Moral dilemma is a situation when people have to choose between two choices. Moral dilemmas can be seen in the society and it takes an important place in citizen journalism. Some experiments about this subject has been made in the past and the purpose of these experiments were to determinate the psychology of the people’s motions when they are in between two alternatives.
Psychological experiments help people to learn about the consequences of the moral dilemmas. It shows the community’s choices and some exceptions. Milgram Experiment clearly showed the actions of the people when they are in a moral dilemma. It is a great example of the peoples desire to obey.
Stanford Prison Experiment is a similar experiment that shows the psychology of the people living in specific circumstances. Stanford Prison Experiment is a classic experiment about good people in evil places. It shows how good people act in evil places when being tortured and seeing violence.
The non-aware ingenious experimenter Zimbardo thinks that the antidote for evil is heroism because it is the only way to be against the power of evil. Heroes are hard to find in our society but they are so important because they are different from others in lot of ways. The moral dilemma of heroes are more unique. Their priorities are much more different than the other people.
A French TV show made a program alike these two experiments. The purpose of this show was to aim the actions of the people who need to make a choice between two alternatives. The competitors have the power to transfer electric to a man or they have to ‘’face the consequences’’. But they do not know what the consequences are so they think that they should give electricity to the man because they are afraid to get hurt themselves.
Philip Zimbardo wrote a book called The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. The book answers the questions ; What is evil, what makes people evil and how do they act towards being evil. Lucifer Effect is the result of these experiments and programs. Lucifer Effect shows peoples’ actions towards having power and the situation to choose.
Paul Lewis, in his presentation about the importance of the reality and choices for the citizen journalism, gives some examples experienced in the past similar to the above experiments. Clay Shirky has also a somewhat similar presentation talking about social media being forced and how it affects people.
Scientists keeps on getting bewildered by how people make choices and the consequences they can support just to secure themselves. Be it social media, or other types of emerging technologies, we keep on seeing the same instinct of inhumane use of power in the face of threat and the rarity of heroes in our life time. Technology has not changed our lack of heroes.