[HN Gopher] Project Operation Whitecoat (2010)
___________________________________________________________________
Project Operation Whitecoat (2010)
Author : smegger001
Score : 92 points
Date : 2025-03-24 16:35 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu)
| aredox wrote:
| It's funny; unethical human experimentation during that period is
| often excused as "it was common practice at the time" (to
| "forget" to consult patients before enrolling them into
| experiments), and here we have people _of the same period_ making
| sure to follow proper ethical procedures...
|
| (The same way that even at the time slavery was common - be it
| XIXth century or Antique Greece - there were already quite a lot
| of people revulsed by it...)
| sofixa wrote:
| For what it's worth, enrolling patients without consent in
| unnecessary procedures still happens today. There's even a
| whole Wiki article about one category of those (which was
| banned in France in 2016, and US in 2024, but probably remains
| legal and pervasive in a lot of other countries):
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelvic_examinations_under_anes...
| thimkerbell wrote:
| Isn't experimentation.
| timewizard wrote:
| I'm sure the patients are comforted by the difference.
| tdeck wrote:
| Unbelievable that this was and is a thing and that I've never
| heard of it before.
| themaninthedark wrote:
| Which Antique Greece was revulsed by slavery?
|
| It wasn't the democracy of Athens... >Participation was open to
| adult, free male citizens (i.e., not a metic, woman or slave).
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athenian_democracy
| MisterTea wrote:
| "there were already quite a lot of people revulsed by it...)"
| does not imply all of "Antique Greece" felt this way. Only
| that some people did.
| senderista wrote:
| Who?
| MisterTea wrote:
| Ask the GP. I was just clarifying the misunderstanding.
| However, an extremely cursory search turns up: https://en
| .wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_ancient_Greece#View...
| where it is mentioned that
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcidamas is one such
| person. Though it seems that slavery in ancient Greece
| was normalized and deeply intertwined within their
| society. I am sure there were critics but like everything
| unpopular, may have been discarded or suppressed.
| foxyv wrote:
| Just a quick reminder, slavery is still common in the United
| States.
| mullingitover wrote:
| This is a fascinating paper with a lot of interesting context,
| the mid-1900s were a different time for medical ethics.
|
| I grew up in the Adventist church and it's been wild seeing it
| drift so far from its original distinguishing stances.
|
| When I was a kid, I primarily went to Adventist schools. However,
| one year after my family moved there wasn't an Adventist school
| available. I went to a local evangelical school instead. It was a
| real eye-opener.
|
| The evangelical school had a program of outright child brain-
| washing about abortion that I'd never heard as an Adventist. As a
| fifth grader I was getting daily updates about the Supreme Court
| nomination battle over (disgaced Nixon lackey) Robert Bork,
| because as early as the eighties court packing was a core
| strategy for anti-choice movement. There was daily news about
| abortion protests they were running. When I went home and asked
| my parents about it, they told me as Adventists we had the
| bible's stance on abortion: the bible says nothing about
| abortion. Adventists hospitals even allowed abortions to be
| performed on prem since they had no doctrinal problem with it.
|
| Fast forward to now, a lot of Adventist members are loudly anti-
| choice, anti-vaccine (the church leadership had to post a very
| delicately worded statement about vaccines because they operate
| respectable medical schools, and had to please both the many
| facebook-addled cranks in their pews as well as the sane
| professionals in their medical school staff), generally
| indistinguishable from generic right-wing evangelicals. The
| Adventist core membership of today I have no doubt would've been
| mostly pro-slavery and definitely would have no qualms about
| shooting people in war.
|
| The paper talks about the church's effort to go from 'sect' (firm
| moral stances putting them at odds with the majority) to
| 'denomination' (compromising their morals to fit in), and the
| church of today I'd say has run as far away as they could from
| being a sect.
| chinathrow wrote:
| Boy am I glad I went to a state school without this crap.
| skyyler wrote:
| The ideological games being pushed on children in state
| schools is different, but it's not entirely absent.
|
| That being said, I'll take historical revisionism over the
| history of the empire over, uh, the evangelical option.
| almostgotcaught wrote:
| > The ideological games being pushed on children in state
| schools is different, but it's not entirely absent.
