[Music]
that’s wrong 240 volts these horrible
acts were committed in the name of
science
welcome to watchmojo.com and today we’re
counting down our picks for the top 10
terrible experiments performed in the
United States known as the Moscow show
trials these court cases give the world
its first public glimpse of mind control
for this list we’re looking at examples
of human experimentation executed in the
u.s. that were harmful to their test
subjects it was important they were
supposedly untreated and it would be
undesirable to go ahead and use large
amounts of penicillin to treat other
disease because you’d interfere with
study please note that some of these
stories could not be proven as 100%
factually accurate and as such may only
be commonly repeated rumors however
we’ve done our best to get the most
accurate information possible an
overwhelming number who say they were
intentionally exposed to mustard gas in
secret experiments have been denied
benefits for decades
number 10 project MKULTRA officially
sanctioned in 1953 and backed by the CIA
this series of experiments studied the
effect of mind control with methods like
hypnosis drugs isolation and sensory
deprivation used to modify human
behavior this is what they did they did
chemicals they did biologicals they did
disguises they did electronic secret
writing and the like the CIA enlisted
the help of prisons hospitals and more
than 40 universities to perform
experiments on subjects without their
knowledge in one of these sub projects
operation midnight climax prostitutes
who were secretly working for the CIA
gave clients LSD and while these men
were under the influence they were spied
on through a one-way mirror in 1973 CIA
director Richard Helms ordered the
destruction of all records related to
MKULTRA but subsequent investigations
led by Senator Frank church and vice
president Nelson Rockefeller in addition
to twenty thousand records recovered in
1977 were able to shed light on these
activities
number nine the Stanford Prison
Experiment designed by psychologist
Philip Zimbardo the goal of this 1971
experiment was to examine the
psychological impact of imprisonment for
the experiment the psychology building
at Stanford University was turned into a
prison with twenty four undergraduate
students divided into two groups
prisoners and guards I don’t look on it
as an experiment or a simulation but
just as a prison that was run by
psychologists instead of run by the
state they took their commitment to
their roles two disturbing levels with
the guards doling out abuse and the
prisoners accepting it things got so
intense that some students had to be
removed due to the trauma
although the exercise was supposed to
last two weeks and had the interest of
the US Marine Corps and Navy it was shut
down after just six days when the
repercussions of the experiment became
clear number eight the Milgram
experiment fascinated by what motivated
Nazi officers to commit atrocities
during World War two Yale psychologist
Stanley Milgram set up an experiment to
see just how far Americans would go
before their conscience stopped them yes
he’s laughing right it’s hard to
understand exactly why part of it is the
absurdity of the situation and part of
this the nervousness that they’re
feeling in the 1960s experiment a
teacher would read questions to a
learner who was actually an actor
pretending to participate in the study
when the learner got an answer wrong the
teacher gave what he believed to be a
real electric shock progressing in
fifteen volt increments up to 450 volts
did it sound as if he was in pain
yeah if the teachers objected they were
forced to administer it regardless after
being assured that they would be free of
all responsibility the teacher typically
complied even when the learner screamed
in agony that’s wrong 225 volts
two-thirds of the 40 test subjects went
all the way to 450 volts proving how
much we’re ingrained to obey Authority
even if we believe it to be morally or
legally unjustified we’ll be all right
yeah
please continue number seven
dr. Leo Stanley’s San Quentin prison
experiments as chief surgeon at San
Quentin dr. Leo Stanley used prisoners
for various experiments from 1913 to
1951 with some verging into dark
territory these experiments included
sterilization and possibly finding
treatments for Spanish flu a strong
supporter of eugenics Stan Lee performed
vasectomies on inmates who were sold on
the idea of better health reformed
behavior and a stronger sex drive in one
project that aimed to find a source of
rejuvenation Stanley used live prisoners
for surgery that transplanted testicles
human or otherwise the experiment began
with testicle sourced from executed
prisoners but when the supply ran dry
dr. Stanley began using boar and goat
testes in his work number six the Boston
project working with the Oak Ridge
National Laboratory from 1953 to 57 dr.
