system of authority. Phenomenon of obedience used to explain holocaust. Most extreme instance of abhorrent immoral acts carried out in the name of obedience. Plato on moral question of whether one should obey when a command conflicts with conscience. Humanists: primary of individual conscience - moral judgment of individual must override authority when the two are in conflict. Experiment at yale: order subjects to carry out a series of acts and study how far they will obey before they refuse to. One teacher and one learner : when learned makes error, he receives neg reinforcement (actually no shock) Teacher is subject is observation, ordered to give increasing powerful shocks > want to see how far he will proceed when ordered to inflict pain and how people would defy authority.
