[jbullock35]

I see. Milgram's answer is: for the "teacher," there is no need to overpower the researcher (Milgram called him the "experimenter") in order to end the experiment. The teacher can just walk away. (And then, if he sees fit, he can call the police or otherwise report the experimenter.)

Milgram was at pains to construct a situation in which there wasn't even an implied threat from the experimenter. When teachers protest that they don't want to continue, the harshest thing that the experimenter says is "You have no choice; you must go on." Milgram wanted to see how obedient people might be when there wasn't even an implied threat of force. (And he found that 65% of subjects were willing to deliver the maximum shock under these conditions.)

[lukeschlather]

There is a clear implied threat: the threat is that you will be removed and someone else will be brought in to finish the job. The calculus is actually at what point you will use force to stop the experimenter from inflicting further harm, because the assumption is that your actions cannot stop the experimenter from inflicting harm without yourself harming the experimenter.

[jbullock35]

> There is a clear implied threat: the threat is that you [the "teacher" in the experiment] will be removed and someone else will be brought in to finish the job.

The claim made above, by others, seems to be that the experiment involved an implicit threat against the "teacher" that might explain why he followed instructions to deliver electric shocks to the "learner." How is being removed from the experiment an "implied threat" against the "teacher" that would get him to follow instructions? And if it isn't a threat of that sort, how is it relevant to understanding why "teachers" followed instructions?

> the assumption [that is, an implicit premise of the experiment] is that your actions cannot stop the experimenter from inflicting harm without yourself harming the experimenter

That doesn't sound right. The teacher can put a temporary stop to the experiment by refusing to obey -- that is, by refusing to shock the learner. He can put a permanent stop to it by, say, calling the police.

[jerry1979]

Interesting take. I have a working thesis that if a person believes something will happen "inevitably" then that person will have a greater disposition to do horrific things in the name of "inevitability". Zizek has pointed out that the belief in the inevitability of global communism allowed hard core communists to commit atrocities. Communism worked through them, they believed. Capitalists do something similar when they help destroy the environment or help exploit workers. They believe that if they don't do it then someone else will.