From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Sat Jun 14 2003 - 13:02:59 MDT
Lee Corbin wrote:
> Do you believe the Zimbardo effect? It has to remain the last word,
> because no one can ethically ever again repeat the experiment. I
> suspect---but can never know--- that the experimenter allowed his
> personal participation and priming of his subjects to interfere with
> the conclusions.
I see no reason to question the accuracy of Zimbardo's experiment. It may
be unpleasant, but it is consistent with human history and with what we
know of human nature. Remember that Hitler was not an *inhuman* monster.
By comparison with real life, Zimbardo's experiment is tame. The only
shocking thing about it is that, contrary to our wish to believe that
something horrible and unusual must be going on at prisons to create
"inhuman" conditions, it reveals that nothing is at work except ordinary
human nature.
-- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
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