I have to share a paragraph in my Social Psychology textbook. It is too funny.
The passage was about the Alamo. To provide a little context, it was a scene of epic bravery in Texas's war of Independence from Mexico. There were fewer than 200 Texan soldiers garrisoned at the Alamo and they were to go up against 4000 Mexican troops under the command of General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. Before the battle began, their commander Lieutenant Colonel William Travis offered every soldier the opportunity to leave he did so by drawing a line in the sand and inviting all who wished to join him to cross it. Every single man crossed that line and all of them died.
The psychologist who wrote the passage was at Alamo for a social psychology conference.
Now for the passage!
"There is no denying the heroism of those 200 men. They gave their 'last full measure of devotion' to the cause. But there is something about experiencing the Alamo in the presence of so many social psychologists - people attuned to the importance of the tiniest situational detail- that made it hard to imagine that the event actually occurred in such a storybook fashion. Given what we know about human behavior, it is unlikely that all 200 individuals enthusiastically crossed the line to join Travis. It is much more likely that the most devoted did so, and then a few more crossed the line so as not to be outdone, and then the others only reluctantly did so, after thinking to themselves, "Oh #@!$%, everyone's staying! What am I going to do?""
LOL. Now every textbook should be written like that.
The passage was about the Alamo. To provide a little context, it was a scene of epic bravery in Texas's war of Independence from Mexico. There were fewer than 200 Texan soldiers garrisoned at the Alamo and they were to go up against 4000 Mexican troops under the command of General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. Before the battle began, their commander Lieutenant Colonel William Travis offered every soldier the opportunity to leave he did so by drawing a line in the sand and inviting all who wished to join him to cross it. Every single man crossed that line and all of them died.
The psychologist who wrote the passage was at Alamo for a social psychology conference.
Now for the passage!
"There is no denying the heroism of those 200 men. They gave their 'last full measure of devotion' to the cause. But there is something about experiencing the Alamo in the presence of so many social psychologists - people attuned to the importance of the tiniest situational detail- that made it hard to imagine that the event actually occurred in such a storybook fashion. Given what we know about human behavior, it is unlikely that all 200 individuals enthusiastically crossed the line to join Travis. It is much more likely that the most devoted did so, and then a few more crossed the line so as not to be outdone, and then the others only reluctantly did so, after thinking to themselves, "Oh #@!$%, everyone's staying! What am I going to do?""
LOL. Now every textbook should be written like that.
Gilovich, T., Keltner, D.
& Nisbett, R.E.(2011).Social
Psychology (2nd ed.).New York:W.W. Norton. pp 275-276
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