Experimenter Page #6

Four-fifths thought more

experiments of this sort

should be carried out,

and 74 percent said they had

learned something of personal

importance about themselves

and about the conditions

that shape human action.

A year after the study,

a psychiatrist, Dr. Paul Errara,

was hired to meet with subjects

who might have suffered

possible negative effects.

This is not another experiment.

There's no trick here.

I can see why you may have

your doubts.

- Yes.

- Yes.

This is a debriefing meeting.

We're here to assess

the after-effects.

So, tell us how you feel.

I'd like to know

what the point is of it.

To learn something about

human nature.

That was the aim.

Professor Milgram?

I hope that... I sincerely hope that,

basically,

you don't have the feeling that

would rather not have been

a part of this experiment.

It's an interesting life experience.

I don't like hurting anyone

and I can't understand myself

going all the way.

- It left me feeling guilty.

- Mm-hm.

Weren't we supposed

to have coffee?

Yeah.

I told my husband.

I know I wasn't supposed to.

But I don't do everything I'm told.

He said he wouldn't have done

the shocks, he would have refused.

I wanted to cry,

but I started to laugh.

- I think I did both.

- I was quite frightened,

and I was quivering, and it's...

I actually tried to memorize

the word pairs myself

so that if they

switched it around

I wouldn't have to get

those shocks.

There's a tendency to think that

everything a person does

is due to the feelings or ideas

within the person.

You haven't had your coffee.

You want coffee?

- Yes.

- Cream? Sugar?

- I'll take two sugars.

- Both, please.

Yes, thank you.

But sometimes a person's actions

depend equally

on the situation

you find yourself in.

And in this case, the power of

the situation overwhelmed

your personal power.

I'm an understanding person.

Okay?

I'm an intelligent human being.

Speak the truth to me...

and I'll cooperate gladly,

even if it's a bitter truth,

but don't lie to me.

The purpose was

to advance science,

learn something.

Maybe you shouldn't do this kind

of experiment if you have to deceive.

Look, you can deceive other

people but don't deceive me.

We had half a dozen sessions

with Errara

and invited subjects.

The meetings were sparsely attended,

full of confusion and complaints,

but we concluded

that no one showed signs of harm,

no one had been traumatized.

- Stanley?

- Tom Shannon.

Tom did the wiring on

the shock generator.

- At Yale. The shock box.

- It's nice to meet you.

- This is Sasha.

- This is Michele.

Hey, I hated hearing about

Jim McDonough. Dead at 49.

That stuff about his heart

was no joke.

Yeah, I know. Sat down to a bowl

of oatmeal and... had a heart attack.

He had nine kids.

Oh, sad. Maybe you shouldn't

unload such a large brood

into the world, no offense.

She's taking us to Paris.

It's the first stamp on her passport.

- That's awesome.

- Sasha thinks I need a vacation.

Yeah. I heard they roughed you

up pretty good

- about those results.

- He's up for tenure.

People get feisty,

but it'll work out.

Gotta finish your book now.

Publish or perish, right?

Actually, I got sidetracked

working on The Small World Problem.

For The Small World Problem,

we asked people in Kansas and Omaha

to mail a packet to a person in

Sharon, Massachusetts.

The instructions are simple.

There's a target person.

In this case, a stockbroker

named Jacobs in Sharon, Mass.

Assuming they don't know them,

people are asked to mail

the folder to someone who might

know him.

They can send it to a friend,

relative, or acquaintance,

but they have to send it,

and this is key, to a person

they know on a first-name basis.

There's a roster to fill out

and a batch of postcards to mail

back to Harvard to track the process.

Will it work? We don't know.

A woman in Omaha sends the

folder to a high school friend,

a bank clerk, in Council Bluffs,

Iowa.

She sends it to a man in Belmont,

Massachusetts, a publisher,

who sends it to a tanner in

Sharon, the tanner sends it

to his brother-in-law, a sheet

metal worker, also in Sharon,

who sends it to a dentist,

who sends it to a printer,

who sends it to Mr. Jacobs.

Seven links in the chain.

The average chain, in fact,

involves 5.5 links.

That is, we determine that less

than six degrees of separation

exist between you

and several million strangers

who you may or may not encounter

in your lifetime.

When we understand the structure

of this communication net,

we stand to grasp a good deal

more about the fabric of society.

Maybe it's not necessarily justified,

this common human complaint.

The feeling that we're all

cut off, alienated, and alone.

I don't need to go into detail do I?

The things I remember,

when I was 16, in Bucharest.

The killings, torture, terror.

- Why are you bringing this up now?

- It's relevant.

The man was just turned down

for tenure at Harvard.

You wish to give the tragedy

some perspective.

It's not just that.

Because, bear with me,

they took people to the

slaughterhouse and strung them

on meat hooks, still alive.

Cut open their bellies like cattle.

A five-year-old boy.

And they watched the entrails

spill out, the blood drain,

and they wrote notes and they

pinned the papers to the bodies.

"Kosher."

Serge was just giving me

a lesson in...

Reality?

The pogroms,

in Romania during the war.

The Iron Guard...

they lit people on fire,

threw them off buildings.

This is my charming way of

saying your husband's work

is very important...

and timely.

Because the techniques change,

the victims change,

but it's still a question.

How do these things happen?

How are they institutionalized?

The Algerian War, the tortures.

Do you know about this in the States?

Yeah, of course.

You should do the obedience

experiments in Europe, Stanley.

France, Germany.

Recreate them.

Will it be different?

- I don't think so.

- Who would fund them?

The experiments are unethical.

Remember?

No tenure, no funding.

And the IRBs? The IRBs, yes?

Basically you cannot do these

experiments without submitting

something to

the Internal Review Board.

He'll finish his book, and then

Stanley wants to move on

from the obedience experiments,

and why not?

Well, you look under a rock,

ugly things crawl out,

and we have to face them.

Your other experiments,

the letters, the maps,

clever, hopeful,

but you have to get back to

the obedience experiments.

- I do? I have to?

- Yes, Stanley. You have no choice.

My new job at

City University of New York

involves a jump in pay

and full professorship.

Head of the department of

social psychology.

The City of New York is

a major laboratory,

to be utilized in the research and

training of graduate students

in social psychology.

That's from the CUNY brochure.

I wrote it.

Sasha finds an apartment for us

in Riverdale

with a great view of the Hudson.

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