William sweet who was the chief
neurosurgeon at Harvard’s massachusetts
general hospital gave uranium injections
to eleven cancer patients who were
terminally ill with all but one
reportedly suffering from brain tumors
dr. sweet was interested in learning how
the distribution of uranium affected the
body and whether it could be used to
treat tumors in 1995 under testimony dr.
sweet claimed he had consent from all
his patients for his experiments however
a lack of supporting documents as well
as the case of one patient who was found
unconscious and later died without
regaining
consciousness or being identified makes
those planes slightly dubious number
five the Tuskegee syphilis experiment
from 1932 to 1972 600 african-american
farmers from Alabama were selected for a
US public health services program
receiving free health care and other
benefits for their cooperation however
they weren’t told they were actually
being studied 399 of the men had
syphilis while the other 201 were used
as a control group many of these
subjects poor and often illiterate
sharecroppers didn’t even know they had
the disease even after penicillin was
developed as a cure for syphilis in 1947
the treatment was withheld from the
patients as was access to proper
information or treatment many ultimately
died of syphilis with at least 40 women
contracting it from their husbands and
nearly 20 children born with it as a
result of an information leak the
project was shut down in 1972 but it
wasn’t until 1997 that President Bill
Clinton formally apologized on behalf of
the government for what happened the
eight men who are survivors of the
syphilis study at Tuskegee are a living
link to a time not so very long ago that
many Americans would prefer not to
remember number four the University of
California experiments on newborns
leading up to a study published in the
medical journal of pediatrics 113
newborn babies no older than 3 days old
were experimented on by scientists at
the University of California’s
department of pediatrics in the early
1960s studies conducted on the babies
included a battery of bizarre and
seemingly unnecessary experiments
regarding blood flow and pressure in one
test over 40 babies were placed on
circumcision boards and held upside down
while doctors measured how their blood
flow to their head in another babies
were placed ankle-deep in ice-cold water
while a catheter was inserted into their
a Horta in an effort to monitor their
aortic pressure
three dr. bender forces
electroconvulsive therapy on children
while working as a neuropsychiatry at
New York’s Bellevue Hospital dr. Loretta
bender decided an effective treatment
for children with developmental
disorders or schizophrenia was
electroconvulsive therapy or ECT
previously called electroshock therapy
in 1947 dr. bender sent small electric
currents through the brains of 98
children all of whom were 12 or under
and one of whom was 3 another of dr.
benders methods for trying to alleviate
schizophrenia was to give her young
patients LSD Ted Chavez Sinskey was one
of the children who went through the
therapy when he was 6 years old and he
later became a human rights activist who
successfully fought against the use of
electroshock therapy in Berkeley
California best thing we can do is go on
with our daily routine all right number
two military experiments with mustard
gas during World War two in 1943 the
Navy recruited upwards of 60,000 young
men for a study only they weren’t asked
to participate they were told only when
they arrived at the naval research
laboratory in Washington DC did they
find the real purpose of the study to
measure the effects of mustard gas and
other chemicals on humans they rubbed a
liquid chemical on my arm and hand and
had me breathe the gas without a mask on
I had no protective clothing in the gas
chamber locked in chambers and exposed
to the deadly gas the men involved in
these experiments suffered horrible
health effects including internal and
external burns additionally as it was a
wartime experiment they were bound by
oaths of secrecy and faced dishonorable
discharge or imprisonment if they spoke
of the order the details of which were
not formally Declassified until 1993
before we unveil our number-one pick
here are some honorable mentions
number one Vanderbilt University’s
vitamin drinks following World War two
researchers at Vanderbilt University
gave over 800 pregnant women a
mysterious concoction they were told was
a special vitamin drink it was actually
mixtures that contain doses of
radioactive iron as the scientists were
testing its absorption rate during
pregnancy the radiation these women were
exposed to was reportedly 30 times
higher than normal around 3 or 4
children died of cancer or leukemia as a
result of the experiment and some
mothers developed rashes lost hair and
teeth and contracted various types of
cancer themselves in 1994 almost 40
years later Vanderbilt University faced
a lawsuit for the four-year study and
was forced to pay out more than 10
million dollars in damages do you agree
with our list I’m bad not too bad I mean
we uh we ran a pretty ragged which
American experiment horrified you the
