In Love at Goon Park, Blum does an equally skillful job balancing the pictures of that psychologist, Harry Harlow, as troubled soul and brutal abuser of his experimental subjects versus helper of humankind through brilliant science.
__________
But there is more to mothering than being warm terry cloth: the cloth mother-reared monkeys matured into social cripples. This prompted the dark, last phase of Harlow's work. What is missing in a monkey raised with a cloth mother? In one raised with a living mother but no peers? In complete isolation? Can "therapists" (younger, unthreatening and highly socialized monkeys) repair the broken animal produced by isolation? What kind of mothers do isolated monkeys become (are they often violently abusive)? This period produced a horrific finding: if an infant is punished for hugging a surrogate mother (with, for example, a jet of air shot from the surrogate's torso), the infant hugs more, not less. This violated every tenet of behaviorist reinforcement theory but is obvious to anyone who loves the wrong person.
These were brutal studies, animals shattered by isolation. They made Harlow a pariah in many circles. Useful science was produced (though not nearly enough to justify the extent of what was done, in my opinion). Animals suffered unspeakably. And Blum documents Harlow's personal demons during this period: alcoholism, estrangement from his children, depression requiring hospitalization and electroconvulsive therapy.
{the debate may continue I guess. well it will. same as there'll be people debating all kinds of different important things right up til there's no oxygen left. or whatever.
the idea that compromise with evil is necessary has led us directly to this moment. the evidence is as clear as it will ever be. it didn't work. and it isn't going to. there is no further movement possible in any direction but down. the ichneumon gambit is still unexplored, and that may be what this all was. either that or just a cosmically sad mistake. an infection. a boil. pus-filled swelling of an entire planet. }
informant38
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...But of these sophisms and elenchs of merchandise I skill not...
Milton, Areopagitica
Except he had found the
standing sea-rock that even this last
Temptation breaks on; quieter than death but lovelier; peace
that quiets the desire even of praising it.
Jeffers, Meditation On Saviors
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6.11.02
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