Got A Question Military Members Here (LONG)

[CriminalMindsRocks]

Ok, I know that there are some members both here & at CS.com who either are currently serving or are retired military. I would start this thread over at CS but since the question I'm asking may cause debate to flare I'm erring on the side of caution & posting here.


Ok, a little background before I pose my question....back in 1987 a movie came out called Project X, it was I guess you'd call it a 'B' movie, it had Matthew Broderick & Helen Hunt playing the central characters. It used to come on HBO all the time, hell, probably still does.

Anyway, whenever it would come on, I would watch it, I own several copies of both the DVD & the soundtrack. This movie was the main reason I got interested in learning ASL & took 3 yrs of it in my HS days.

For those who've never heard of it, it revolved around the U.S Air Force & one particular chimp,, Virgil, who before coming into the ownership of the military was put on loan to the University of Wisconsin Physcology(sp?) Dept where came to meet & bond with Hunt's character who taught him ASL.


Matthew Broderick's character eventually meets & later bonds with Virgil & attempts to free him once the reason behind this top secret project become clear to him.

Basically, according to the forward before the movie begins, this movie was based on supposed real experiments that the USAF conducted, teaching chimps to fly using a simulator & then at a later time subjecting these same chimps to radiation so they could gauge how long a human pilot who had been caught in a radiation blast could fly before they died, in the case of if WWW3 was to happen.


So, my question is...Did our military actually conduct experiments of this nature as implied in the prologue?

I hold my own opinions on this, but I will reserve them until later

Oh and BTW please if you will, refrain from mentioning the allegations that Bob Barker brought during the production. Representatives from whoever monitors animal treatment during movie filming where live animals are used investigated the allegations & found no evidence of abuse or misconduct where the chimps were concerned

[Greenday]

So, my question is...Did our military actually conduct experiments of this nature as implied in the prologue?

Probably. They needed to find out how it would affect humans somehow and you sure as hell can't kill humans in the name of science. I mean, we regularly kill tons of animals to find out the lethal doses in various animals and you need enough test subjects in order to get an accurate representation of the population. I mean, we can't just say, "Hey, it's not healthy to drink this, trust us." Nope, we have to kill animals to prove it.

So in all reality, if they didn't kill a few monkeys to save some humans, I'd be super shocked.

[CriminalMindsRocks]

Just curious, but have you seen the movie itself?

regarding your last comment, I understand that human life has to trump the life of a few chimps, I do. But on the flip side, Broderick's character in one scene close to the end makes a very compelling argument against such tests. His argument being that your theory is flawed right out of the gate. If you've seen the movie then you'll know which scene I mean

And I happen to agree with his character, your test results won't be accurate UNLESS you use an actual human. Because as much as chimps are as close as humans, we have something that a chimp does NOT, the knowledge that he/she is dying, where a chimp DOES NOT

[Greenday]

Just curious, but have you seen the movie itself?

regarding your last comment, I understand that human life has to trump the life of a few chimps, I do. But on the flip side, Broderick's character in one scene close to the end makes a very compelling argument against such tests. His argument being that your theory is flawed right out of the gate. If you've seen the movie then you'll know which scene I mean

And I happen to agree with his character, your test results won't be accurate UNLESS you use an actual human. Because as much as chimps are as close as humans, we have something that a chimp does NOT, the knowledge that he/she is dying, where a chimp DOES NOT

Nope, never seen it. It's not on my list to watch.

Whether or not chimps know they are dying won't change their physical anatomy and whether they can survive radiation poisoning.

[Andara Bledin]

I don't know that the military was using chimps for air-based research by that point, but here's a depressing article about how the air force abused chimps in the name of 'science' during the space race in the 50s and 60s.

http://www.releasechimps.org/research/history/air-space

[Greenday]

It's crappy to kill so many animals but what's the alternative? What if we used humans for these tests and they died? Medical research would stall completely. A lot of scientific research would end. It'd greatly reduce where we are today if it wasn't for those tests.

[AccountingDrone]

i think in the film what offended Matthew Broderick the most was the helmet crush testing [strap helmet on chimp, strap into ejection seat, slam a heavy weight onto the chimp's head to see how much trauma happens. They were about to take the talking chimp away and perform that test on him as I vaguely remember.

I have issues watching films/seeing imagery of animal abuse.

[Gravekeeper]

So, my question is...Did our military actually conduct experiments of this nature as implied in the prologue?

This isn't really a question for members of the military ( since you would need pretty specific members of retired USAF to answer it I would think ). Just a matter of good ol' fashion standard research. Not even hard research. Its not exactly uncommon knowledge.

Andara's link pretty much covers everything you're asking.

( The answer is yes, the USAF did every horrifying thing imaginable to chimps during the space race. Including living crash test subjects. Things far more horrifying than what your b grade 80s movie depicts. )

Hell, even the movie you're talking about was accused of and investigated for animal cruelty. >.>

[Panacea]

And I happen to agree with his character, your test results won't be accurate UNLESS you use an actual human.

