A few weeks ago I attended TED@Aspen, a smaller gathering of TED attendees in Aspen, Colorado watching the Monterey, California conference via live video feeds. We listened to various speakers discuss such heady topics as “What is Life?” and “How Do We Create?”.

During one session, Professor Phillip Zimbardo spoke on “Will Evil Prevail?”. This Stanford University social psychologist and author of The Lucifer Effect is best known for conducting the infamous Stanford prison experiment in 1971. In that mock experiment gone astray, student participants played the roles of guards and prisoners — in an astonishingly short amount of time, the guards succumbed to the corruption of their power and began to abuse the prisoners.

Zimbardo compared this experiment to the abuses at Abu Ghraib as a confirmation of his discoveries and research. He hypothesized that the soldiers were good but the barrel was bad. He says not “who” but “what” is responsible for these horrific prison abuses. Zimbardo asked, “What makes people go wrong?”

He defined “evil” as “the exercise of power to intentionally harm people psychologically, destroy them physically and commit crimes against humanity.”

Could the Holocaust Occur in America?

Zimbardo continued his presentation by talking about Stanley Milgram’s infamous experiment at Yale. He wanted to explore questions such as “could the Holocaust occur again in America?”

Milgram set up an experiment to measure the willingness of people to obey an authority figure instructing them to perform acts against their conscience. An experimenter ordered the “teacher” subject to give what he or she is led to believe are painful electric shocks to a “learner” subject. The “learners” were actually actors. For each wrong answer, the teacher administered electric shocks, although in reality the learner was not receiving the shocks. As the exam continued, the teacher was instructed to incrementally increase the voltage level and learner would act out increasingly dramatic responses — from banging on the wall, to complaining about his heart, to complete silence.

Milgram asked a group of 40 psychologists what percentage of these people would go to the end of the power dial where they would knowingly kill someone? Most of them said 1%.

Two-thirds of the “teacher” subjects administered the full 450 volts. He continued this experiment in other parts of the world and the percentages increased. He had the “learners” act out rebellion and 90% of the “teachers” went all the way.

A Realistic View of Human Evil

The lessons and reality from Milgram’s and Zimbardo’s experiments are similar to what the apostle Paul writes to Timothy:

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst.
1 Timothy 1:15

Most people would consider themselves in the top quarter of morality and ethics, likening themselves to Mother Theresa rather than Charles Manson. Paul viewed himself as the worst person in terms of the evil inside of him.

His approach wasn’t to throw himself into a depression or take a pessimistic view on life, but to keep himself accountable in the best possible manner while having a positive, successful ministry.

During this session at TED, I realized that Professor Zimbardo’s definition of evil was too simplistic and ignores the reality of day-to-day life. Evil is not comprised only of extreme actions and horrific crimes against humanity. Evil can be subtle actions between people and against society.

It is the little lies that lead to deeper deception. It is the anger inside that generates bitterness. It is the greed that leads to corruption or greater evils.

What evils do you see in the workplace? Overstated expense reports? Lying about a colleague to get a promotion? Bribes under the table to land a contract? Are you tempted to take part? Do you ignore them? Do you report these evils?

Not everyone is a Jeffrey Wigand, the whistle-blower from Brown & Williamson Tobacco, featured in the movie, The Insider. But what do you do as these difficult moral situations arise?

It is also interesting to think about how our society views these evils. Are most of us like Dr. Zimbardo and focus on the horrific? So when Martha Stewart is convicted of a “minor” crime and serves time, we welcome her back into our lives? Or does she lose credibility and get ignored? Does white-collar crime get a pass on our moral scale? Or only major white-collar crimes, such as the Enron scandal, deserve our anger and scorn?

Questions for Discussion

• What are the principles that guide you and your decisions?
• How do you hold to your principles when facing tempting situations?
• What is the most difficult circumstance you’ve been in during your career? What did you do?