|
| People say this all the time and it's facile. Yes ideology
| is everywhere and you cannot be completely free from it.
| But the critical difference between secular ideology and
| religious ideology is that ( _in a properly functioning
| society_ ) you can challenge/question/probe secular
| ideology.
| econ wrote:
| Nah, you can't really. Before you question the textbook
| you have to wonder if it is worth it. Since the
| successfully indoctrinated believers won't let you get
| away with it it is not worth it. So much so that they
| never get to hear other versions of anything.
| MSFT_Edging wrote:
| What textbook taught in the United States has anything
| with an ideological stance that isn't at the very least
| revisionist towards making the US look better?
|
| Most history taught in the states already waters down the
| historical facts to make us look better.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| Depends on how you characterize the War of Northern
| Aggression I suppose
| skyyler wrote:
| Also depends on how you characterize the genocide of the
| natives.
| almostgotcaught wrote:
| > Nah, you can't really. Before you question the textbook
| you have to wonder if it is worth it.
|
| This is some weird goalpost moving - I didn't say it's
| easy I said it's possible. Contrast with the fact that
| you fundamentally cannot question religious ideology -
| it's literally against the rules.
| skyyler wrote:
| >Contrast with the fact that you fundamentally cannot
| question religious ideology
|
| Martin Luther was pretty successful in his questioning.
|
| But I guess he did get excommunicated for it, didn't he?
|
| Well, I guess that could easily be described as "not
| easy".
| almostgotcaught wrote:
| You're again hitting the nail exactly on the head as to
| the difference: the Lutheran reformation gave way to
| _Lutheranism_ , it did not actually reform the Catholic
| Church (cf the counter reformation). So again you see an
| instance where questioning foundational ideology _from
| within_ is not possible.
| skyyler wrote:
| I have a feeling that it's a lot more difficult to
| purchase indulgences nowadays than it was during Luther's
| time.
|
| But luckily, I'm not Catholic, so I have no idea.
| mullingitover wrote:
| Arguably the entire hack created by protestantism was the
| infinite free indulgences "salvation by faith alone"
| glitch.
| skyyler wrote:
| Okay, so you are admitting that Martin Luther had a
| measurable impact on the practices of the church, right?
| mullingitover wrote:
| You seem to be saying that religions are open to having
| their dogmas questioned and then growing from that,
| something that they are famously not open to (kind of the
| whole idea of a dogma).
|
| Obviously 'Not all religions,' etc. However the Catholic
| church is notoriously dogmatic. Usually the more you
| press a dogmatic group to change, the more they dig their
| heels in about it. It's only when the organization is
| wounded by a schism or massive loss of membership do they
| suddenly start getting word from heaven that God has
| changed his mind.
| skyyler wrote:
| I asked you a very simple yes or no question, actually.
|
| Your lack of answer to that question speaks a lot.
| kibwen wrote:
| _> But I guess he did get excommunicated for it, didn 't
| he?_
|
| This is wildly underselling the consequences of
| challenging the church: two centuries of unrest and war
| that would eventually result in millions dead, amounting
| to a significant fraction of Europe's population.
| skyyler wrote:
| Right, so contesting the church isn't impossible, but it
| isn't easy.
| mmcdermott wrote:
| > the critical difference between secular ideology and
| religious ideology is that (in a properly functioning
| society) you can challenge/question/probe secular
| ideology.
|
| This feels like an odd statement, given how many of the
| most repressive regimes in human history were or are
| secular. Maybe the "properly functioning" part is doing
| the heavy lifting, but if so, it makes the statement
| almost meaningless.
| nsxwolf wrote:
| You cannot question modern gender ideology in any public
| school around me.
|
| All children are indoctrinated with something. There is a
| competition for who gets to do it.
| mullingitover wrote:
| Main ideological information I learned in state schools:
| "there are these different ideologies" provided without
| judgement. There was even a devil's advocate argument for
| the south and slavery.
|
| In religious schools, even the best of them, I learned
| nothing about any ideology but the "true" one, everything
| else was people being deluded by the devil.
| skyyler wrote:
| >Main ideological information I learned in state schools:
| "there are these different ideologies" provided without
| judgement. There was even a devil's advocate argument for
| the south and slavery.