I've seen the movie. It's a good one. I enjoyed it. Like all movies loosely based on real things that happened, a lot of liberties were taken, but those kinds of experiments were performed long after they ceased to really tell us anything of scientific value.

But understand this: we get very accurate information from all kinds of animal testing. Whatever you think about the ethics of animal testing it is NOT ethical to perform experiments with a risk of human harm on a human UNTIL you have done animal trials. A lot of experiments never make it past animal trials as a result; we learn what we need to learn from the animals and either learn we don't need to put humans at risk because we can make needed improvements without it or we learn the proposal is so dangerous that we can't put humans at risk (the latter happens a lot more than you'd think in drug trials)

The animals used will vary. Different animals suit different purposes. Chimps are often used for some kinds of experiments because they are our closest relative on the evolutionary tree.

[CriminalMindsRocks]

AccountingDrone, actually no the test they were about to subject Virgil (ASL chimp) to was they had trained these chimps to fly using simulators which would eventually lead to them be taken to the main radiation chamber where they were subjected to different levels of radiation to see how long the chimp could fly before he died.

Broderick's character line was 'if we subject this chimpanzee to ionizing radiation he will fly just like we taught him to. But a human pilot will NOT fly the same, because he would know he was dying'

Graveskeeper, yeah Bob Barker was the one who brought those allegations, which as I said, whoever monitors live animal conditions on movies where live animals are used found NO evidence of abuse towards ANY of the chimpanzees used in this movie.

Panacea, believe it or not, but this movie is one of my favorites in case that was unclear like I said, I own both the DVD & the soundtracks (which btw is by one of my favorite soundtrack composers, James Horner).

I guess I just don't really understand why multiple chimps had to be used, seems like once you got the data you were looking for, you'd close up shop & be done. Seems like the chimp they named Goofy had it right, which is to say, don't do well during training

Panacea, since you've seen it, maybe you can answer me this...towards the beginning, after Helen Hunt had had Virgil for a year, her superior shows up one day to tell her the NHF weren't renewing her grant & that Virgil was to be sent to a zoo in Houston. So, my question is, did the superior lie or did the NHF lie to the superior who was only telling Hunt what she herself had been told? Did the military intercede before Virgil could be transferred to Houston or what?

[Greenday]

I guess I just don't really understand why multiple chimps had to be used, seems like once you got the data you were looking for, you'd close up shop & be done. Seems like the chimp they named Goofy had it right, which is to say, don't do well during training

Because single trials prove nothing.

[BlaqueKatt]

I guess I just don't really understand why multiple chimps had to be used, seems like once you got the data you were looking for, you'd close up shop & be done.

no you have a single datapoint, it's it an outlier, the average, who knows?
Part of the scientific method is "replication of results".

It would be akin to testing a new medication on a single person before releasing it to the general public because hey, you got your data-he's fine.

[Gravekeeper]

Because single trials prove nothing.

^ That.

And being in the midst of the space race they didn't have much time or patience for things like "ethics" to stand in the way. So it was chimps on a rocket sled. Previous to this the USAF had actually done volunteer testing. But they couldn't do outright survival tests with volunteers ( ie major skull, spine, etc trauma ).

But understand this: we get very accurate information from all kinds of animal testing.

The sad/ironic part about this is we actually don't get accurate information from animal testing when it comes to things like crash tests. When it comes to testing of this nature ( physical forces, etc ) there isn't a animal that is an accurate enough human analogue to provide accurate data beyond the general scope of "Did the chimp survive? Then a bet a human could too.".

These days the benefits of biomedical research on primates is pretty small. Most countries have banned or are phasing out primate testing. The US is still the world's largest user of chimps in biomedical research but even it has started phasing out primate testing. Many major pharmaceutical companies have already banned it after reading the winds of public opinion.

Its sad its taken this long and that, as usual, the most prevalent groups have to be dragged kicking and screaming into modern society, but at least things are on a positive trend.

[Shangri-laschild]

Broderick's character line was 'if we subject this chimpanzee to ionizing radiation he will fly just like we taught him to. But a human pilot will NOT fly the same, because he would know he was dying'

Outside of knowing what test you are participating in or that a human might recognizing how they are dying, I'm confused on why it would be different between the two. I would think animals, especially when we are talking about animals smart enough to manage communicating with us, would be just as able to tell that they are dying as a human would.

[NecCat]

Because a dying animal will follow his danger instincts: trying to hide or trying to resolve the pain. A human that knows he is dying and also understands the goals of the task he is trying to accomplish may decide to work towards completing the goal or reducing the amount of goal failure for his last act(s). I can't imagine a chimpanzee who knows he his dying is going to care very much about flying.

I don't disagree with testing done on animals but I have seen published some scientific tests that were so poorly thought out that the results would tell you nothing but how much you can torture animals.