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Monday, July 25, 2011

A Look Back: "Experiments in the Revival of Organisms"

"A Look Back", is going to be a series of articles based on various topics and genres, that have already occurred before the twenty first century. It'll be posted at random interval so don't expect one every week. Without further ado, here's the article.

The 90s were a very confusing time in human history. People began to think, "Hey, we don't really have to just make weapons and bombs, we could actually make things to benefit daily life!" and those same people, were swiftly picked up for a ten day exclusive vacation at a re-education camp water park sponsored by the KGB.

On 1940, a motion picture was released under the name "Terminator: Dawn of the Machines" "Experiments in the Revival of Organisms". Obviously, this isn't one of your casual summer action flicks. This motion picture, was a nineteen minute and thirty one second clip 'documenting' Soviet research into resuscitation of clinically dead organisms.




The film gives an average Joe's explanation and depiction of a series of medical experiments related to the revival of dead organisms, mainly various dogs. Obviously, they didn't want to confuse our small minds with medical wonders.


In the first experiment, we are shown a canine heart. The heart is shown beating by itself, without being attached to a canine body of course. The heart is shown connected to four tubes presumably pumping blood. (At first I thought it was blueberry custard, but blood makes 251% more sense.) The heart is then pumped with a unnamed fluid, which could possible be adrenaline, since after injected, the heart is seen pumping in a horror movie fashion. The idea was to show that the organ could continue life process after death of the entire organism.


"Somethings out of place here... Oh, here's my pen."


After we are shown the horrific scenes that will haunt us for exactly 6.24 minutes, we are shown a pair of lungs.The lungs are connected to a machine that pushes blood and oxygen into the lungs, and we are brandished a inflating and deflating pair of lungs on a plate. As obviously assumed, you shouldn't watch this while eating dinner, it's not very appetizing. (Unless you're into that sorta stuff, which in that case, you should get some help.)


I'm 70% sure it's not a chicken.


Slowly but surely, the pair of lungs white-out into a drawn diagram of a dog head, connected to various fun contraptions. They claim on the video, that they were able to keep the dog alive, un-attached to the rest of it's body; The machine pumps oxygenated blood into the head which supposedly, keeps the head alive and "well".


They continue to do highly scientific tests such as, poking it in the eye repeatedly, tickling it's nose with a feather, feeding it citric acid, shining bright lights at it, and making loud noises with a hammer near the specimen. Truly top-class science going on here. 


It's not that bad once you get past the decapitation part.


The final and most horrific experiment, is the last one. They show another diagram explaining how the heart and other important life-depending organs function to keep the whole animal alive. We are shown with a diagram and explained that animal's blood was drained and declared clinically dead. Which is usually a bad thing for humans. (If you didn't know.)


After such, they waited for ten minutes before beginning their experiment. Once the clock hits zero, they connect the dog to a lung-heart machine, which begins to pump oxygenated blood back into the 'specimen'.


Like the end of any dog movie, the dog is shown almost lifeless in till the very last second in which life springs back into the dog. We are shown through a heart and lung monitor, the heart starting again and returning to a normal heart rate, and likewise the respiration.


"Is there something wrong?"

As happy uplifting music plays, we are told that dogs were disconnected from the machines, and after a few days for the anesthesia to wear off, the dog returned to a normal state. After the experiment, the dog lived well, lived long, grew, and had a family.


One could suggest that he went on a Soviet killing spree ten seconds after this picture.


Since this happened about seventy years ago, I cannot make a post predicting what will happen with the research and what it means for humanity tomorrow, since today is tomorrow of yesterday.


Day-ception.


I would like to add that the experiments were carried out by a Soviet Scientist named "Sergey Byuhonenko". Sergey is recognized for the lung-heart machine featured in the film, and his work towards the first Soviet open heart surgery in 1957.


People have said that the film itself, is a re-enactment of the original experiments actually conducted in the late 1930s, although the actual experiments were well-documented and are probably real. (These are the Soviet's we're talking about.) 


Now, this "film" can be found below, if you wish to not sleep for the next few days; Feel free to watch it.


The film is in black and white, and there is relatively no "blood gore".  Although, there are severed hearts, lungs, and heads in this film. The actual  inflating and deflating of the lungs is extremely uncomfortable to watch, I suggest skipping that scene or simply take my word for word on what happens in the film.



For a fitting conclusion, here's a KGB joke I found on the internet.

An archaeologist finds a mummy in Egypt. An international debate starts over how old it could be... Nobody knows, so the mummy is brought to various countries for analysis by different experts...It is brought to the USA first, the US specialists say, it is 3.000 years old.Then, the Japanese, precise as usually, find that it is 2.953 years old. The Russians come with the final result: "The mummy is 2.953 years, 5 months, 2 weeks and 4 days old". Journalists curiously ask how they found this out, the Russians reply: "The mummy was taken to the KGB and he confessed under torture" -  www.coldwarjokes.com