10 Most Dangerous Science Experiments Ever Conducted
In innumerable ways, science has made our lives better and more convenient. However, if utilised improperly, this potent tool has the potential to end lives. There have been instances in history when it has been dangerously employed for political purposes. In addition, science's quest to push the frontiers of what is previously known might result in tragic circumstances.
This collection of sad circumstances makes us reflect on how science can be both strong and devastating when applied improperly.
1. Project MKUltra
The infamous Project MKUltra was the CIA's attempt to perfect mind control. From the 1950s until 1966, it began. In this experiment, individuals were given substances like the powerful psychedelic LSD, usually against their will. They endured sensory deprivation, lack of sleep, sexual assault, hypnosis, and other forms of psychological torture that no one would ever choose to go through.
The project's objectives include developing mind-controlling medications and studying chemical weapons to defeat the Soviet Union.
2. The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment
Between 1932 and 1972, 399 African American syphilis patients living in rural Alabama were denied treatment because of the fictitious study that the government paid for. Despite the fact that penicillin was discovered to be effective against the disease in 1947, clinicians continued to blame their patients' "poor blood" and failed to mention that syphilis was the actual cause of their deaths.
This experiment was carried out by the U.S. Public Health Service to learn more about the effects and natural progression of untreated syphilis. 28 people died immediately from syphilis, while a total of 100 patients passed away from linked complications.
3. Making the Plague a Weapon
Plaque wandered around Europe and killed nearly half of the population. In the 13th and 14th centuries, around 100 million individuals perished, resulting in a decline in global population. In the 1980s, the Soviet Union's biological warfare research department identified a method for deploying the plague as a weapon by sending it in the warheads of missiles at adversaries. Along with tons of plague, defectors reported that the Soviet Union also had hundreds of cargoes of anthrax and smallpox.
4. The Large Hadron Supercollider
The world's most advanced and largest machine is a scientific apparatus located in Switzerland. It was developed to learn more about particle physics and to explore it. However, the people became afraid of this device. It is also held responsible for bringing asteroids to the planet and starting earthquakes.
The LHC was alleged to have the ability to produce black holes that may engulf the earth, despite the fact that such conspiracy theories concerning it have been refuted. The collider's operating company, CERN, did not fully ignore this possibility.
Although the LHC is not harmful, CERN stated that it could produce some black holes.
5. The Aversion Project
Between 1971 and 1989, a medical torture project was launched in South Africa. Their objective was to "cure" the homosexuality of the military recruits. The practise was carried out under apartheid, a legal framework that upheld discriminatory practises against South Africans of colour. In this project, coercive "aversion therapy" procedures including chemical castration and therapeutic electric shocks are used. The army took part in this initiative and was permitted around 900 sex reassignment operations.
At that time, the medical community regarded homosexuality as a mental disease. Dr. Aubrey Levin, the project's professional Chief Psychiatrist, was later found guilty of violating human rights and condemned to prison by the international organisations.
6. The Trinity Test
This list includes the first nuclear experiment. The Manhattan Project was started during World War II because America desperately needed an advantage. The first nuclear weapon was ignited in the desert of New Mexico on July 16, 1945, during the Trinity Test. Even if the majority of scientists are confident in their research, there were still powerful sceptics who questioned the bomb's capabilities. Some even questioned whether the bomb would completely destroy all living and nonliving things on Earth.
7. Kola Superdeep Borehole
An effort by the Soviets that began in the 1970s aimed to pierce the earth's crust as deeply as feasible. In the extreme northwest of Russia, on the Peninsula or Kola, the Soviet Union was able to successfully drill a 12-kilometer hole in 1994. This provided us with scientific information, such as the finding of the microscopic plankton's 24 different species' ancient remains.
Nothing contradicting transpired, but there were worries of the sudden occurrence of seismic impacts brought on by excessive drilling or possibly by rupturing the entire planet earth.
The location of the experiment's hole is now closed.
8. STD Study from Guatemala
An another horrifying US experiment that harm was done in the name of "research." In Guatemala, between 1945 and 1956, roughly 1,500 persons were knowingly exposed to STDs like syphilis and gonorrhoea. Orphans, inmates, military conscripts, and prostitutes were the next group of participants in this dreadful experiment. To infect their participants and carry out their experiment, researchers employed dubious methods, infected prostitutes, and injections. The participants sued John Hopkins for its role in this experiment, seeking $1 billion in damages.
9. Unit 731
During World War II, the Japanese Army's covert research and development programme allowed the horrifying experiments on human subjects. Shiro Ishii served as the unit's general, and about 250,000 men, women, and children conducted scientific experiments there under his direction. The majority of subjects were Chinese casualties and prisoners of war from Russia and the Allies.
Amputations of limbs and the removal of internal organs including the liver, lungs, brain, and other organs are examples of forced surgical procedures. Vivarisections are the practise of cutting and operating live patients without anaesthetic. Forced pregnancies, biological warfare, frostbite testing, and the use of flamethrowers and grenades as weapons were all performed on the test subjects.
10. Experiment in Nazi Concentration Camps
The Nazis employed thousands of detainees from concentration camps in their medical research. The use of malaria to infect people, poisoning them, forcing sterilisation, inducing hypothermia in prisoners, and many other experiments are included in this list.
The Nazi physician responsible for these experiments is Josef Mengel, who epitomises the term "evil doctor." He paid special attention to twins, the majority of which are Jewish and Roma (Gypsy). Mengele, often known as the "Angel of Death," was responsible for crimes including dismembering victims, removing their organs without anaesthetic, injecting inmates with deadly bacteria, among other atrocities.
The notorious Mengele conducted experiments to demonstrate the illness resistance of Roma and Jews using the eyeballs of dead victims he had collected for his heterochromia studies.