World as Laboratory: Experiments with Mice, Mazes, and Men

by Rebecca Lemov

Deeply researched, World as Laboratory tells a secret history that’s not really a secret. The fruits of human engineering are all around advertising, polls, focus groups, the ubiquitous habit of “spin” practiced by marketers and politicians. What Rebecca Lemov cleverly traces for the first time is how the absurd, the practical, and the dangerous experiments of the human engineers of the first half of the twentieth century left their laboratories to become our day-to-day reality.

Genres: History, Psychology, Science, Nonfiction, Politics, History Of Science

304 pages, Paperback

First published November 29, 2005

Reviews

[Christina]

What can I say about the equivalent of eating sandpaper? Dry, dry, dry. Lots of information to digest, but in the end what am I supposed to do with it? I prefer Rutger Bregman’s Humankind: A Hopeful History, to this book. Bergman gave me some hope and all that we learned about human nature is not really true, humans are mostly decent. The author in this book ultimately sides with the scientists? I’m a big fan of skepticism but some people may see conspiracies in her writing that aren’t really there. She’s putting all this information out there to confirm your own bias. And then she ends with a wink and a nod. Hmmm

[Paul]

Interesting. But there is a lot to wade through here and it did feel a bit heavy going by the end.

[Matias Andrade]

Good foundation, but doesn't go into the most interesting (and unseemly) aspects of behaviorism.

[Frank Spencer]

There's lots of interesting information here - besides the usual studies such as Milgram, Leary, and Watson, you'll learn about Clark Hull's attempt to quantify everything, Mowrer's varied methods of helping people, the use of social science in the Pacific in WWII, and various CIA related studies.

[Kris Saknussemm]

Very satisfying survey of some of the more baffling moments in behavioral science...and what the CIA termed "Sensitive Research Programs."