Removing this tumor would mean that Mr. X personally didn’t intend to kill his wife or be abusive they were actions projected through him by this effects his tumor had to his amygdala.

I think you’ve slipped into a bit different area here, but I also think it is worth examining at least briefly.

“Removing this tumor would mean that Mr. X personally didn’t intend to kill his wife or be abusive” is a very interesting perspective. I’m not sure that removing the tumor itself would be any indication as to his intent. It would seem that he actually did intend to kill his wife. There may be several contributing factors, but I think the fact that he did kill his wife shows intent. The evidence provided does not suggest that he accidentally bumped into a ladder on which she stood and she fell to her death. Did the tumor contribute to his dismissal of certain emotional factors that may have prohibited him from killing his wife? Maybe. There are some cultures that would suggest that a man has the right to kill his wife for any number of irrational (to us) reasons. But I would doubt that every man who kills his wife has a biological agent affecting his capacity for murder or mercy. We can attest that there are certainly some factors of the biological agent that has a contributive affect, but I’m not sure we can blame the tumor entirely for the intent or the final outcome.

Responding to Sara Buttine

My friend is ADHD, and gets in trouble all the time. He says the he can’t help it, he didn’t take his medicine. That was his excuse for everything. Should he get treated differently from the rest of us even though he breaks the rules? No. Should he get excused from causing a scene in class because he forgot his medicine? No.

I think this is an excellent example. Both my son and I are ADHD. I no longer require medication (and haven’t since my teens) while he has finally stabilized on his meds. Observing my son on or off his meds is like watching the difference in night and day. However, that said, one of the things that I consistently remind him (and his teachers) is that a lack of meds is no excuse for bad behavior. His ADHD impairs his ability to focus. It does not remove his ability to focus. Put him down in front of a good movie, or a video game, or something else mentally engaging and that focus issue is "suddenly" under control again. So does his biology affect him? Yes. Does it mean that he’s not responsible for his action both on and off his meds? No. His meds only assist him in that control over his behavior; they do not provide the control itself.

I think you’ve made a great observation here.

Responding to Lance Wiley

Topic: Imagine the case of Mr. X: an ill-tempered, abusive husband, prone to impulsive anger. One day, in a fit of rage, he takes a hammer and bludgeons his wife to death. He is convicted, and sentenced to 30 years in prison. Once in prison, a brain scan reveals a large tumor in his amygdala. Doctors operate and successfully remove the tumor. After the operation, Mr. X’s behavior changes dramatically. He is no longer hostile or aggressive, and becomes a model prisoner. All who work with him agree that he has become a “new man.”

• Suppose that the doctors working with Mr. X determined that, the tumor did influence his behavior. Is the “new” Mr. X responsible for his earlier behavior? Why or why not?

• Should biology be considered when determining if someone is guilty of a crime? If so, under what circumstances?

• What should be done with him now and why?

Response: This is such a controversial topic that becomes highly polarized between religion and science. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde comes to mind. At what point does biology end and morality begin? What do we consider when we know there are genetic and biological predispositions we can trace (science) but run counter to moral assumptions based on any number of external factors (religion)?

In this strange case of Mr. X, and using only the facts as presented, we have a man who verifiably committed murder. The legal implications are clear. Commit the crime, do the time. And I would be more than willing, personally speaking, to stop there. But that’s neither a good indication of the underlying factors nor does it actually confront the issue of responsibility. Was Mr. X responsible for his actions even knowing, after the event, that a tumor impaired his judgment? I think the key is in the impairment not the overriding of his judgment. Did the tumor make him more prone to aggression and eventual homicide? Yes. But is he ultimately responsible for his actions? Yes. Therefore Mr. X should stay in jail.

There are many different things which affect or impair our judgment on a daily basis. Whether anyone likes the implications or not, coffee alone affects judgment. I know, for me, I can drink enough to be bouncing off the walls and completely out of my mind. This moves into the Twinkie Defense, but I’m not convinced personally that being impaired in judgment is the same as lacking the ability to judge or exert self-control. I usually fall on the side of “Did you violate someone’s right to life that cannot be claimed as self-defense or unavoidably accidental? Yes? Go directly to jail. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.”

One of the problems with this line of biological excuse for actions is that we can take it one step further. If a tumor, and not the man, is responsible for the homicide then we just remove the tumor and we can remove responsibility. How much more difficult is it to go from removing biological matter to manipulating genes and creating a monster problem in either direction: that is, we can remove a person’s genetic disposition toward violence, alcoholism, homosexuality, politics or we can add dispositions for passivity, martial obedience, workhorse class (slavery). At what point do we decide that everything is biology instead of choice?

I don’t think there is a fast and easy answer to this. I think it is a combination of things that have to be taken into consideration. But I don’t think we can escape the consequences of our behavior on merely biological grounds or dismiss biological factors as completely subservient to behavioral control. Either extreme is a dangerous position to hold.

