The phrase “mad scientist” came to life not without good reason. Scientists are often know to think out of the box, but sometimes they just really go beyond what is normal and imaginable!
1. “Would you go to bed with me tonight?” – In 1978, psychologist Russel Clark with the help of his students conducted an experiment to see which gender would be more willing to receive sex from a stranger of the opposite gender. “I have been noticing you around campus. I find you to be attractive. Would you go to bed with me tonight?” was the question asked, and 75% of guys accepted, while not a single woman did.
2. Hanging studies – In 1905, Nicolas Minovicis, a forensic scientist was able to persuade an assistant along with other willing participants to be hanged for 12 times to see what would happen to the human body when a person is hanged. While fully aware of the dangers, he had the participants hanged up to two from the ground!
3. Human corpse electrification – Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein may have gotten her inspiration from the 1780’s experiement where Luigi Galvani electrocuted human corpses. The experiement first made use of animal specimen, but became more and more bizarre until a human corpse was used. The most noted demonstration was on January 17, 1803 when a 120-volt battery was used to electrocute the executed murderer named George Foster. This also brought to life researches on trying to revive dead bodies with electricity since corpses seemed to show signs of life and movement while they were being electrocuted.
4. Stanford Prison Experiment – Philip Zimbardo had a group of students play prisoners and guards in a mock setup in order to see why prisons have become such violent places. Results were observed fast an on the first night, the prisoners had a revolt while the guards felt threatened and exercised hard control of their power. The prisoners had negative experiences while the guards enjoyed this power they had. After just 6 days and even having thought of going to the real police for help, the experiment was cancelled because of the adverse effects observed.
5. The Obedience Experiment – Stanley Milgram’s obedience experiement was conducted at Yale University where the main premise was to test whether the participant of the experiment would acquiesce to the researcher’s demand—even if it meant having to kill the subject. The subject was just an actor being “subjected” to electrocution and a shockingly disturbing obedience of raising the voltage higher was noted even when the subject was already “dead.”