Generational Dynamics Forum - New Site

gerald wrote:
> People are like rats in a cage --

> from -- Escaping the Laboratory:
> The Rodent Experiments
> of John B. Calhoun
> & Their Cultural Influence
> http://www.lse.ac.uk/economicHistory/pd ... madams.pdf

> ----And the change was permanent ----

> Employed in the Laboratory of Psychology of the National Institute
> of Mental Health from 1954, Calhoun repeated the experiment in
> specially constructed “rodent universes” – room-sized pens which
> could be viewed from the attic above via windows cut through the
> ceiling. Using a variety of strains of rats and mice, he once more
> provided his populations with food, bedding, and shelter. With no
> predators and with exposure to disease kept at a minimum, Calhoun
> described his experimental universes as “rat utopia,” “mouse
> paradise.”

> With all their visible needs met, the animals bred rapidly. The
> only restriction Calhoun imposed on his population was of space –
> and as the population grew, this became increasingly
> problematic. As the pens heaved with animals, one of his
> assistants described rodent “utopia” as having become “hell”
> (Marsden 1972).

> Dominant males became aggressive, some moving in groups, attacking
> females and the young. Mating behaviors were disrupted. Some
> became exclusively homosexual. Others became pansexual and
> hypersexual, attempting to mount any rat they encountered. Mothers
> neglected their infants, first failing to construct proper nests,
> and then carelessly abandoning and even attacking their pups. In
> certain sections of the pens, infant mortality rose as high as
> 96%, the dead cannibalized by adults. Subordinate animals withdrew
> psychologically, surviving in a physical sense but at an immense
> psychological cost. They were the majority in the late phases of
> growth, existing as a vacant, huddled mass in the centre of the
> pens. Unable to breed, the population plummeted and did not
> recover. The crowded rodents had lost the ability to co-exist
> harmoniously, even after the population numbers once again fell to
> low levels. At a certain density, they had ceased to act like rats
> and mice, and the change was permanent.

> -----------------------------
> and people are different?
> -----------------------------

> John, sometimes I think you look at humanity like rats in a cage
> -- not that I would disagree with that objective position -- or as
> Spock of "Star Trek" would say "fascinating".