Comment by ckastner | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ckastner | Hacker News Reader

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From the article of that HN discussion:

> “Now, okay,” Zimbardo corrected himself on the phone with me. He then acknowledged that the informed consent forms which subjects signed had included an explicit safe phrase: “I quit the experiment.” Only that precise phrase would trigger their release.

> “None of them said that,” Zimbardo said. “They said, ‘I want out. I want a doctor. I want my mother,’ etc., etc. Essentially I was saying, ‘You have to say, “I quit the experiment.”’”

> But the informed consent forms that Zimbardo’s subjects signed, which are available online from Zimbardo’s own website, contain no mention of the phrase “I quit the experiment.”

If the transcript of that phone discussion is thruthful and accurate, then Zimbardo lied with regards to that issue.

I believe this is a huge issue. The original article makes the accusation that this was probably criminal action ("false imprisonment"). Yet it is not listed in the "Contentious Issues" section of the rebuttal. I didn't read the entire piece, but searching for certain keywords didn't turn up anything new, either.

(Edit: just to be clear, claiming to be contractually entitled to hold people against their will unless they use an "explicit safe phrase" is nonsense to begin with, which is why I was hoping the rebuttal would address that argument.)

> claiming to be contractually entitled to hold people against their will unless they use an "explicit safe phrase" is nonsense to begin with, which is why I was hoping the rebuttal would address that argument

I agree, but at the same time safe-words exist for a reason. To allow people "playing the game" to tell what is a real out of character comment, and what is just part of the role. I honestly have no idea what the law says with respect to that. I think it's a tough area to play around in, and things can get real murky real quick.

(I'm talking quite generally wrt the concept around consent with safe words etc)

You appear not to understand the concept of a safe word.

The entire point of a safe word is that it is SHORT and MEMORABLE, not long and generic. "I quit the experiment" is a highly generic phrase, easily forgotten. Calling that phrase a "safe word" is absolutely absurd.

Also, even if I accepted your argument that "I quit the experiment" Is somehow a "safe word"-- it still wouldn't be technically correct to say, because it's not a word, it's a phrase / sequence of words. Have you ever heard of a "Safe phrase?" Me neither. That's because making a "safe word" a phrase completely defeats the concept of a safe word. It needs to be short enough to be said and understood in as little time as possible. Making a "safe word" a phrase instead of a short and easily-communicable SINGLE WORD is so deceptive and intellectually dishonest that it's clearly a willful and intentional misunderstanding of the safe-word concept. It's trickery, pure and simple.

Good safe word: "Banana."

Bad safe word: "Stop."

Terrible to the point of being unusable safe word: "I quit the experiment."

Zimbardo's lack of addressing this issue in his so-called "rebuttal": pathetic.

That's a good point... Zimbardo could claim that anything but the agreed-upon safe words were to be understood as part of the act they were hired for. Then, I imagine that it would be very hard to show beyond reasonable doubt intent to actually falsely imprison someone.

However, the original article claimed that the consent form had no such agreement -- Zimbardo merely claimed so in a phone interview.

Furthermore, given that Zimbardo's rebuttal is 18 pages long, you'd think that he'd at least briefly comment on the accusation of potentially criminal behavior.

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