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Comment by gtcode | Hacker News Reader

I'd speculate that, after such an age of barbaric experimentation, new and supposedly more innocuous methods that don't require physically detaining/restraining a subject have long since been conceived, implemented, and tried.

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I don't know, some of the things they were doing up there were just ridiculous and useless. Like putting a woman in a chemically induced coma for a year, and playing high volume affirmations though a headset she wore the whole time. The doctor who started all this up there was just Mengele with a Psych degree and some very stupid ideas.

Many MKUltra documents were shredded, and even those recovered were of little scientific benefit due to the way the experiments were carried out. So many people had their lives irrevocably destroyed, and for absolutely nothing of value.

> and for absolutely nothing of value

Nothing of value to society anyway; looking at the 1979 reunion video, it seems like they were pretty happy with the return on investment overall.

[0] https://www.gnosticmedia.com/ccn-unspun-020-mkultra-reunion-...

According to Tim Weiner's Legacy of Ashes, the purpose of the experiments was to find a reliable way to manipulate people so that they'd stay manipulated. The CIA was having a very hard time establishing reliable agents and informants behind the Iron Curtain, because all they really had to offer was stupendous amounts of money, and people weren't staying bought. Their targets generally didn't buy the ideological angle.

From that (odious) perspective, I don't think the experiments were ridiculous, though they did turn out to be useless. At the time it was pretty common to view breaking a personality down as a viable path to establishing control over it. The Koreans had done similar things to American prisoners, with some minor, temporary effectiveness.

The best approach of all would be to get people to volunteer and consume all the information you want before they even commit a crime. You could entice them with hard-to-resist benefits like cheaper groceries or a more active dating life.

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