3 ms·
The results are a bit more involved than that: * 65% administered the (maximum) 450 volt shock * All participants questioned the experiment at one point * No
by btn 16y ago
The results are a bit more involved than that:
* 65% administered the (maximum) 450 volt shock
* All participants questioned the experiment at one point
* None of them backed out until the 300 volt level (over halfway), when the learner started to bang on the wall.
- jeroen 16y agoThe last link in http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1881668 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1881668 is the video that goes with the transcript in the article. The shock that is administered is 150V, which means that at least one participant (this one) did back out before the 300V level.
- btn 16y agoWikipedia reports that too, but the original paper reports that nobody stopped before 300 volts and that there was no feedback from the victim until that level. I'm not sure why there's a discrepancy.
- mfukar 16y agoPossibly because there's a subtle but definite difference between an experiment carried out on 51 subjects from which 1 stopped before 300V and one on 50 subjects from which nobody stopped before 300V. I'm not saying that's what happened, but as far as I know, there's no assurance mechanism to verify datasets reported by scientists.
- pessimizer 16y agoThe scientists made the film, too, so there's probably a less interesting explanation.
- mfukar 16y agoYou're probably right; where many see fertile soil for an entertaining conspiracy theory, there may be as little as human forgetfulness. The interesting part is the implications of such omissions, and not the reasons behind them.