From: oaf@serverx.osf.org (Oded Feingold)
Subject: Madness of Crowds (is your crowd mad?)
Summary: A Moby Course at Harvard Extension School
Keywords: aggression anthropology panic plague scapegoats witchcraft
Organization: Open Software Foundation
Distribution: ne
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 20:12:48 GMT
Expires: 25 Sep 92

[LONG - a review of a course I liked.]

Harvard Extension School starts Monday, September 21.  There's a
course I'll recommend to anyone interested in how the world works...
				 ----
		  PSYC E-1556  THE MADNESS OF CROWDS
	      Mondays, 7:30-9:30 P.M., Emerson Hall 108
 William Henry Anderson, MD, Lecturer on Psychiatry, Harvard Medical
    School.  4 units.  Noncredit $200, undergraduate credit $305,
			graduate credit $815.
				 ----
The silly and undersold course description, from page 123 of the
current catalog:

    This course examines behavioral phenomena of groups, crowds and
    mobs.  Witchcraft manias, financial crashes and panics, behavior
    during plagues, cults and mass movements, prophecies of apocalypse,
    and similar events will be studied.  The approach will be eclectic,
    with biological, psychological, historical and anthropological
    perspectives considered.

Let's rephrase it from the perspective of someone who took the course
and has fewer space constraints...

	Why do people lose it when they're together in groups?  What
	makes dictators attractive?  How come bullies win, and how can
	just a few of them dominate thousands of ordinary people?  Why
	do purportedly rational folks turn into lynch mobs, and under
	what circumstances?  What capacity for uncivilized behavior
	does our evolutionary history confer on humans?  Why is
	instinctive, unreasoning behavior sometimes the only way we
	can respond to a situation?  When is it good?  When is it bad?
	Why do soldiers go into situations no sane person would get
	near?  How do we convince them to do so?

	Should you join a boom market?  How can you tell when it's
	likely to bust?  What values do constitutional restraints on
	police power carry for non-perps and non-victims, and how
	likely are they to be observed in times of societal stress?
	Do it make sense to have mandatory drug testing?  How about
	AIDS testing?  Could the US go the way of Nazi Germany,
	Kampuchea, Yugoslavia?  What policies here can influence what
	happens elsewhere?

	How does your body chemistry change when you're on a team, be
	it a work group or a youth gang, and what does that say about
	your capacity for cooperative action?  What's the maximum size
	for the inner circle of an organization?  When should it
	split, or at least develop another "layer" of management?  How
	do you  organize a group for shock value or political
	effectiveness?  What's a good way to draw attention in a mass
	action?  What's a good way to avoid attention?  How do you
	spot trouble before it starts in a mob scene?  If you want to
	interfere, how do you do so?  How come eight cops can cut
	through a crowd like a knife through butter, and how do you
	make yourself less likely to be in a crisis with them?  Why do
	mobs want scapegoats?  How can you prevent yourself from
	becoming one?

	What's your life strategy for mediating between cooperation
	and competition?  How does it fit in with the time and place
	you live in?  How does a used car salesman(*) sidestep your 
	instincts for self-preservation?  How does a demagogue or cult
	leader do so, and how can you distinguish cults from
	"legitimate" movements or religions?   What should you watch
	for if you're buying, voting, or handing over your life
	savings to the perfect master?

Current news items, like (last year) the Gulf War, Jeff Dahmer, and a
spectacular accusation of child abuse in New Jersey get hauled out and
analyzed as group/crowd phenomena.

The course challenges anyone's assumptions about self, truth, justice, human
nature, the power of reason (and positive thinking), family values(!)
and one's relationship with society.  It provides a handle for
thinking about big and sometimes dangerous events, and maybe dealing
with them a little better.

If you're at OSF, I have some catalogs (with registration forms) in my
office [rm 358].  I'll even answer the occasional question.

Oded Feingold  oaf@osf.org     Contractor at  Open Software Foundation
OSF:   11 Cambridge Center     Cambridge,  Ma. 02142    (617) 621-7265
Home:  408 Broadway            Somerville, Ma. 02145    (617) 776-1225

(*)  Okay, so "salesman" is sexist.  There are reasons ....
Newsgroups: ne.general,ne.seminars