most ha I get a little skittish nervous
for more historical top 10s published
every day be sure to subscribe to
watchmojo.com is a big like worry what
you gotta do get my really fine actor
okay yes I am body my eyes are there no
night look
[Music]
Oh
[Music]
that’s wrong 240 volts these horrible
acts were committed in the name of
science
welcome to watchmojo.com and today we’re
counting down our picks for the top 10
terrible experiments performed in the
United States known as the Moscow show
trials these court cases give the world
its first public glimpse of mind control
for this list we’re looking at examples
of human experimentation executed in the
u.s. that were harmful to their test
subjects it was important they were
supposedly untreated and it would be
undesirable to go ahead and use large
amounts of penicillin to treat other
disease because you’d interfere with
study please note that some of these
stories could not be proven as 100%
factually accurate and as such may only
be commonly repeated rumors however
we’ve done our best to get the most
accurate information possible an
overwhelming number who say they were
intentionally exposed to mustard gas in
secret experiments have been denied
benefits for decades
number 10 project MKULTRA officially
sanctioned in 1953 and backed by the CIA
this series of experiments studied the
effect of mind control with methods like
hypnosis drugs isolation and sensory
deprivation used to modify human
behavior this is what they did they did
chemicals they did biologicals they did
disguises they did electronic secret
writing and the like the CIA enlisted
the help of prisons hospitals and more
than 40 universities to perform
experiments on subjects without their
knowledge in one of these sub projects
operation midnight climax prostitutes
who were secretly working for the CIA
gave clients LSD and while these men
were under the influence they were spied
on through a one-way mirror in 1973 CIA
director Richard Helms ordered the
destruction of all records related to
MKULTRA but subsequent investigations
led by Senator Frank church and vice
president Nelson Rockefeller in addition
to twenty thousand records recovered in
1977 were able to shed light on these
activities
number nine the Stanford Prison
Experiment designed by psychologist
Philip Zimbardo the goal of this 1971
experiment was to examine the
psychological impact of imprisonment for
the experiment the psychology building
at Stanford University was turned into a
prison with twenty four undergraduate
students divided into two groups
prisoners and guards I don’t look on it
as an experiment or a simulation but
just as a prison that was run by
psychologists instead of run by the
state they took their commitment to
their roles two disturbing levels with
the guards doling out abuse and the
prisoners accepting it things got so
intense that some students had to be
removed due to the trauma
although the exercise was supposed to
last two weeks and had the interest of
the US Marine Corps and Navy it was shut
down after just six days when the
repercussions of the experiment became
clear number eight the Milgram
experiment fascinated by what motivated
Nazi officers to commit atrocities
during World War two Yale psychologist
Stanley Milgram set up an experiment to
see just how far Americans would go
before their conscience stopped them yes
he’s laughing right it’s hard to
understand exactly why part of it is the
absurdity of the situation and part of
this the nervousness that they’re
feeling in the 1960s experiment a
teacher would read questions to a
learner who was actually an actor
pretending to participate in the study
when the learner got an answer wrong the
teacher gave what he believed to be a
real electric shock progressing in
fifteen volt increments up to 450 volts
did it sound as if he was in pain
yeah if the teachers objected they were
forced to administer it regardless after
being assured that they would be free of
all responsibility the teacher typically
complied even when the learner screamed
in agony that’s wrong 225 volts
two-thirds of the 40 test subjects went
all the way to 450 volts proving how
much we’re ingrained to obey Authority
even if we believe it to be morally or
legally unjustified we’ll be all right
yeah
please continue number seven
dr. Leo Stanley’s San Quentin prison
experiments as chief surgeon at San
Quentin dr. Leo Stanley used prisoners
for various experiments from 1913 to
1951 with some verging into dark
territory these experiments included
sterilization and possibly finding
treatments for Spanish flu a strong
supporter of eugenics Stan Lee performed
vasectomies on inmates who were sold on
the idea of better health reformed
behavior and a stronger sex drive in one
project that aimed to find a source of
rejuvenation Stanley used live prisoners
for surgery that transplanted testicles
human or otherwise the experiment began
with testicle sourced from executed
prisoners but when the supply ran dry
dr. Stanley began using boar and goat
testes in his work number six the Boston
project working with the Oak Ridge
National Laboratory from 1953 to 57 dr.
