Nazi Data and the Rights of Jews

Extract

Scientists are sometimes tempted to use data collected by Nazi researchers in the infamous death camps. Recently, scientists interested in hypothermia have attempted to use data from extensive studies on the effects of cold that took place in 1942 at the Dachau concentration camp. About 300 persons, mostly Jews, were placed in near-freezing water for varied periods of time, and then warmed by different techniques. About one third of the victims died. Should scientists use this data on what happens to people when they get cold, and how they can be warmed? Some German and Canadian scientists already have. By contrast, the United States Environmental Protection Agency recently refused to republish Nazi data on the toxic gas phosgene.

Ethicists have not found common ground for agreement on the question of using morally tainted data. Philosopher Arthur L. Caplan, a bioethicist at the University of Minnesota, argues that the Nazi data can be used so long as the purpose is an important one, and the data is presented with a clear moral denunciation of how it was obtained. The moral repugnance of the data source might be overruled, suggests Caplan, by the possibility of saving lives. On the other hand, Jay Katz of Yale University Law School disagrees with Caplan's position. The data, argues Katz, should be condemned to oblivion and never used by science, although the descriptions of the experiments can be republished as a reminder of the Nazi horror.