Human nature, in general, is very repetitve

I believe you just nailed it and it’s one of the keys, I think, to understanding the Milgram experiment. The nature of the experiment itself falls into this particular repetitive cycle. Ask a question, get a response, check the answer, push a button, rinse, repeat. Even the setup of the experiment provided an element of the habitual and normal by placing the switches in a very bland row. It is easy to just run down them as each wrong answer was given. Likewise, the conductor’s responses were repetitive.

1. Please continue.
2. The experiment requires that you continue.
3. It is absolutely essential that you continue.
4. You have no other choice, you must go on.

Over and over again, these “teachers” heard these phrases. If you examine this list carefully, what you see is a reinforcement of the habitual. You must continue. You must go on. You must do what you are doing. You must do what you are already doing. Just continue on with the experiment. It’s like listening to a metronome.

Responding to Pearly George

I find this subject interesting as the Milgram experiment came up in my Sociology class last fall. The online ABC Primetime news segment, “The Science of Evil,” was incomplete at best. While it certainly showed one aspect of the Milgram experiment, it left out others that have equal if not more revealing importance. The study for the ABC presentation replicated the original experiment to a point: that is, the victim was visibly isolated from the subject of the test. According to Milgram’s book, Obedience to Authority: An Experimental View, in variations on the study the closer the proximity of the victim the less cooperative the subject to inflict pain. Instructions given over a phone were also less likely to be followed precisely to their intended end than those given from an instructor in the same room. I think that any presentation should show the variations in order to put the depravity of results in better perspective.

What I find interesting about the Milgram study, according to Thomas Blass in a Psychology Today article, is that over repeated experiments the percentage of people who would inflict high amounts of pain through the system remained consistently around the 63% range, give or take one or two percentage points. Part of Milgram’s study was to determine explicitly if he could replicate the mind-numbing obedience of regular German citizens during World War II. It is this aspect of groupthink that I believe is important to understand. By becoming a part of the anonymous crowd, there are some individuals who seem to behave in a manner that would appear different than if they were acting alone. I’m sure that many conclusions could be and have been drawn over the results of Milgram’s experiments where most people inflicted the highest shocks available, but I’m not convinced that it says much about individuals outside their desire to find an acceptance of their actions external to themselves. But that also may be the point: as human beings we seek out acceptance, validation, and inclusion through external means sometimes to the point of deconstructing our own personalities and habits to fit in with the larger expectations of the group.

In the ABC study there is an interesting twist on the experiment that makes me wonder if it was intentional. The primary subject of the interview was an electrician by trade. The technical aspects of the manner of punishment, i.e., the shocks, was something that was quite familiar to him. But while we observed him continuing to give the shocks, continuing to grimace and turn toward the instructor, we also observed him continuing on with the experiment to the vocal outcry of the victim. His explanation later? He did not know why he continued to listen to the instructor. He knew that he should have stopped earlier. He then blamed the victim for not removing the superficial devices that delivered the shocks. But the point is that he continued despite knowing what electricity could do to someone (he would have to know to be an electrician) and despite his reservations to continuing the experiment. I think there are several reasons that explain the behavior of those who follow through with the continued shocks.

First, there is the legitimization of authority that comes into play: that is, the assumption that leadership is exercised by someone either with the correct knowledge or the proper motives even if it is not immediately apparent. Second, there is the idea of groupthink. A group is any collection of individuals more than one. The continued assurance or direction by the instructor provided a plausible bubble of acceptability to the actions of the subject that stepped outside of his own moral parameters to deflect both responsibility for his actions and the blame for the results of his actions. The transference of authority to the instructor and the blame to the victim—and therefore liability from the subject—is seen even in the short clip we watched and appeared to evidence this bubble of acceptability even though he found himself embarrassed by it during his post-study interview.

Realistically, I’m not really sure where I would fit on the spectrum of the experiment. I tend to be a nonconformist in many ways though I do find myself having to adjust certain actions and attitudes to ensure cooperation and success in my workplace. Sometimes it is only after weeks of stubbornly holding my own position that I have to give in to the “greater opinion” on a subject in order to assure that a project is actually completed whether or not I agree with the methods or end results. For this specific experiment, I don’t find myself in line with the conformity of inducing pain after a certain point. For me, it would necessarily be situationally determined based on the responses of the other party. I don’t necessarily find myself agreeing with authority figures merely due to their position or title.

The evidence of groupthink and legitimization of authority extends to nearly every circumstance of life. Insofar as “horrible” as an inadequate adjective and outside any “eye of the beholder” arguments, I would suggest that evidence of these kinds of behaviors are found in the genocides of Rwanda and Darfur, the “witchcraft” murders in Kenya and India, the skinhead uprisings in Russia and France, and the humiliation and torture of gays in Uganda and Nigeria—to merely name a few. These are certainly horrible, but I think that it misses the point. This kind of groupthink happens in the little things all around us. If we are capable of participating in the least of these behaviors, then we are certainly capable of participating in the worst of these behaviors.

Note: This was actually written last Thursday for class, but I’m just now getting around to posting it here. Depending on what I find later among my classmates I will probably post my individual responses to those as well.