|
| Did you hear a "devil's advocate" argument for the
| burning of Tulsa, Oklahoma by white supremacists?
|
| Both-Sides-Ism isn't a real way to account for
| ideological coercion in education. It's just painting a
| picture that includes your enemies. What your enemies
| look like in the picture is LADEN with ideology.
| ty6853 wrote:
| Our state school played the pledge of allegiance every
| morning, had police with drug dogs doing sweep to great
| praise of the administration, and military recruiters
| begging us to come kill enemies of the state. The
| sanctioning of these activities for all to witness was
| part of the indoctrination -- praise for god was just
| replaced for worship of the government. Meanwhile basic
| civil stuff like how to invoke your rights a traffic stop
| was never even mentioned.
|
| This is why even as a hardline atheist I have sent at
| times my kid to private religious education, and I hope I
| can continue to afford it. Neither system is great but
| worshipping someone who exists only as an ideal entity in
| your mind seems marginally better than worshipping the
| world's largest incarceration machine and military
| aggressor.
| mullingitover wrote:
| > Our state school played the pledge of allegiance every
| morning
|
| I had the opposite experience, I never did the pledge in
| public school (or in the Adventist schools), at least not
| regularly enough for me to recall, but in the evangelical
| school it was the entire school doing it together in a
| big room every damn morning, first thing. I'd argue
| religious schools are more likely to drill it into you
| than public schools on account of the "under God" part
| that they've retconned in.
|
| I also never saw military recruiters in public school,
| neither in military-dense Hawaii nor in deep red central
| Oregon.
| skyyler wrote:
| If you didn't notice the military recruiters in your US
| public school, I have to imagine you weren't paying
| attention. They posted up during lunch with tables and
| stuff where I was. Maybe they were just capitalizing on
| the 2008 recession.
|
| There was never an assembly dedicated to them; it was
| always just a kiosk-type thing students could walk up to.
| dang wrote:
| Ok, but please don't take HN threads on generic flamewar
| tangents. They're invariably less interesting (because more
| repetitive, and more indignant) than the specific point they
| tangent off from.
|
| This is in the site guidelines:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
| paxcoder wrote:
| Christianity opposes abortion in accord with the prohibition of
| murder, what with science informing us that human life begins
| at conception and our consciences, and God's moral law recorded
| in good book that murder i wrong.
|
| I notice you use the word choice and classify the pro-life
| position s "anti-choice" which makes it seem like a bad thing.
| However the "choice we are talking about here is directly and
| intentionlly causing death to an innocent human being. I think
| it is very important to understnd that.
|
| To borrow an atheist trope, you and I agree that murder is evil
| and immoral in most cases. I just think it's wrong in one more
| case, when the victims are yet unborn too (I reckon murder is
| intrinsically evil and immoral)
| hulitu wrote:
| > Christianity opposes abortion in accord with the
| prohibition of murder
|
| But murdering people in wars is quite ok, isn't it ? /s
| CalRobert wrote:
| I recall an organization that was proud of Desmond Doss (one of
| only 3 conscientious objectors to get the medal of honor) and
| pre-political Ben Carson (I never was able to square the person
| I saw campaigning with the extremely well-regarded
| neurosurgeon). I wonder what happened.
| timewizard wrote:
| > because as early as the eighties court packing was a core
| strategy for anti-choice movement.
|
| Bork was a staunch capitalist and wanted to destroy anti
| monopoly laws. His position on abortion was that it should be a
| state legislature issue.
|
| You spot the problem but I believe you misattribute the source
| in a way that actually only benefits Bork and those who would
| champion him.
| hulitu wrote:
| > the mid-1900s were a different time for medical ethics.
|
| But sadly, only nazis and japanese are bad, others (CIA) are
| good.
| CalRobert wrote:
| If 39 pages is too much for you, there's
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Whitecoat#Seventh-da...
