I Want to be a Mad Scientist When I Grow Up Quiz

Answer: Electricity

Aldini was the nephew of scientist Luigi Galvani, who gave his name to the process of galvanization. Aldini was infatuated with electricity and notions of reanimation. He traveled the courts of Europe towing along a cart full of dead body parts and dead animals that he would apply electricity to, causing them to spasm and shake giving the appearance of reanimation.

He is known to have put an electrical prod into the anus of a recently executed criminal causing his eyes to open and the corpse to shake convulsively.

He was also known to use electricity on the living who were suffering from mental illness. He was one of the first scientists to try and use electric shock therapy without any real knowledge of the consequences. He claimed that electricity was a vital life force.

Answer: Human-Ape hybrid

Ilya Ivanovich Ivanov was very influential in the field of artificial insemination, which has helped countless couples to become parents. Unfortunately, he was also very interested in creating a human-ape hybrid. He was sent to Guinea in 1927 where he attempted to inseminate female chimpanzees with human sperm.

In 1928 the French colonial government stepped in to stop a planned experiment that would have included impregnating human women with chimpanzee sperm. He went back to Russia where reports stated that his experiments were backed by Stalin who allegedly wanted to make an army of "humanzees".

When he failed he was disgraced and sent to Alma Ata in Kazakhstan where he died from a stroke in 1932.

Answer: The Second Sino-Japanese War

During the Second Sino-Japanese War, at Unit 731, Shiro Ishii was in charge of some of the most horrible experiments on human beings. In one experiment prisoners had limbs amputated and reattached to other parts of the bodies. Some prisoners had parts of their bodies frozen and then thawed to study the effects of untreated gangrene.

Others were given poisons, syphilis, and various other diseases so that the results could be studies. Vivisection on pregnant females was also done after the females were impregnated by the guards. Ishii was arrested by the Americans at the end of World War II but was given immunity from prosecution for his war crimes when he turned over the information he had gathered on germ warfare by using humans as his test subjects.

Answer: Dachau

Rascher was executed by the Nazis in April 1945 - not, of course, for his experiments but for deceiving Himmler. Many of his experiments were related to induced hypothermia and enhanced recovery for this condition. Prisoners were forced to stand naked outside in freezing weather and/or placed in 'baths' of iced water until near death, and a variety of methods were used to attempt to warm them up again.

The vast majority of his test subjects died a painful death. He is also credited with creating the standard cyanide capsules which could be used in murder or suicide.

He performed operations without anesthesia and experimented on humans to study blood clotting.

Answer: A Beautiful Mind

John Nash (b. 1928) is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest minds in the science of mathematics, sharing the 1994 Nobel Prize in Economics. His battle with paranoid-schizophrenia was portrayed by actor Russell Crowe in the movie "A Beautiful Mind".

His disease lead him to engage in eccentric behaviors such as writing complex scientific notations on blackboards in the dark to make sure that others could not spy on his work, and believing that all men who wore red ties were spies. His battle with this devastating disease and his contributions to many fields of mathematics are awe-inspiring.

Answer: Castle Frankenstein

Johann Conrad Dippel was born in Castle Frankenstein and there are some who think that he may have been the inspiration for the character in Mary Shelley's horror novel "Frankenstein's Monster". His work included attempts at making an "Elixir of Life" from the bones and body fluids of the dead.

He was known to steal the bodies of the dead, but this was a rather common practice at the time. He practiced vivisection and attempted to transplant the soul through various means. A well-educated, religious man, Dippel was also involved in alchemy and is credited with the invention of the dye known as "Prussian Blue".

Answer: Dr. Andrew Ure

Ure described to his audience how he made the cadaver move and display signs of life. Ure used two rods that were connected to a battery and by placing one in the neck and one in the hip. The body began to convulse uncontrollably. When a rod was inserted in the heel the leg would convulse.

He then showed his audience that if he applied the rod to the cadaver's diaphragm it would begin to rise and fall as if breathing again. When the rod was placed in a small incision in the forehead he could make the body display many facial expressions that apparently included fear, sadness, anger, horror and terrifying contorted smiles.

He then showed the audience that he could make the cadaver point a finger at any one of those present.

Answer: The heart of King Louis XIV

William Buckland (1784-1856) was a well-known geologist, paleontologist and is given credit for writing the first scientifically sound account of a fossil dinosaur. Some of his more disturbing behavior included zoophagy and he attempted make a meal of every animal on the planet at least once.

His house was a menagerie and one of his favorite meals was mice on toast. He was known to lick or taste all types of non-food objects also. When shown the preserved heart of King Louis XIV which was held in a silver container, he loudly exclaimed that he had never eaten the heart of a king and proceeded to do just that.

There was nothing he would not taste at least once.

Answer: False

This is completely false. Dr. Benjamin Jeffcoate is a fictional mad scientist from the Canadian television series "My Secret Identity" (1988-1991). While some types of communication with animals can occur a chimpanzee cannot be taught to speak English or any other language.

Their mouths and vocal chords are not designed to create the complex sounds of human speech and more importantly they do not have well-developed speech centers in their brains.

Answer: A two-headed dog

Vladimir Demikhov created at least 20 two headed dogs. He did this by grafting the shoulders, front legs and head of a living puppy onto the shoulder of a living adult dog. Both could pant and the grafted puppy heads were observed to try and eat. None of his creations lived more than a month due to tissue rejection.

Although his work was considered vital to the science of transplantation and tissue rejection, his creations were horrific.