Eva and Miriam were ten years old, when they were taken away from their mother, forever. They had become subjects of a massive, inhumane medical experimentation program at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The program was led by physician Josef Mengele, or the angel of death. He used one twin as a control and used the other twin as a subject to everything from blood transfusions to forced insemination, injections with diseases, amputations, and murder. They would see the results of the twin that was being subject to the pain and compare it to the controlled twin. He believed that if one was hurting, the other would begin hurting.
For eugenicists like Mengele, identical twins share a genome, but any physical of behavioral differences in twins would be due to behavior, not genetics. They believed that selective breeding could be used to encourage socially acceptable behavior and wipe our undesirable tendencies.
Otmar von Verschuer held significant power and influence in Nazi Germany. He collected genetic information on large numbers of twins, studying the statistics in an attempt to determine whether everything from disease to criminal behavior could be inherited. His protege was Josef Mengele.
Mengele was extremely racist and a devoted member of the Nazi Party. Later, he was promoted to chief camp physician of the entire Birkenau amp and became known for his brutal selections of incoming prisoners for the gas chambers.
https://www.history.com/news/nazi-twin-experiments-mengele-eugenics
Psychologists today love experimenting on twins, though they don’t experiment the way Dr. Mengele did. They usually have twins take questionnaires, and these demonstrate how similar identical twins are–though they are not 100% identical. According to the research of Thomas Bouchard at the University of Minnesota, the personality profiles of twins almost look like the same person took the test twice. This effect occurs whether the twins were reared together or apart and whether their parents treated them the same or differently. Twins are special and we definitely can learn a lot from them about the effect of nature vs nurture. However, we must do this ethically.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyT2AlzzzQs
I find the obsession that Nazis (Dr. Mengele in particular) had with twins relatively normal considering the other theories they had about Jews, sterilization, the superior race, etc. Though it is fascinating to compare the research done on twins today compared to the torturous methods of the Nazis. One can't help but wonder what the conclusions were, or if it was mere torture for sake of torture. In many cases I find that twins, though in appearance seem very similar, can be quite opposites personality wise. I have identical twin cousins and they could not act any more different from each other. Twins are quite interesting because it's easy to believe that if two people look identical they must act identical aswell, and experience the same emotions. Finding conclusions to theories about twins are quite interesting, but what Dr. Mengele did to his victims is nothing more than torture in most cases. Though, (like I said above) I wonder if he did come to any conclusions, and if so were they documented? Maybe we will never find out, although what Dr. Mengele did I also find something worth studying (perhaps in relations to human phycology when they think that they will not be held responsible for their actions).
ReplyDelete