|
| """
|
| Over the course of the 19-year program, more than 2,300 U.S. Army
| soldiers, many of whom were trained medics, contributed to the
| Whitecoat experiments by allowing themselves to be infected with
| numerous different kinds of bacteria that were considered likely
| choices for a biological attack. While some volunteered
| immediately after basic training, for conscientious objectors at
| Ft. Sam Houston, Texas (before they began their medic training),
| the near certainty of being assigned as a combat medic in Vietnam
| helped some medics choose instead to remain in the United States
| with the Whitecoat program. The goal of the program was to
| determine dose response for these agents.
|
| """
|
| I attended an SDA high school and was a member of the church for
| a couple years in college (I dated an SDA woman). It was
| interesting that they had a ton of dentists, doctors, etc. and
| ran well-regarded medical schools, but also espoused young Earth
| creationism. They also were generally suspicious of government
| involvement in religion, with many worried about a "national
| Sunday law" and being disallowed from worshipping on Saturday.
| Conversely, this generally included a desire for religion not to
| get too involved in government, which I respected quite a lot.
|
| I never really believed, and left the church after breaking up,
| but I really miss the sense of community. Every Saturday I'd go
| to a service with a boring sermon but some _fantastic_ singing
| (the entire congregation could, and did, sing, and those walls
| rang with "Down By The River To Pray" in 4 part harmony), then
| have a vegetarian (albeit cheesy) potluck after, and then just
| chill at the beach with friends. Society would do well to adopt
| the sabbath as a cultural practice. The minister where I was
| seemed pretty chill with marriage equality - I remember he gave a
| sermon about marriage while people protested California's prop 8
| outside and he pointed out how badly LGBT couple wanted marriage
| at the same time others took it for granted.
|
| I wonder if it's still like that.
| dataviz1000 wrote:
| > California Adventists have higher life expectancies at the
| age of 30 years than other white Californians by 7.28 years
| (95% confidence interval, 6.59-7.97 years) in men and by 4.42
| years (95% confidence interval, 3.96-4.88 years) in women,
| giving them perhaps the highest life expectancy of any formally
| described population. [0]
|
| SDA live a lot longer.
|
| The SDA vegetarian diet was also the driving force behind the
| Kellogg's Cereal company [1]
|
| [0]
| https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullar...
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Keith_Kellogg
| CalRobert wrote:
| Vegetarian diet, abstinence from alcohol and smoking, and
| maybe most of all pretty strong (albeit also quite insular)
| communities. They seemed to be pretty well-off too, for the
| most part.
| MrMcCall wrote:
| I can only imagine how much better a person does in college
| when they're not drinking or smoking and perhaps even
| minimizing their promiscuity.
|
| That's gotta improve their chances against over 90% of
| their peers, at least, I imagine.
|
| "Youth is wasted on the young" is only true because our
| youth are not taught how to not conserve and utilize their
| energy.
| ToucanLoucan wrote:
| > It was interesting that they had a ton of dentists, doctors,
| etc. and ran well-regarded medical schools, but also espoused
| young Earth creationism.
|
| Creationism is a canned joke ideological point that American
| Christians of all types seemingly can't get enough of. It's
| hilariously bad "science" at the very best, and outright farce
| at the worst. But for some reason simply acknowledging
| evolution is, seemingly as of the last 20 years or so, utterly
| untenable, and so they perform.
|
| > They also were generally suspicious of government involvement
| in religion, with many worried about a "national Sunday law"
| and being disallowed from worshipping on Saturday.
|
| I mean that just sounds like garden variety Christian
| persecution complex to me. I don't think a certain segment of
| the Christian population can properly reckon with reality if
| they don't feel they are being somehow oppressed despite
| running... basically everything.
| CalRobert wrote:
| Well, they view Genesis as a literal account. I agree with
| you, though.
|
| As far as the latter point - it was mostly that, at least
| where I was, a desire to keep government out of religion
| paired with a desire for religion not to be too involved in
| government. Among other things they knew that other
| denominations were more powerful than them and would have far
| more influence in government.
|
| I'm not an SDA booster (I'm not a member and haven't attended
| any church for 20 years, and found the insularity of the
| community stifling) but I still think it's a really
| interesting denomination.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| The origin the dispute is not so much arguing that Genesis
| must be literal but that acknowledging evolution diminishes
| the special uniqueness of the human soul
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| In what way does it? I thought all that was because of a
| distinction bestowed by God, not because of anything
| material.
