

Pit of despair - nopassrecover
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_of_despair

======
jacquesm
This reminds me of a bit of painful personal history.

When moving back from Canada to the Netherlands we took our dogs that we had
acquired while in Canada back with us. Sarah, a three year old Irish wolfhound
and Lisa, a 2 year old labrador / husky mix.

They went by plane, in crates specifically designed for the purpose.

On arrival the wolfhound had completely lost it, didn't recognize any of us
and was totally out of it for at least two weeks, after which she slowly
recovered. That was just 8 hours in a crate, not even close to the 'pit of
despair' shown in the article, and anybody that willfully places an animal in
such conditions just to see what damage will occur ought to be shot.

If I had had any idea something like that could have happened I would have
gladly taken a boat with her, no matter how much longer that would have taken.
It was incredibly sad to see her in that state, eventually she completely
recovered though.

The other dog didn't show anything strange at all and took the whole thing in
stride.

~~~
gizmo
> anybody that willfully places an animal in such conditions just to see what
> damage will occur ought to be shot

Are you talking about sadism or scientific curiosity? I detest the former but
I'm comfortable with the latter.

~~~
nebula
Not to sound pedantic but you do realize that those two qualities are not
necessarily mutually exclusive in people right? If we condone such cruelty to
other living beings in the name of scientific curiosity, there is no limit to
it. It's not ok to go around torturing others because one is 'scientifically
curious'.

~~~
gizmo
Our society is built on the backs of the less fortunate. We live in a country
we've taken from weaker humans, we feed animals in factories until we're ready
to kill them because it's cheaper than treating them humanely. We get our
energy from coal mines where hundreds of thousands of workers have died and we
stand by as genocides and famines wipe out entire regions. We buy products
made by children who work all day every day in factories.

Given the circumstances, cruel experiments on animals (or even humans) to
speed up scientific progress (and therefore welfare) looks like a really good
deal to me.

Victims of science are just another statistic.

~~~
Hexstream
Well, then I hope for you you never become a statistic!

------
ZeroGravitas
A warning for those of a sensitive nature, that's some disturbing reading
about animal experiments, mostly psychological torture of young primates.

~~~
booticon
Shit, it's making me depressed just _reading_ about it.

~~~
pohl
Same here. And I was expecting some levity (I thought it might be a Princess
Bride reference).

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z05StkAKKF0>

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Jun8
This ... words fail me. I'm not against reasonable experimentation in animals
(for drug research and related) but this seems just like some sick psycho's
idea of research. The article says the experiments were controversial but
check out Harlow's biography, he got two awards _after_ conducting these
experiments. My view of psychiatry (clueless people trying random drugs to
cure things they don't fully understand) has sunk to a new low. To me this is
no different than Mengele's experiments. Do we take pity on _him_ because he
was depressed.

Jeez, this article ruined a perfectly good morning for me.

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BigZaphod
It really sounds like Harry Harlow was a sociopath
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy>). I know a handful of academic
science-types (some of which do experiments with animals) and I can't imagine
any of them condoning so cruel a study. Ugh.

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_pius
That is unbelievable. The scientist in question exhibited a profound lack of
empathy; he probably would have been an interesting subject for
experimentation himself.

------
philk
What incredibly creepy experiments. Makes you glad we have ethics committees
these days.

~~~
bergkampf
It doesn't make me glad. I think we could achieve much more significant
progress in science if we weren't held back by ethical demagoguery.

~~~
joshuarr
Luckily for you, many PIs in the research field agree with you and have lax
morals when it comes to torturing innocent defenseless animals. Compliance is
a joke and doing whatever the hell you want to whatever creature you want
(humans included, mind you) is as easy as checking a box on a piece of paper
that nobody reads.

Our species is a virus, and we do whatever we can to protect our own kind
until there is nothing else left.

------
Tichy
"Much of Harlow's scientific career was spent studying maternal bonding, what
he described as the "nature of love"."

Apparently he was not very successful with his research - did he try to
research that because he had no feelings to begin with?

Probably horrors like that and worse happen every day in a lot of research
institutions. Some of the research is probably important and interesting.
Still I have a hard time imagining how anybody can come up with and conduct
such experiments.

~~~
philk
From the article itself:

 _In 1971, Harlow's wife died of cancer and he began to suffer from
depression. He submitted to electro-shock treatment and returned to work but,
as Lauren Slater writes, his colleagues noticed a difference in his demeanor.
[6] He abandoned his research into maternal attachment and developed an
interest in isolation and depression._

His wife died, he got depressed and switched to the unpleasant experiments
described in the article.

~~~
hugh3
Wow. Yes, it seems like an awful lot of psychologists are in the field because
they're trying to understand their own problems. This, ladies and gentlemen,
is why you should never date a psychology student.

~~~
rimantas
My psychology lecturer at the university told exactly that: many of those
choosing psychology to study do that in hope to solve their problems.

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vsync
Unlike other commenters I actually do see some useful results from this study.
At what cost though? I can understand the argument for animal testing but
something seems just that little extra bit off; when you're trying to study
depression you end up having to inflict emotional pain, which is as literally
torture as you can get. I've seen enough of the Internet not to be shocked
often but this managed.

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marknutter
I have long held that the worst way to die (IMO) would be to fall down a tube
of gradually decreasing width, head first of course. It's appalling that
someone actually did this to animals.

Why didn't he just setup experiments where he forced monkeys through a fine
mesh screen to prove that their psychological disposition is less than
satisfactory when their physical state is reduced to a puddle of goo. Lots of
great science to unearth there.

Of course, like mice, perhaps he just hated monkeys for the sake of it:
[http://www.theonion.com/articles/worlds-scientists-admit-
the...](http://www.theonion.com/articles/worlds-scientists-admit-they-just-
dont-like-mice,1256/)

~~~
locopati
Oddly enough, your first sentence describes human birth.

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nopassrecover
The interesting thing for me was the effects, not the ethics of the research
itself. It is interesting that the torturous aspects of this were primarily
mental not physical and still disgust people. Contrast with
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unnecessary_Fuss> (linked from that article) and
you'll get what I consider a true idea of torture. That is not to say there
aren't ethical concerns etc., but most of the horrible actions were committed
by the monkeys themselves and were presumably unexpected, in contrast with
something like in Unnecessary Fuss where there was intentional infliction of
harm.

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danfitch
So is the internet a new age "pit of despair"? Is there enough social
interaction for children these days or do they replace it with WOW and other
"almost" social situations?

~~~
philk
I'm not sure that those two situations are in any way comparable.

~~~
rdtsc
Actually the point was that lack of direct social contact leads to depression.
Interacting with people though a digital interface also probably leads to a
similar, albeit not drastic, of an effect.

Personally, even though I have access to more people and more information over
the net, I am less social and that does have an effect on my mood. I have to
make an effort to spend face-to-face time with family and friends to become
"normal" again. (By "normal" here I just mean "not depressed"). Digital
interface just doesn't cut it, there is some physical aspect to the
interaction that cannot be transmitted even through a video conference.
Anyway, I don't have anything to support this, just a personal opinion.

------
pw0ncakes
Torturing monkeys to prove points about depression?

Depression sucks, and the worst versions of it could certainly be compared to
torture in terms of the misery inflicted on the suffer, but I find it
questionable that one could link externally-inflicted torture and depression
in such a way that these experiments would have any value.

