20 Science Experiments That Appear Incredibly Sinister

Throughout history, science has brought about numerous changes that have been both good and bad. There have been times when scientists have made honest mistakes, but there have also been times when they have committed unimaginable horrors. 

In the 1960s and 1970s, a group of psychologists led by Peter Neubauer separated twins and triplets and placed them with adoptive families for a study partly funded by the National Institute of Mental Health.

During the Holocaust, prisoners were subjected to cruel and inhumane medical experiments by the Nazis. A Schutzstaffel (SS) physician named Josef Mengele targeted twins in these experiments to test theories of racial superiority. Many prisoners suffered, and some did not survive. 

The Japanese Imperial Army conducted medical testing on civilians during the 1930s and 1940s, primarily in China. Historians estimate that as many as 200,000 people may have died due to the brutal experiments, which included spreading infectious diseases and testing frostbite treatments. 

Speech pathologists at the University of Iowa conducted a study in 1939 to prove that stuttering was a learned behavior due to a child’s anxiety about speaking. They induced anxiety in orphans by telling them they were stuttering and should not talk unless the children were sure they would pronounce words correctly. 

In the 1830s, only cadavers of executed people were available for dissection, prompting anatomists to buy corpses from grave robbers. A man named William Burke went one step ahead—he smothered a dozen lodgers at their boarding house and sold their remains to anatomist Robert Knox. 

The father of modern gynecology, J. Marion Sims, remains a controversial figure. He is heavily criticized for his cruel treatment of vesicovaginal fistula on enslaved women. He conducted experimental surgeries on these females without anesthesia because he believed the process wasn’t painful enough.

The US Public Health Service launched a study in 1932 to analyze the effects of untreated syphilis in black men. Besides 399 Alabamian black men, the researchers also examined 201 healthy men to track the disease spread. 

Many still believe that the government deliberately infected Tuskegee participants with Syphilis. When historian Susan Reverby’s work came to light, it showed that the US and Guatemalan governments co-sponsored a study on 1,500 syphilis patients. 

In 1971, psychologist Philip Zimbardo tried to examine human nature in a prison study. He built a jail and paid university students to act as guards and captives. The two-week experiment was stopped after six days when patrols started to torture prisoners who had become depressed. `

Humanity’s fascination with implantable identity codes exploded after the appearance of the first RFID implant in 1998. Indeed, some institutions now have FDA approval to implant them in people for tracking purposes. 

Stanley Milgram’s famous ‘shock’ experiments remain a stark reminder of how far people will go under the orders of an authoritarian figure. In the study, volunteers were made to believe they were administering electric shocks to a test subject, who was actually an actor hired by Milgram. 

The Hofling hospital experiment in 1966 had nurses administer a lethal drug dose to a patient. Unlike Milgram’s experiment, in which the subjects may not have fully understood the potential danger of their actions, the nurses were fully aware of the toxic dose.

In early 1895, Emma Eckstein sought treatment for her nervous disorder from Sigmund Freud. Freud’s colleague Wilhelm Fleiss proposed a radical cure that involved cauterizing her nostrils to cure her excessive masturbation.

Yale professor Jose Delgado caused a stir in the scientific community during the mid-20th century with his invention, the Stimoceiver. The device used radio waves to manipulate human behavior, and quite alarmingly proved the potential to control human subjects.

Most toddlers have a strong urge to be around their parents. As it turns out, monkeys also exhibit similar behaviors, as discovered by psychologist Harry Harlow.

In February 1954, Russian researchers stretched the borders of medical science in what was termed “dog head transplants.” Doctors Vladimir Demikhov and Sergei Bryukhonenko received a lot of criticism for these scientific abominations but pursued them regardless.

Spider goats existed only in science fiction until Professor Randy Lewis came along. The creature doesn’t pale in comparison to other goats, despite having a lot of spider DNA.

After a drug is deemed safe for animals, it usually has similar effects on humans. However, this, unfortunately, was not the case in the testing of the leukemia palliative TH1412 in 2007. 

Finally, we have another bio-genetic experiment that sounds like science fiction. Researchers at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California, discovered that human brain cells thrive perfectly in fetal mice.