| BobbyTables2 wrote:
| Christians do seem to revel in how the early believers were
| persecuted for their faith...
|
| Of course, they too shared that experience with others in the
| times of the Charlemagne and that of the Inquisition.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| > Creationism is a canned joke ideological point that
| American Christians of all types seemingly can't get enough
| of.
|
| this is uninformed and prejudiced on its face. In Theology
| graduate class, the first week of lecture included the
| division between "literalist" Biblical traditions, and
| others. It is well known among anyone who has studied
| comparative religion in any way that Christians are not at
| all unified in the interpretation of Genesis, despite outward
| appearances.
| sepositus wrote:
| I don't usually expect nuanced theological discussions
| here. It's usually the equivalent of bumper sticker
| comments.
|
| The "appetite" for Young Earth Creationism amongst my
| Christian group is very low if nonexistent. In fact we
| often spend more times groaning at the antics this crowd
| gets into.
| VincentEvans wrote:
| What other antics and policies do "we" groan about and
| then nevertheless elect politicians to govern the rest of
| us? Policies attacking female reproductive freedom?
| Attacks on LGBT? Attacks on freedom of religion? Attacks
| on separation of church and state?
|
| I feel like you are trivializing the dogged,
| uncompromising, and ceaseless war organized religion
| wages against intellectualism, progress, and tolerance.
| MrMcCall wrote:
| As a Sufi, I agree with the overall truth of your
| analysis, but it is absolutely not true for we Sufis, who
| believe in love above all.
|
| I will state it clearly that we believe in always loving
| our fellow human beings, regardless of their ethnicity,
| form of religion (including none at all), sexual
| preference, or gender identity. The only time we have a
| problem with someone is if they're abusing others,
| irrespective of reason; in that case, we must love the
| oppressed differently than we love the oppressors, and
| prevent the abuse.
|
| I am a lifelong reader and appreciator of science,
| scientists, and engineers, and have some level of
| understanding of the evolution's beauty on this Earth
| over the past 4B years. That's how God manifested this
| wonderful creation, perhaps two trillion galaxies with
| maybe hundreds of billions of stars in each, and this
| lovely oasis, Earth, with so much water and life, over
| the last ~14Gy since the CMBR's Big Bang origin.
|
| Remember, you can't blame science if a person says
| they're a scientist then claims that the Earth is flat.
| Most religious tradition is just as off-base. If it ain't
| about love, it's not from God, for God only wants us to
| be happy, no matter what the belligerent hypocrites,
| liars, and cruel oppressors of this world do in God's
| name. To love someone means to want them to be happy, on
| their terms, so long as they're not hurting others in the
| process (which wouldn't create happiness, only cruel
| pleasure).
|
| God freely gave us our free will to do with as we please,
| for good or ill. But It also made this universe such that
| it keeps a karmic tab on all our actions towards others,
| and we will reap what we so, each of us, in calculus-like
| precision in this universe of integrated information
| systems.
|
| Life is the realest, most deadly-serious game you can
| ever imagine. And your happiness is at stake, so choose
| well how you evolve your heart and treat your fellow
| human beings.
| VincentEvans wrote:
| Thank you for thoughtful post. I know near nothing about
| Sufi religion. Sounds enlightened and good for them/you!
| My words were very influenced by frustration rooted in my
| experiences in US, especially as of late.
| MrMcCall wrote:
| I'm of the same feelings, my friend.
|
| Most posts have a pretty complete picture of our Sufi
| perspective.
|
| To be Sufi is to be the small part of all forms of
| religion that truly try to manifest compassion, kindness,
| generosity, and all the virtues, to _ALL_ our fellow
| human beings, by self-evolving ourselves from vice-ridden
| to virtue-containing. The spiritual process is a
| purifying of ourselves, not of others. They must do it
| themself, and only our love can help them.
|
| Peace be with you. Thank you for caring about true
| compassion.
| jack_pp wrote:
| I feel like you are trivializing the dogged,
| uncompromising and ceaseless war liberals wage against
| common sense and decency.
|
| I'm sorry but when the other side of the war wants me to
| pay fines, go to jail or be expelled because I
| subjectively hurt someones feelings I gotta go with the
| church whatever their faults
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