Julie Cross

Professor Wertz-Orbaugh
UWRT 1102-03
2-2-15

Inquiry Proposal Final Draft

While doing research about the Holocaust there have been certain topics that
stuck out to me. One of them is the medical experimentation that happened during this
time period. Many medical experiments were conducted by the Nazis during the
Holocaust and I would like to learn more about it. I have chosen to inquire about this
topic because I find it interesting. I like to learn about experiments and scientific
advancement. I thought of this particular topic because in my health and quality of life
class, we discussed that our ethical guidelines were created after the experimentation
that the Nazis used during the Holocaust. I thought it would be something interesting to
inquire about.
The only background knowledge that I have about this topic is that there were
experimentations done on twins. I do not know anything more specific or detailed than
that. I am aware that there were other types of experiments besides twin studies. I do
not know what kind of experiments they did with twins or what the results were. I think
there was a lot of experimentation with the children, but I am not positive about this.
From the small amount of research I have done about this topic thus far, I have
gathered that there were experiments with the different kinds of gasses that they used
in the gas chambers. I am excited to learn more about this subject. I am interested in
this is because I like to know why society does things in certain way. Ethical guidelines
are used every day with so many different applications and they were created because
of these experiments. I want to know what the Nazis were doing because clearly it was

so bad that ethical guidelines were created for researchers to follow. Im interested to
know what the Nazis were doing and who they were doing it to but mostly why they
were doing it. What did they want to know from the experiments? I believe that I am
intrigued to learn more about this because it was a huge part of history. There was so
much death and horror during the Holocaust and this is something that doesnt get
focused on as much.
Due to the fact that I have such little information about this topic, there is so
much more than I can learn. I want to know more about specific experiments, who the
experiments were focused on, why they did the experiments, how long the experiments
lasted. Specific questions that I have are: Who was responsible for the experiments?
Was it a committee within the Nazi organization or was it all Nazis? What were the most
common experiments conducted?
There are two ways to approach my topic. You could approach it from an
educational standpoint and say that the Nazis were trying to learn more and didnt
realize that they were being unethical with their experiments. They were helping the
science field by obtaining information through their experiments and advancing science.
Or one could take the other side and say that they were being unethical and doing
horrible things to innocent people. There is a pro and a con to most situations and
anyone could take either side. I think it is important to go into my research with an
unbiased opinion so I can gather all of the research.
What were the medical experiments that were conducted during the Holocaust?