Another month has passed and here is a new rationality quotes thread. The usual rules are:
- Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be upvoted or downvoted separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)
- Do not quote yourself.
- Do not quote from Less Wrong itself, HPMoR, Eliezer Yudkowsky, or Robin Hanson. If you'd like to revive an old quote from one of those sources, please do so here.
- No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.
Here's one with actual information gained: Imperial Japanese experimentation about frostbite
The cost of this scientific breakthrough was borne by those seized for medical experiments. They were taken outside and left with exposed arms, periodically drenched with water, until a guard decided that frostbite had set in. Testimony From a Japanese officer said this was determined after the "frozen arms, when struck with a short stick, emitted a sound resembling that which a board gives when it is struck."
I don't get the impression that those experiments destroyed a lot of trust-- nothing compared to the rape of Nanking or Japanese treatment of American prisoners of war.
However, it might be worth noting that that sort of experimentation doesn't seem to happen to people who are affiliated with the scientists or the government.
Logically, people could volunteer for such experiments and get the same respect that soldiers do, but I don't know of any real-world examples.
I was going to say that I didn't think that medical researchers had ever solicited volunteers for experiments which are near certain to produce such traumatic effects, but on second thought, I do recall that some of the early research on the effects of decompression (as experienced by divers) was done by a scientist who solicited volunteers to be subjected to decompression sickness. I believe that some research on the effects of dramatic deceleration was also done similarly.