Oh, yes. The Nazi doctors did all sorts of experimental studies on starving to death, how long it takes to die of cold and exposure, and so forth, using human guinea pigs.
They might put naked prisoners into cold water or cold rooms, and time how long it took them to die, for instance.
It does raise some interesting ethical issues. Is it legitimate to consult Nazi studies of death from exposure when the participants were, in effect, murdered? Obviously it was not legitimate to kill people in order to make these medical discoveries, but since the killing has already been done and cannot be undone, is it legitimate to make use of the test results?
My personal response is, no. It's not legitimate. It may seem wasteful to throw careful medical research away, but careful researched based on murder simply shouldn't be used in any way, IMHO.
I understand, but the research I am referring to was done by Jewish doctors in the Warsaw Ghetto, by observing the starving Jews around them and in their hospital. Very different.
Disagree.
If the results of research performed in unethical, even murderous, ways can be used to prevent or treat future human suffering, I think it is entirely legitimate to use it. Surely those who died would prefer that their suffering not be entirely in vain.
The story of the Bible is largely one of eventual good coming from temporary evil.
What better way to honor the victims of that evil than to use their deaths to save the lives of others? Simply throwing out the research would be worse, in my mind, because the people who were tortured and killed would have died for nothing.
But that's just me.