William sweet who was the chief
neurosurgeon at Harvard’s massachusetts
general hospital gave uranium injections
to eleven cancer patients who were
terminally ill with all but one
reportedly suffering from brain tumors
dr. sweet was interested in learning how
the distribution of uranium affected the
body and whether it could be used to
treat tumors in 1995 under testimony dr.
sweet claimed he had consent from all
his patients for his experiments however
a lack of supporting documents as well
as the case of one patient who was found
unconscious and later died without
regaining
consciousness or being identified makes
those planes slightly dubious number
five the Tuskegee syphilis experiment
from 1932 to 1972 600 african-american
farmers from Alabama were selected for a
US public health services program
receiving free health care and other
benefits for their cooperation however
they weren’t told they were actually
being studied 399 of the men had
syphilis while the other 201 were used
as a control group many of these
subjects poor and often illiterate
sharecroppers didn’t even know they had
the disease even after penicillin was
developed as a cure for syphilis in 1947
the treatment was withheld from the
patients as was access to proper
information or treatment many ultimately
died of syphilis with at least 40 women
contracting it from their husbands and
nearly 20 children born with it as a
result of an information leak the
project was shut down in 1972 but it
wasn’t until 1997 that President Bill
Clinton formally apologized on behalf of
the government for what happened the
eight men who are survivors of the
syphilis study at Tuskegee are a living
link to a time not so very long ago that
many Americans would prefer not to
remember number four the University of
California experiments on newborns
leading up to a study published in the
medical journal of pediatrics 113
newborn babies no older than 3 days old
were experimented on by scientists at
the University of California’s
department of pediatrics in the early
1960s studies conducted on the babies
included a battery of bizarre and
seemingly unnecessary experiments
regarding blood flow and pressure in one
test over 40 babies were placed on
circumcision boards and held upside down
while doctors measured how their blood
flow to their head in another babies
were placed ankle-deep in ice-cold water
while a catheter was inserted into their
a Horta in an effort to monitor their
aortic pressure
three dr. bender forces
electroconvulsive therapy on children
while working as a neuropsychiatry at
New York’s Bellevue Hospital dr. Loretta
bender decided an effective treatment
for children with developmental
disorders or schizophrenia was
electroconvulsive therapy or ECT
previously called electroshock therapy
in 1947 dr. bender sent small electric
currents through the brains of 98
children all of whom were 12 or under
and one of whom was 3 another of dr.
benders methods for trying to alleviate
schizophrenia was to give her young
patients LSD Ted Chavez Sinskey was one
of the children who went through the
therapy when he was 6 years old and he
later became a human rights activist who
successfully fought against the use of
electroshock therapy in Berkeley
California best thing we can do is go on
with our daily routine all right number
two military experiments with mustard
gas during World War two in 1943 the
Navy recruited upwards of 60,000 young
men for a study only they weren’t asked
to participate they were told only when
they arrived at the naval research
laboratory in Washington DC did they
find the real purpose of the study to
measure the effects of mustard gas and
other chemicals on humans they rubbed a
liquid chemical on my arm and hand and
had me breathe the gas without a mask on
I had no protective clothing in the gas
chamber locked in chambers and exposed
to the deadly gas the men involved in
these experiments suffered horrible
health effects including internal and
external burns additionally as it was a
wartime experiment they were bound by
oaths of secrecy and faced dishonorable
discharge or imprisonment if they spoke
of the order the details of which were
not formally Declassified until 1993
before we unveil our number-one pick
here are some honorable mentions
number one Vanderbilt University’s
vitamin drinks following World War two
researchers at Vanderbilt University
gave over 800 pregnant women a
mysterious concoction they were told was
a special vitamin drink it was actually
mixtures that contain doses of
radioactive iron as the scientists were
testing its absorption rate during
pregnancy the radiation these women were
exposed to was reportedly 30 times
higher than normal around 3 or 4
children died of cancer or leukemia as a
result of the experiment and some
mothers developed rashes lost hair and
teeth and contracted various types of
cancer themselves in 1994 almost 40
years later Vanderbilt University faced
a lawsuit for the four-year study and
was forced to pay out more than 10
million dollars in damages do you agree
with our list I’m bad not too bad I mean
we uh we ran a pretty ragged which
American experiment horrified you the
most ha I get a little skittish nervous
for more historical top 10s published
every day be sure to subscribe to
watchmojo.com is a big like worry what
you gotta do get my really fine actor
okay yes I am body my eyes are there no
night look
[Music]
Oh
[Music]
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