The Human Factor (1963 The Outer Limits)

"The Human Factor"
The Outer Limits episode
Episode no. Season 1
Episode 8
Directed by Abner Biberman
Written by David Duncan
Cinematography by Conrad Hall
Production code 3
Original air date November 11, 1963
Guest stars
Episode chronology
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List of The Outer Limits episodes

"The Human Factor" is an episode of the original The Outer Limits television show. It first aired on 11 November 1963, during the first season. The title was re-used in 2002 for an episode with an unrelated plot.

Contents

Introduction

Doctor James Hamilton develops a device that allows him to experience the thoughts and feelings of another person.

Opening narration

“ In northern Greenland, the mountains stand like a wall along Victoria Channel whose straight course marks the line of the great Baffin Fault. Until recently not even the Eskimos ventured into this arctic waste, but today, as in other lonely places of the world, the land is dominated by those instruments of detection which stand as a grim reminder of man's fear of man. This is Point TABU, a name given this predominantly underground base by a young officer who explained that the letters in TABU stood for 'Total Abandonment of Better Understanding'. Some two hundred men and a few women make this their permanent residence. Their task is to maintain a constant alert against enemy attack and be prepared to respond to it devastatingly. ”

Plot

At an outpost in Greenland, an officer (Guardino) begins losing his grip on reality after losing one of his soldiers in an icy crevasse. Haunted by a spectre of the dead man, the officer decides he must detonate an atomic device at the outpost to obliterate the crevice - and the outpost as well. The outpost doctor (Merrill) uses a revolutionary mind probe in an attempt to understand what is driving the officer mad. When an unexpected earthquake causes the probe to malfunction, the minds of the doctor and the officer are switched. This new identity enables the insane officer to set about his plan for destruction in the guise of the doctor, while the real doctor is confined to a padded cell.

Closing narration

“ A weapon? No, only an instrument: neither good nor evil until men put it to use. And then like so many of man's inventions it can be used either to save lives or destroy them, to make men sane or to drive them mad, to increase human understanding or to betray it. But it will be men that make the choice. By itself the instrument is nothing until you add the human factor. ”

Cast

External links