Our Long History of Doing What We Are Told (And Why I Love The Game)

Fellow Pilots,

There's a great video out today by SOLVM, one of our lesser-known YouTube geniuses.  It includes exemplary patience, smart play, and some counterexamples for reflection:

Although I'm a clear counterexample ;-), most history teachers are boring.  It's why you hated the class in high school.  We wear boring clothes in staid colors, we read books, and we frequent museums.  Our jokes are bad.  Example:

Elderly Man: “Father, during the war I allowed a Jewish refugee to live in my attic.”


Priest: “I do not see anything wrong with that. You helped a poor soul survive the war.”


Elderly Man: “I collected rent from him for every month that he stayed.”


Priest: “That’s not a good thing you did, but it was for a good cause. You helped him survive.”


Elderly Man: “Should I tell him the war is over?”


See what I mean?

Speaking of WWII jokes, we use one to talk about human behavior.  It's more instructive, and not actually intended to be humorous: 

"How many people did Hitler kill?"  

The guesses usually range from 10-20 million, but the answer is "one."  Hitler directly took only his own life - but he got his countrymen and women to kill a lot more on his dreams, plans, and orders.  The actions of Nazi Germany during this dark period have dumbfounded and fascinated psychologists, sociologists, historians, economists, and the rest of us ever since.


After Adolf Eichmann's trial, the great Yale psychologist Stanley Milgram designed an elegant and frightening experiment in an attempt to understand the forces that make us follow orders.  The study was simple - subjects were brought into a room with a "researcher," where they asked questions of a person (an actor) in a separate room.  A convincingly designed machine was used to give fake electric shocks when the actor got the questions wrong.  And when the actor got more questions wrong, the warning labels progressed from describing the shocks as mild, to painful, and finally lethal.  The actor complained of a heart condition, and pretended to be in pain.  When the subjects protested, the "researcher" simply told them that the experiment must continue.  Some 65% of the subjects believed they could be administering shocks that kill - and they pressed the button.


 

Milgram's experiment has been repeated around the world hundreds of times.  It has many variations, but always reaches the same conclusion.  We are obedient.  We do as we are told.

UNFORTUNATELY, War Robots pilots are not immune to this phenomenon.  We have numerous "authority figures," like our clan leaders and officers.  We have opinion leaders like Adrian Chong, Stew Pendous, Manni, and more.  If that weren't enough to keep us in line, we have Discord servers, forums, and chats full of people who abuse and disparage the interesting and creative ideas of pilots in their community.  The result is that most pilots do as they are told.


What happens when we misbehave?  Witness the angry reaction in the forum to Friday's piece by Dr. Z0S0, which made the relatively benign assertion that it was economically better to level robots than weapons.  In case you are new to this blog, some of the other heresies espoused by the University have included:

• Mix up your weapons
• Don't bother with the center beacons of Shenzhen, Dead City, or Moon 
• Play like the battle is only seven minutes long
• Win rates are not dependent on the absence or presence of premium gear 

Of course, there's good news - some of us always decide to be part of the solution instead of remaining as part of the problem.  Human behavior varies widely, from the independent to the wacky.  For every subject in Milgram's work who hit the button, there was someone who refused.  Like "Pilot Shart" did, when warned not to mix his weapons.  God forbid they have different ranges!  They're ugly!  

The next time someone tells you that you can't or shouldn't, or that you have to or need to ... remember that War Robots is a game.  Only animated robots get hurt or destroyed, unless you throw your iPad.  The orthodoxy is unnecessary.  Free your mind to explore the possibilities.

Even more importantly, when you hear a suggestion or a creative idea, kindly refrain from attacking the source.  Give it some space in your brain.  It might grow into something awesome.  This is the goal of THE War Robots University - to help you grow into pilots who find a way!

Today's lesson comes courtesy of Professor Rat (Bastard), who reminds you that touching his robot inappropriately will get you destroyed!  Note the encirclement at 7:47 and the overall time of the battle, just under three and a half minutes - a classic four beacon victory (see yesterday's post about battle length).  (Note: "Aurora Doctrina" was the original name of the WR University clan.) 

 

"The legal and philosophic aspects of obedience are of enormous importance, but they say very little about how most people behave in concrete situations. I set up a simple experiment at Yale University to test how much pain an ordinary citizen would inflict on another person simply because he was ordered to by an experimental scientist ... Ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality, relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority." -Stanley Milgram

In summary, you have the unqualified blessing of the U to RESIST.  Get out there and win some battles, lose some battles, and enjoy the game.  It's a great one if you embrace your inner weirdness.

Your humble servant,

Where y'at, phD


Faculty Notes

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