the stanford experiment is a notorious example of how prone people are to losing their shit when put in positions of power/lack-of-power.

Jack’s choice for the reading is here.
It’s Philip Zimbardo’s account of the experiment, who was the lead in the experiment. He’s caught a lot of criticism for both the experiment and his presentation of it… so it should be a good starting point for discussion.

Jack proposes the following questions:
What’s more surprising, how guards abused their power or how prisoners complied?
Is your life more like that of a prisoner, or a guard?
Do liberals, conservatives, socialists, etc. see themselves as prisoners or guards?

ps: the piece i mentioned about artificial intelligence and corporations is here.