Why my 12 months in Iraq were NOT wasted.

[pvn]

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So to reiterate: when a human being drops a bomb from high above the clouds on a city where other humans live (and he himself lives on the other side of the world), he it not to blaim for the murder, even if he voluntarily agreed beforehand to do such a thing if it was asked of him?

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Niels, familiar with the Milgram Experiments

Cody

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Yes. Are you saying that we should destroy the system that creates such situations? I agree. The step towards that is to take responsibility for our own actions.

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If you are in fact familiar with his experiments and you still come to that conclusion, I'm not really sure what to say.

Prof. Milgram basically gave us documented evidence of the sad truth, people are sheep. Not only are most people wired/conditioned like that, but worse yet, many seemed to enjoy it.

Taking down "the state", in this case, won't do anything. The proof is there, people are a dangerous animal and taking away the only referee we have now isn't going to accomplish anything, no matter how much you wish it were so.

Cody

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Milgram didn't do anything to show if this tendency is hardwired or a result of conditioning. You even implicitly acknowleged this by using the "wired/conditioned" combo. It's one of those two; which one it actually is makes a huge difference. DUCY?

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Cody: It's one of these two things

PVN: It's one of these two things, DUCY?

Cody: Uhh that's what I just said.

So I have no idea why you're repeating me, but in reference to the fact that Milgram observed current situations and didn't get into conditioning, yes that was his intent. Other experiments were done later trying to expand his work.

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When you say "If you are in fact familiar with his experiments and you still come to that conclusion, I'm not really sure what to say" you're implying that the reason behind the observed behavior must be hardwiring. But you're begging that question. If it is indeed conditioned then such a statement does not make sense, whereas nielsio's position does make sense.

Given a lack of evidence, it doesn't make sense to simply assume that the observed behavior is hardwired.

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It seems to me, given most of recoreded history, that people are bastards, and given the fact that the large-scale spread of information is a fairly recent occurrence, I'm going to go with a guess of 80% hard-wired 20% conditioned. Your guess?

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Many people are bastards, and this seems to have been the case throughout recorded history. But many is not all. Personally, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't capitulate as the subjects in the Millgram experiments did; I've quit jobs over much, much smaller moral issues before (twice). And the length of time this has been the case isn't indicative of hardwired behavior. (Some) people have been growing crops for "most" of recorded history; it's certainly not a hardwired behavior.

[pvn]

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If the state is part of the conditioning that makes people sheep, then it isn't acting as the referee it is acting as the coach.

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QFT. +1.

[Richard Tanner]

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I don't understand your position. If people are sheep based on this study and you agree this may be due to conditioning (heavily influenced by their statist upbringing), then why are you also saying that "Taking down "the state", in this case, won't do anything. The proof is there, people are a dangerous animal and taking away the only referee we have now isn't going to accomplish anything, no matter how much you wish it were so."

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Because states have come and gone 100 times or more, and they still pop up, so taking down the US (the state I assume we're talking about as it's always referenced) won't accomplish anything if the behavior is hardwired in us.

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If the state is part of the conditioning that makes people sheep, then it isn't acting as the referee it is acting as the coach.

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I don't think I ever disagreed with this, but thanks for adding it.

Cody

[Richard Tanner]

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What the Milgrim experiment and others like it proved was that power is something that should not be.

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Whoa whoa whoa, back the truck up, are you saying that in ACland, power won't collect in certain people's hands???

Cody

[Kaj]

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I don't understand your position. If people are sheep based on this study and you agree this may be due to conditioning (heavily influenced by their statist upbringing), then why are you also saying that "Taking down "the state", in this case, won't do anything. The proof is there, people are a dangerous animal and taking away the only referee we have now isn't going to accomplish anything, no matter how much you wish it were so."

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Because states have come and gone 100 times or more, and they still pop up, so taking down the US (the state I assume we're talking about as it's always referenced) won't accomplish anything if the behavior is hardwired in us.

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If the state is part of the conditioning that makes people sheep, then it isn't acting as the referee it is acting as the coach.

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I don't think I ever disagreed with this, but thanks for adding it.

Cody

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So why don't we spread the word that a state is not necessary? Or at least work to limit it's power. Humans existed for thousands of years all over the globe without one. Seems like your position is "That's how it is today, so don't bother." If everyone felt like that, we'd still live under kings and queens and respect their authority as divinely endowed -- but we don't. So change actually does happen for the better and people actually can choose to live more free from the yokes of the state. And just to clarify again, you and this study have not proven anything about hardwiring anything in us that couldn't be overcome through new conditioning.

[Richard Tanner]

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When you say "If you are in fact familiar with his experiments and you still come to that conclusion, I'm not really sure what to say" you're implying that the reason behind the observed behavior must be hardwiring. But you're begging that question. If it is indeed conditioned then such a statement does not make sense, whereas nielsio's position does make sense.

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See response to Kaj

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Given a lack of evidence, it doesn't make sense to simply assume that the observed behavior is hardwired.

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Lack of evidence?? We have plenty of history to go off of. It may not be millions of years, but there's certainly plenty of time for a behavioral study.

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I'm pretty sure I wouldn't capitulate as the subjects in the Millgram experiments did; I've quit jobs over much, much smaller moral issues before (twice).

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Funny, when Milgram asked his students what the outcome would be, I think they said something like 2% would make it to the end. People are eternially optimistic.

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(Some) people have been growing crops for "most" of recorded history; it's certainly not a hardwired behavior.

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Growing crops =/= Being a "bastard" (as we're using it).

If it's hardwired in people to care nothing for the rights of others and/or to trample those rights at a moments notice for their own gain, then we're going to have a very tough time co-existing without something to stop them.

If it's conditioning, then taking down the US isn't going to help, but I suppose changing the collective minds of the 6.1 billion people that aren't anarchists could work. Would be a fun way to see. I wish you luck with that one though, since it seems like it's going to be a tough road to hoe.

Cody

[Richard Tanner]

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So why don't we spread the word that a state is not necessary?

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I suppose that would be because I don't believe that clause to be true. Not sure how you could infer any different.

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Or at least work to limit it's power.

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I do, what made you think I don't.

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And just to clarify again, you and this study have not proven anything about hardwiring anything in us that couldn't be overcome through new conditioning.

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So I ask several times what you (and other's) opinions about hardwiring v. conditioning are, and you say "You didn't prove anything". Uhhh no, I didn't attempt to, in fact estimation came with the words "guess" in it.

You're confusing the bejeezus out of me.

[Kaj]

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Lack of evidence?? We have plenty of history to go off of. It may not be millions of years, but there's certainly plenty of time for a behavioral study.

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If we did a study in Europe in 1550, would you conclude that Europeans were hardwired for religious intolerance and acceptance of the divine right of kings? There'd be plenty of history to base this upon, right? But such a conclusion has been proven totally wrong as history unfolds, showing that the beliefs of 1550 were conditioned, not hardwired. Would you not agree that a behavioral study of 2000 humankind taken 500 years in the future may show that our political attitudes regarding the role of the state were also conditioned rather than hardwired?

Also, if you did that 1550 study in North America, you'd find very different beliefs regarding political organization -- what happened to their hardwiring? So your conclusions regarding the state are not as widespread as you think.

[Nielsio]

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What the Milgrim experiment and others like it proved was that power is something that should not be.

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Whoa whoa whoa, back the truck up, are you saying that in ACland, power won't collect in certain people's hands???

Cody

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What I'm saying is that we should be looking for no power.

Now what would be the extreme of decentralization?

[ThaSaltCracka]

Have any of you guys seen "No End In Sight"? I am thinking about seeing it tonight.