He also notes that the distress as well as the level of compliance was unexpected, and some unpredictability of any experiment must be expected by both researchers and volunteers (Milgram 1964).
This type of 'follow up,' while perhaps acceptable in the 1960s would likely be seen as inadequate by modern researchers. But recently, in an essay in Granta Magazine, Ian Parker has reevaluated the obedience experiments, noting that they cast doubt upon our sense of self. So much of morality is situational, he notes, perhaps the most profound revelation of the Milgram experiments. The experiments are thus a counterweight against the idea that people who commit genocide during a tyrannical regime are different than us -- rather they are 'us,' or could be us, if we do not resist the will to obey without thought.
Milgram's experiments did likely have a positive social influence and show the banality of evil -- a banality that is still being exposed across the world today. However, a reader cannot help but wish that the lesson did not need to be learned within a laboratory, and the lessons of the real world would...
Milgram's experiments raise provoking questions, regardless of their ethical problems -- they would likely never be performed again, in any form at a university. But they did not answer how to motivate people to act morally against authority, which would be a more difficult experiment to design.
Works Cited
Baumrind, Diana. (1964). "Some Thoughts on Ethics of Research: After Reading Milgram's 'Behavioral Study of Obedience.'" American Psychologist, 1964.
19: 421-423. Retrieved 24 Apr 2008 at http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/baumrind_crit_mil.html
Milgram, Stanley. (1964)."Issues in the Study of Obedience: A Reply to Baumrind."
American Psychologist. 19:848-852. Retrieved 24 Apr 2008 at http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/milgram_rebut2.html
Milgram, Stanley. (1963). "The Perils of Obedience."
Parker, Ian. (2000, Autumn). "Obedience." Granta. 71.
